Sony A100 dSLR Digital Camera Daytime Tests

We test the Sony A100 for image noise and for the effectiveness of its image stabilization system.

The A100 digital SLR camera from Sony is the first from them since the purchase of the intellectual property from Konica-Minolta, and is their first ever SLR. It has a nice range of features, which have been well covered on other sites.

Here we concentrate on testing two characteristics: daytime image noise and the effectiveness of the in-camera camera shake system.

All the images shown here are minimal compression JPEGs of a 100% crop from the center of the RAW image with no adjustments made.

Image Noise

100ISO


200ISO

400ISO

800ISO


1600ISO

As you can see, image noise is very low from 100ISO to 400ISO, pretty good at 800ISO and very noticable at 1600ISO.

Note that the RAW files for these noise tests of the Sony A100 dSLR Digital Camera are available for download from the web site.

Anti-Shake Technology

To test this we did a simple test. We focused on some flowers outside the house at a focal length of 70mm (105mm in 35mm-equivalent terms) and show at 200ISO and varying shutter speed.

1/125 second

1/60 second

1/30 second

With anti-shake turned off

With anti-shaked turned on

1/15 second

With anti-shake turned off

With anti-shake turned on

1/8 second

With anti-shake turned off

With anti-shake turned on

1/4 second

With anti-shake turned off

With anti-shake turned on

Now to discuss these results. Firstly I do have a pretty steady hand, so the results with the anti-shake technology (called Super SteadyShot by Sony) turned off are pretty good. This is also partly due to the good grip this camera afforded.

You will notice that a huge about of shake slipped in at 1/8th of a second. Since nothing else changed I think this was the point where the camera’s mirror slap caused a noticable effect. Many cameras show pronounced vibration due to the shutter at a particular shutter speed or group of them. However the steadyshot nicely fixed this. Even at 1/4 of a second, an extreme hand-held shutter speed at a focal length of 105mm (35mm effective), the Super SteadyShot did a good job of keeping the image sharp. So we are very impressed with this technology.

See the following article for nighttime image noise tests with the Sony A100 digital camera.