Cybershot T1000:Cybershot T100, the mini review

A few weeks ago, our Intergalactic Space Pig (Daimaou) was offering a short HD video on the launch of a new range of Sony compact digital cameras. Among the models presented, the T100 particularly received our full attention. But while Daimaou was detailing every single model, this deceitful pig totally overlooked the T100! So to right this wrong, I, L1G, faithful Akihabara News reader, have decided to write a mini review on this superb camera, with Daimaou’s blessings. Hopefully, this will lessen the insult our dear Green Piggy did to this camera by leaving it aside in his video.

The first thing we can notice is the screen. Measuring 3", this screen is simply superb. The brightness is so excellent, even by bright daylight, that the visor is really optional. Handling is quite easy and the metallic casing feels nice in the hand. It gives a good impression of robustness (Daimaou must have had prototypes in his dirty hands). It’s also quite dense and weights a good 200g with card and battery, even though its measurements are those of a compact camera.

Zooming is quite good as well. There’s nothing to say about the quality of the 5x telescopic optical zoom (nothing comes out of the camera), which makes it easy to take the camera in an out quickly. I’ve included a few photos to show you the quality of the 10x digital zoom (still at 8Mpix), which is just slightly lower than the quality of a real 10x optical zoom.

Photos a great! The automatic face detection works really well and the automatic mode is really impressive. Just press on the button to take a photo, and the results are good! For proof, the photos I took of the 2 hostesses at an event in Geneva last week-end.

If the automatic mode does not give you full satisfaction in a difficult shooting situation, you can choose between many different scene modes. I didn’t have to use them but still tested them. Nice results! We can clearly see the difference between modes but I was not able to use them in their real situation, so the real quality remains to be seen.

For the rest, there’s the musical slideshow function. There’s a choice between 4 different tunes; each one being associated to specific transition effects (simple, nostalgic, elegant, dynamic), but nothing prevents you from using one particular tune with another transition effect. We are able to choose our own music with the software provided, but the new tunes are limited to 3mn and can only replace existing ones.
The battery lasts for about 380 photos, but you need 5 hours and a half to completely recharge it! I’d advice you to take the battery out between photo sessions as the standby mode seems to require lots of power.
Let’s finish by the Memory Stick Pro Duo, that you can bring up to 8GB for now. The camera already supports 32GB Memory Sticks, that will be available in 3 years... most likely we'll have replaced the camera by a newer model, the T1000 for example. Just by the name, that should be a killer camera…

Here are 2 ZIP files (9MB each) containing tests photos.

File 1, 9MB
File 2, 9MB

L1G for Daimaou