Minolta DiMAGE 5

I purchased my Minolta Dimage 5 at Schiphol airport, Amsterdam, and having had about 6 weeks of use, and still not used all the features, although I think I am just about ready to write a review about the camera. Buying at Schiphol took over EUR 200 off the price – EUR 885 instead of EUR 1085 (shop price when I purchased it), although this soon went on two extra 96Mb memory cards.

I chose the camera because it had the feeling of an ...
...been the owner of a Minolta SLR for many years, and liked the look of this one more than the Fuji Finepix 6900, and it was slightly cheaper. Of course domestic Digital Cameras have not yet reached a standard where you can ditch your SLR for good, but for a keen user this will be perfectly adequate, although not really for professional use.

The 7x manual zoom was another thing which attracted me to this camera, with this being the equivalent ... more

I purchased my Minolta Dimage 5 at Schiphol airport, Amsterdam, and having had about 6 weeks of use, and still not used all the features, although I think I am just about ready to write a review about the camera. Buying at Schiphol took over EUR 200 off the price – EUR 885 instead of EUR 1085 (shop price when I purchased it), although this soon went on two extra 96Mb memory cards.

I chose the camera because it had the feeling of an SLR (Single Lens Reflex – if you don’t know what this means then, to put it very bluntly, the Dimage 5 won’t be the camera for you!), and I have been the owner of a Minolta SLR for many years, and liked the look of this one more than the Fuji Finepix 6900, and it was slightly cheaper. Of course domestic Digital Cameras have not yet reached a standard where you can ditch your SLR for good, but for a keen user this will be perfectly adequate, although not really for professional use.

The 7x manual zoom was another thing which attracted me to this camera, with this being the equivalent of a 35-250mm zoom lens. Whilst there are more powerful digital zooms around, the Digital zoom effectively will pixellate your pictures to achieve this. There is a macro feature and a macro lock (very useful if you are using the camera for close-ups).

The camera takes normal AA batteries, and there is a pack of 4 alkaline batteries supplied with the camera. However, using alkaline batteries will prove very expensive. Just playing around with the zoom lens and the display and taking six photos to see what it was like, whilst waiting for an onward flight used up the supplied set of alkaline batteries. Instead you should use High power rechargeable (NiMH) batteries, with Minolta recommending 1600 mAH capacity batteries or higher (I personally would use 1800 mAH batteries).

Taking mainly flash photos I usually get about 60-70 shots out of a set – so I always take two fully charged sets with me. I was a bit aggrieved at having to shell out for a charger and batteries – four batteries cost about EUR 18 a set, although ultimately, the fact that you can use a separate charger and also can using ordinary rechargeable batteries rather than proprietary ones made especially for the camera means the outlay is not as bad as it could otherwise be. The batteries are loaded into the back of the camera beneath the LCD display, and the battery chamber is locked/unlocked using a lever (it is not easy to accidentally flick this open).

The camera uses Compact Flash memory, with a 16Mb card being supplied with the standard, however it should be noted that you will almost definitely need to upgrade the memory cards, as using the camera at its maximum resolution (2048 x 1584 or superfine), and highest output size, you will be struggling to get anything more than a single shot on the supplied memory card. I mainly use the camera in the 1600x1200 output resolution (fine resolution) – printing at 300dpi will give you an acceptable colour print around 6 inches x 4 inches in size – your standard print size, with a 96Mb memory card storing approximately 93 pictures in this resolution. This however is not a problem unique to the Dimage 5, being a common complaint of digital camera owners. Effectively the highest setting for resolution will also allow you to take 7” x5” prints at 300 dpi. The memory card is contained in an opening flap on the right end of the camera, along with the USB port. The positioning of the neck strap fasteners does get in the way slightly here, although doesn't really make more difference to the camera over all.

To get your pictures off your camera and on to your computer, the camera connects via USB, thus necessitating Windows 98 or later, and the camera is then recognised as a removable drive (it comes up as f: on my desktop computer) and you can drag and drop as you want in order to get the pictures off the memory card. Under Windows XP (I run this on my laptop) there is built in syncing software, which allows you to chuck all pictures across due to plug and play – great for when you are on the road. For users of Win98 it should be noted that you must use the desktop icon in the systray to shut down the camera, otherwise you can lose data by disconnecting the camera without doing so. The camera will also work with Mac OS 8.5 and later, and there are drivers supplied on the accompanying software CD.

The camera contains a built in flash, which is adequate for relatively close up work – beyond about 8-9 foot it fails to cut the mustard, although there is a hotshoe interface to allow you to connect an external flash to your camera. The flash is a manual pull-up flash, very simlar to a lot of the flashes found in-built in SLR cameras. As per an SLR there is a view through the eyepiece, which corresponds to the view through the lens, and there is an LCD monitor on the back of the camera too. You can either set the camera to use the eyepiece as viewfinder, the LCD display, or both (switching automatically).

You can of course view your photos, and delete those you don’t want, by hitting the Quickview/trash button once or twice respectively, and you are asked to confirm that you want to delete the picture before actually deleting it, so you won’t accidentally delete your shots. The info button allows you to see thumbnails of your prints (very useful when searching through the contents of the memory card) as well as colour distribution. The LCD display is fixed (unlike for example the one on the Canon G-1 or Canon G-2), although the eyepiece is moveable. There is a zoom function to allow you to check the detail of a shot, which is a toggle control, also on the back of the camera.

There is also a tripod mounting screw-hole and the camera fits any standard tripod shoe. Where traditionally you would find the film winding crank there is the mode selector, from which the following modes can be selected:

- Off
- Stills camera mode
- Playback mode (allows you to flick through the photos or movieclips that you have taken.
- Movie mode (see below for info on the camera’s capabilities in this mode)
- Setup mode (allows you to format the memory card, setup directory paths etc.)
- Transfer mode (for USB transfer to a computer)

The top display displays shutter speed, mode (e.g. White Balance, macro – explanation later), number of remaining exposures, size and quality settings as well as countless other settings. The settings can be changed for the manual focus mode (e.g. not just point and click!) using the selector on the left handside of the camera, where the following settings can be set:

- Size of output (from 640x480 up to 2048 x 1584 pixels)
- Quality (four settings and “RAW” mode)
- Motordrive (e.g. time delay photography, time lapse photography
- White balance (useful in artificial light e.g. strip lighting to ensure you don’t get dark yellowy/green prints)
- ISO (Film speed – 100-800 or Auto)

A second selector allows you to select colour, contrast and exposure variation (EV) whereby multiple images are taken at the same time and you can choose which one to keep – great when you only have one bite at the cherry to get the image you want.

The lens, which is a Minolta lens, and is like the case made of a magnesium alloy casing for lightness comes with a lens hood, so that you can avoid the problems that can beset you if shooting with the sun at a strange angle, and the lens hood has a screw thread to attach it to the lens – you will have to remove it to take shots as the zoom ring is covered by it when it is on. The lens also comes with a lens cap, and being threaded, you can use filters with the lens if you want to – any 49mm diameter screw thread filter can be used, and there are also adapters available if you want to use other diameter filters. There is also a focussing ring which you only need to use when in Manual Focus mode (selectable via a button on the left hand side of the camera body).

The software includes the USB software, although most OSes will automatically recognise the camera, as well as a RAW viewer (useful if you use the highest quality settings), although there is no other software of any substance (other digital cameras include Photoshop Elements etc.), although I personally was not fussed about the software, as I had Photoshop 6.0.1 and Fireworks 4.0.2 already.

The movie clip feature allows clips of up to 60 secs in duration, although cannot handle sound, although ultimately this is a feature I would not anticipate using a great deal. Saved movies can also be sent to the computer via the digital out (next to the mains adapter slot). Movies are at 320x240 resolution, so theoretically you could use this as a very expensive webcam! (Tongue very much in cheek there!) There is also a socket for a remote control (not supplied) and a mains power supply (also not supplied!).

The camera does everything that I require of it, and a lot more, although for your average home user, something like a Canon G-1, Canon Ixus or Fuji Finepix 6800 might be a better choice if all you want is a digital camera to go in your pocket to take holiday snaps. Whilst it is heavy in comparison with the Ixuses and other more “point and click” cameras, it does its job very well and is also more robust. Although an electronic zoom might seem a strange omission, I would actually say that it is a good thing, as battery life is not affected so much, and also there is more to go wrong with an electric zoom.

There is a learning curve to this camera, and indeed I still take about three times as many photos as I would with a normal film camera, but at least I can get rid of any photos I don’t think are good enough. There is a "Getting started" printed guide, which will get you out and snapping, but for the full manual you will have to open up the PDF manual supplied on the software CD - a bit annoying that they didn't include a paper copy really. Of course for the camera to offer all it does, the weight is going to be of course heavier than most cameras, however the camera is still easily carriable.

This camera is:

- For someone who wants an SLR feel to a digital camera
- Substantially more than just a point and click camera
- An excellent good middle to high range camera
- Substantially more extendable than most digital cameras

This camera is not:

- a professional digital camera (stick a zero on the price tag for one of those!)
- for your typical “holiday snaps” photographer
- a compact camera for taking out on nights out
- a digital video camera

PS The camera is easy to use if you have used as SLR but a big jump up from a point and click.

­Morgenhund 02.02 

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