This is a great camera, classed as a "prosumer" it falls between a full on digital SLR and a consumer digital snapper.
It's ideal for someone who wants to move on from their first digital camera to something that gives more control over the end picture.
Sensor The 5 mega pixel sensor is good for high quality A4 prints. The sensor also has an "anti shake" feature that really does work and I found gives you effectively one more stop.
Lens The good quality 7x optical 28 - 200 mm (35mm equivalent) zoom lens allows the camera to be used for most type of work from indoors to sports activity. The only lens drawback I noticed was that its macro capability is somewhat restricted.
Battery The battery last for ages, I never managed to run it down between charges.
Exposure control I found the camera to have good accurate white balance and with a shutter speed of 30 seconds to 1/16,000th of a second, well capable of almost any kind of shot.
Speed Start up time is quite quick but there is a significant lag between pressing the shutter button and the picture being taken. Just enough for you to lose that expression or moment of action that you'd been waiting for. It seems that the only way of overcoming this is to upgrade to a £1,000+ digital SLR.
Noise I wouldn't recommend this camera be set at much more than 400 ASA as noise becomes apparent.
Viewfinder The Electronic Viewfinder is limited to only 235,000 which makes for difficult fine focus control
The A1 will work in RAW mode and its results although slow to record are of a very high quality.
Overall it's a great camera and a good next step from your first digital experience.
I did have a few lockup problems when the camera froze up, this was recified by downloading the latest firmware revision fro the Minolta website
Hope this helps you
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
I found your review very interesting. It sounds like a good camera if you want to become that bit more professional with a digital camera. The only thing stopping me from rating this very helpful is that you haven't put a price. If you put one it would definitely be extremely useful. Esther x.
nigeofnewbury 23.07.2005 13:47
I prefer a "POINT & SHOOT" camera myself - nice review.
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Advantages: 5 megapixels, x7 optical zoom, RAW file format, 28-200 mm lens Disadvantages: noise increases at slower shutter speeds, but I find this acceptable for what you pay for
astro81 10.01.2004 ·
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: somewhat helpful
Review of Minolta DiMAGE A1
Advantages: 5 megapixels, x7 optical zoom, RAW file format, 28-200 mm lens Disadvantages: noise increases at slower shutter speeds, but I find this acceptable for what you pay for
astro81 10.01.2004 ·
Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: somewhat helpful
Review of Minolta DiMAGE A1
Advantages: Very good photo quality, 8 Megapixel resolution, Amazing low light focusing abilities, Full manual controls Disadvantages: Can't save favorite settings to mode dial like other cameras, No memory card included, Can't save favorite settings to mode dial like other cameras
Jul 23rd, 2005
exceptional by (11%):
very helpful by (22%):
helpful by (67%):
