The Bottom Line: I recommend Sony DSC-H2 if you want a 6MP camera with good optics, 12x optical zoom and image stabilization that has a 2-inch screen and uses ...
dkozin's Full Review: Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-H2 Digital Camera
After using the 5- Megapixel Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-H1 and selling it due to several shortcomings, I was eager to see if the new 6-Megapixel Sony DSC-H2 is much better. The H2 competes with optically-stabilized mega-zoom cameras from Panasonic and Canon (as well as other Sony models) and has the same kind of major features (12x optical zoom and optical image stabilization).
The direct competitors of the H2 are Panasonic FZ7 and Canon S3 IS, both of which are quire impressive. I bought my Sony H2 for $360, which is $20 less than what I bought my H1 for some 10 months ago. The progress is good for consumers: you get more resolution and a couple of extra features for less money.
What Is Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-H2?
The successor to the 5.1-Megapixel Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-H1, the Sony CyberShot DSC-H2 is a 6-Megapixel digital camera with a 12x optical zoom (36-432 mm equivalent f/2.8-8.0 wide, f/3.7-8.0 tele), optical image stabilization, a 2-inch LCD screen, powered by 2 AA batteries. Two rechargeable NiMH AA batteries and charger are included.
The camera stores pictures on a proprietary Sony Memory Stick Duo or Memory Stick Duo Pro and features fast USB 2.0 Hi-Speed connection to PC and Mac computers. It has 32 MB of built-in memory to get you started.
The camera has advanced manual control options, including manual focus, manual exposure, exposure bracketing and macro mode. It comes with a lens hood and a filter adaptor.
The major difference with the H1 is slightly higher resolution, smaller LCD screen (2 inches vs. 2.5) and higher ISO modes.
Getting Started
The camera comes with two AA mAh NiMH batteries, charger, lens cap, lens filter adaptor, lens hood, strap, cables, software and manuals. In a typical Sony fashion, the charger is the kind that has a separate detachable power cord. The charger works in any country (110-240 V, 50-60 Hz) and you can get a different cord for different power outlets. Plus, unlike the chargers that plug directly into the wall AC outlet, this one will not block the adjacent outlets on the power strip.
The batteries charged pretty slowly. My patience ran out much faster. Once in awhile, when an electronic device does not behave as you wish, you have to teach it a valuable lesson. I pulled the batteries out before they had a chance to fully charge and put them into the camera.
The Camera
Just as the H1, the H2 itself is rather large, comparing to the Canon S3 IS and even more so in comparison to the Panasonic FZ7. Even without batteries it is subjectively much heavier (and much larger) than the FZ7, my favorite mega-zoom camera du jour.
The H2 looks like a SLR with a pronounced handgrip, an adjustment wheel in front part of the handgrip and a sturdy mode selector wheel on the top deck. It feels sturdy and generally well-made. The camera is mostly silver, unlike the all-black H1.
The lids for the memory card and batteries are at the bottom. The camera accepts Memory Stick or Memory Stick Pro cards. The bottom also has a tripod mount.
The back has a 2-inch LCD screen (which is for some reason smaller than the H1’s 2.5 inches), an electronic viewfinder (EVF) with diopter adjustment, buttons for menu control and other functions, zoom buttons that provide 2-speed zooming. The top deck has a mode selection wheel (Auto, Program, Shutter Priority, Aperture Priority, Manual, several scene modes, Review, Movie Mode), shutter release button, buttons for focus mode selection and burst/bracketing button.
The front of the handgrip has a slit, which houses a wheel that serves to adjust shooting parameters (e.g. aperture or shutter speed). The wheel can be clicked as well as rotated. I am not a big fan of this arrangement. The side of the camera has a rubber-like lid that covers the USB and A/V ports.
The controls have generally good tactile feel with only slightly too much effort required.
The camera has an on/off button on the top deck, which powers the camera on/off when depressed and held. Once powered, the camera extends its lens forward relatively fast and you are ready to shoot in about a two seconds after you turn the camera on. The shutdown takes about 2-2.5 seconds.
Make sure you removed the lens cap before turning the camera on in any of the shooting modes. But if you forget (which happened to me at least once), the camera will sense it and the LCD show you an error message that suggests that you should Remove Lens Cap. The lens cap is very sturdy and is attached to the camera well, unlike the flimsy lens cap of the Canon S3 IS and semi-sturdy lens cap of the FZ7.
Ease of Use
The H2 is very easy to use. I have not read the manual (I have not even opened it), but was able to use the camera and all its features in no time. The camera can be used by any member of the family and by photographers of all levels of expertise from novices to advanced ones (albeit it will not give you much control over the shutter speed or aperture).
The camera comes pre-set to Auto mode (green camera pictogram on the mode wheel). You do not have to do anything other than point and shoot - the camera takes care of the rest. The camera uses 5-area smart autofocus (in non-manual modes, you can also select spot autofocus, continuous autofocus, preset manual focus to 0.5m, 1m, 3m, 7m or infinity and even manual focus with fine control).
You press the shutter release button halfway to make camera focus (the camera shows you that it focused and beeps to confirm focus) and then you take the picture by pressing the shutter release button all the way.
You zoom in and out by using the zoom buttons on the rear of the camera. The camera has an electronic viewfinder (EVF) and a 2-inch LCD screen that is accurate, fluid (slightly less fluid in the dark) and works well in the sun.
If you want more control, you can select one of the scene modes (Portrait, Landscape, Show, etc.). For even more control, you can select Program mode, in which you can select ISO, white balance, exposure compensation, flash output adjustment, metering mode, sharpness adjustment, contrast adjustment, saturation adjustment, color and picture effects, etc.
And if you want even more control, you can switch to the Aperture or Shutter Priority or full Manual mode, where you get to control aperture and shutter speed directly. The parameters (shutter speed and aperture) are adjusted by clicking (pushing in) the adjustment wheel in the front part of the handgrip to select the item you want to adjust and then rotating it.
I find this method of setting adjustment less precise and slower than the use of buttons in the Panasonic FZ7. The wheel clicks when rotated (has detents), but it doesn't mean that every click changes the setting selected one step.
The flash mode can be selected by pushing the arrow up button on the rear panel, the macro mode can be selected by using the arrow right, the timer by arrow down and the exposure compensation can be engaged by arrow left. There is a separate button for review.
The flash pops up automatically if the selected flash mode requires it to. It pops up rather high and generally works well.
Performance
The 12x optical zoom is smooth and has two speeds of zooming, depending on how much effort you apply to the zoom buttons. The camera can zoom fully in about 2-3 seconds at full speed, which is not quite as fast as the Canon S3 but faster than the FZ7.
The camera has optical image stabilization called Super Steady Shot. You can select (using the setup menu) to have it engaged when the camera takes a picture only (default) or have it work continuously to eliminate shake when composing the shot as well. The second approach is more energy-consuming and I do not use it.
The image stabilization works well, letting me shoot handheld a couple of stops slower than I would normally dare using the 1/focal length rule. For example, at wide angle (36 mm equivalent focal length), I normally would have to shoot at a shutter speed faster than 1/36 s. And at full telephoto, it would have to be faster than 1/432 s. But I was able to use much slower speeds with no blur, including 1/100 s at telephoto.
The problem however is the fact that the camera is so heavy, I am not sure if the good results were caused by the efficient image stabilization or by the weight of the camera. But in any case, the bottom line is you can shoot handheld at higher zoom levels and in darker conditions than you would ever dare with a non-stabilized camera (e.g. Kodak EasyShare Z740).
Now the bad part. The camera is slower than competition in dark conditions and in burst mode. It has no problem focusing in under a second in bright daylight at both wide angle and telephoto. But indoors, even using its bright focus assist light, the camera struggled to focus. It occasionally took 2 seconds for it to obtain focus at wide angle and 4 seconds at full telephoto (12x optical zoom). This is slightly better than the H1, but not much improvement and is significantly slower than either the FZ7 or the S3.
Additionally, the H2 has a burst and bracketing modes that are a joke comparing to Canon S2 IS or Panasonic FZ5, which do about 4 fps. The Sony H2 does about 1.5 fps at best, which is 3 times slower than the FZ7. Although an improvement on the H1 (anything would be an improvement over the 0.7 fps) still, calling this a burst mode is a bit of a joke.
You can take pictures in normal mode at about one every 1.5 seconds or so. But the flash takes up to 12 seconds to recycle!
Fully charged batteries should last about for 300-400 photos, which is very good. But the tradeoff is slow performance.
Picture Quality
The camera has a Carl Zeiss 12x optical zoom (36-432 mm equivalent focal length) with f/2.8 maximum aperture at wide angle, f/3.7 at telephoto, which is rather good.
The camera lets you select the resolution for your images up to 6M. You also get a choice between Standard and Fine quality.
The built-in 32 MB memory can fit about 10 photos at the highest resolution and best quality. You will definitely need to get a memory card.
The camera produces very good, well-exposed, sharp, contrasty and richly-colored photos. The H2 has good auto white balance, aside from incandescent lighting. The photos are sharp throughout the frame. There is some chromatic aberration noticeable, especially at telephoto.
The camera lets you select automatic ISO or select ISO up to 1000. The image noise is slight up to ISO 100, gets more pronounced at ISO 200 gets worse at ISO 400 (and some fine detail get softer to diminish noise). Still, if you are printing 6x4 or 5x7 pictures, the noise should not be visible at all up to ISO 400 and will only be slightly visible at ISO 200 with larger prints. With 6-megapixel shots it produces, you can print your photos at up to 11x14 inches with good detail (ISO 100 and perhaps 200). The ISO 800 and 1000 are not really unusable, even for 6x4 prints.
Lens Hood and Adaptor
The camera comes with a lens filter adaptor and lens hood. They are rather sturdy and easy to attach. The lens hood is small an is not round. It seems to be less effective than the one that comes with my Panasonic FZ7. But Canon S2 IS comes with neither filter adaptor nor lens hood.
More on Features and Controls
The camera has a low-light focus assist illuminator that helps it focus in low light. It is very bright, but the camera still sometimes takes 2-4 seconds to focus in low light, even if the light reaches the area.
You can use the exposure compensation in the Program mode and it comes in handy in some situations. There are a bunch of scene modes as well, which help the camera tweak the focusing and exposure settings according to the type of scene.
The aperture is adjustable from f/2.8 to f/8 at wide angle and f/3.7 to f/8 at telephoto.
Camera Sounds
The camera itself is rather quiet in operation, even the zooming. You can customize the sounds it makes through its speaker and their volume.
Menu System
I have not read the manual, yet was able to use the camera in all modes. I like Sony's menus less than recent Canon menus or Panasonic ones. But they are certainly usable, it just takes more time to do the same thing with Sony menus than it does with Canon or Panasonic.
LCD
The H2 has a 2-inch non-articulated (fixed) LCD screen and an electronic viewfinder. Both the LCD and EVF coverage as about 100% - you can see exactly what will be recorded. The LCD is bright, fluid (unless it is dark), has good visibility in sunlight or darkness and decent, which helps you confirm the focus. Both the LCD and EVF can be set to Normal or High brightness.
Computer Connectivity
The camera uses USB 2.0 Hi-Speed connection to transfer pictures to a computer. You can also remove the Memory Stick memory card (if you use it) and use a memory card reader (if you have one).
I used the camera with the USB cable. I did not need to install any USB drivers on my Windows 2000 SP4 computer. The file transfer is was very fast at about 2,600 KB/s. Pretty fast. I have not used the software that was provided with the camera since I have Adobe Photoshop CS2.
Reservations
Just as I was unhappy with several aspects of the Sony H1, I am unhappy with them in the H2. If I never experienced Panasonic FZ7 or Canon S3 IS, I would be very happy. The Sony H2 is still a much better camera than likes of Kodak Z740. And it seems to be a good value if you look at its price, specifications and what it comes with.
Pricewise, the H2 slots in between Canon S3 IS and Panasonic FZ7. It uses only 2 AA batteries, unlike the S3 that needs 4 of them. The H2 includes charger and batteries, whereas Canon S3 IS does not. But Panasonic FZ7 includes a faster-charging compact battery.
The H2 also includes the lens filter adaptor and lens hood, which Canon does not include, but Panasonic does.
The major problem with the H2 is its speed. It is slow to focus in the dark, slow in burst and bracketing mode. And it is large and heavy, unlike the FZ7.
And I dislike the fact that the camera uses expensive (and Sony-exclusive) Memory Stick media. SD cards would be a much better choice for us, consumers. But Memory Stick is much better choice for Sony. That way they can make more money.
I have to admit that the camera is sturdy, has good image quality overall and is frugal with its batteries.
Bottom Line
I recommend Sony DSC-H2 if you want a 6MP camera with good optics, 12x optical zoom and image stabilization that has a 2-inch screen and uses 2 AA batteries and can deal with its size, weight and slow low-light focusing and flash recycling. But if you want a compact and fast alternative, check out Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ7 - my favorite mega-zoom du jour.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 360 This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Flexible Enough for Enthusiasts
6-megapixel CCD captures enough detail for photo-quality 14 x 19-inch prints 12x image-stabilized optical zoom; 2.0-inch LCD display High Sensitivity ...More at Amazon Marketplace
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