Sony Cyber-shot DSC-H9

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http://reviews.cnet.co.uk/digitalcameras/0,39030233,49291182,00.htm

Reviewed 28 June 2007

Reviewed by Lori Grunin

Sony changed quite a few details, inside and out, between last year's DSC-H5 and its latest megazooms, the £310 Cyber-shot DSC-H9 and £250 DSC-H7. An f/2.7-4.5, 31mm-465mm, 15x zoom supersedes the 12x on last year's, and the resolution kicks up a notch from 7 to 8 megapixels. Say goodbye to AA batteries and hello to a proprietary lithium ion.

Two features differentiate the H9 and H7: the H9 retains the same excellent 76mm (3-inch) flip-up LCD as the H5, while the H7 uses a fixed 64mm (2.5-inch) version, and the H9 includes Sony's NightShot infrared mode. They are otherwise identical, and we expect the same performance and photo quality. We tested the H9.

Design
The plastic body feels rather cheap, and the grip -- slightly larger than the H5's -- could use more of a rubbery texture. Sony also 'improves' upon the simple four-way-plus-set navigation controls of the H5 by adding a scroll wheel and the now-Sony-standard Home and Menu buttons.

We love the scroll wheel, but it takes a little while to get used to the operation for adjusting shooting settings. You toggle between changing the particular setting and changing the settings values with the OK/Set button; the changeable option turns yellow. In theory, it's all very logical. But in the heat of the shoot, it requires a little too much thinking. Still, it makes sense, so it shouldn't take long to adapt.

After using several Sonys, we're still not thrilled with the Home button. When you press it, the first item it shows you is Shooting; but when you select that, it displays the current mode dial setting and tells you to use the Menu button to change the current settings. In other words, telling you that you've pressed the wrong button. If it's that confusing, perhaps it needs some restructuring.

On the other hand, you have to scroll over four categories and down a level to get to settings such as AF illuminator and AF mode, then down another level to change the flash-sync mode. (Especially since you can get to these more easily via the Menu button.) True, these aren't settings you want to change frequently, but why bury them quite so deeply and keep the useless info close to the surface?

Features
The H7 and H9 offer a typical set of manual, semi-manual and automatic exposure options, including scene modes for high ISO, portrait, twilight portrait, landscape, twilight, beach, snow and fireworks. (Inexplicably, on the H7, the metering and bracketing/continuous shooting must be changed via the LCD, while on the H9, they have dedicated buttons.)

There are also newfangled choices such as Face Detection, Advanced Sports Shooting and NightShot infrared mode. Face Detection only operates within full automatic mode, and you have no control over which faces it sees or selects. The Advanced sports mode sets the camera to a fast shutter speed and uses a continuous autofocus.

Performance
If you don't count the slog through the menus, the H9 -- and by extension, H7 -- delivers good speed for its class. Based on our test results, it wakes up and shoots in a reasonable 2.1 seconds, with a shutter lag of 0.6 and 1.3 seconds in bright and dim light, respectively. It can shoot consecutive single images 1.4 seconds apart, growing to a modest 2.9 seconds with flash enabled.

Continuous shooting is fixed at about 2 frames per second (fps), regardless of image size, and can run for about 18 shots before it starts to slow. We were slightly disappointed by the surprisingly small electronic viewfinder. Sony's Super SteadyShot optical image stabilisation, as ever, works very well.

Shooting speed (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Typical shot-to-shot time

Time to first shot

Shutter lag (dim)

Shutter lag (typical)

Canon PowerShot S5 IS

1.6

1.3

0.8

0.5

Sony Cyber-shot DSC-H9

1.4

2.1

1.3

0.6

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ8

1.8

2.7

1.3

0.6

Image quality
Under the right circumstances, the photos look very good. Those include shooting at sensitivity settings of ISO 200 or lower, in bright sunlight. Thanks to the fast continuous shooting, solid stabilisation and reliable centre-point focus, the H9 delivered the best results we've had so far taking photos of dogs in the park. The EVF updates quickly enough to make it possible. The automatic white balance does a solid job, if rather cool, and colours look bright and saturated.

As with other megazoom lenses, however, Sony's displays some distortion and chromatic aberration (edge discolouration) on the sides of the photo, as well as purple fringing on high-contrast edges. In general, the Canon PowerShot S5 IS exhibits better sharpness both in the centre and from side-to-side. As for shots at medium-to-high sensitivities, we suggest you avoid them. Despite boasting support for up to ISO 3,200, The jump between ISO 200 and ISO 400 reveals serious detail loss and notable increase in artefacts. Though it produces better noise measurements than the S5 at the higher ISO settings, the Sony has more apparent image degradation.

For movie capture, Sony makes a slightly better trade-off than most between file size and movie quality. Though they're not quite as sharp, its 30fps VGA MPEG movies require about 1.3MB per second of storage -- far less than the Canon's 2MB per second M-JPEG recordings. One disappointment here is the tiny microphone, which records muted audio.

Conclusion
If you shoot primarily outdoors in daytime -- especially sport, children and animals -- and don't find the interface quite as annoying as we do, the H9 is a great choice. The approximately £60 difference between the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-H7 and DSC-H9 makes your choice simple: if you can forgo the infrared and the flexible LCD, then buy the cheaper model.

Additional editing by Nick Hide