Sony Alpha 380 Review

The Sony Alpha 380 poses as the ideal candidate who wishes to purchase his first SLR. As such, its main strength lies in the presence of a LiveView mode (under the LCD, as in compact devices) particularly effective. Unlike competing solutions, in fact, the development is very reactive and shooting almost instantaneous.

The grip of the device has some problems. While we appreciate the lightness and the discretion of the housing, we regret certain choices of ergonomics. The grip is too small for a solid grip (unless you have very small hands ...) and some controls are poorly placed. The combination wheel / exposure correction, in particular, proved difficult to use. The left button of the directional pad is also placed too close to the monitor for comfortable use.

Fortunately, the number of buttons is kept to a minimum. The settings for shooting with the most frequent feature are in a dedicated command: Flash, ISO mode and shooting (single, continuous ...). Otherwise, the command Fn (function) provides access to secondary settings via the LCD screen: Fashion and autofocus, white balance, image filters (sunset, black & white, contrast / saturation ...), etc. . Its is one of the Latest Gadgets by Sony.

A tour of the menus reveals the same simplicity. Besides a successful facelift since the Sony Alpha 380, they contain only the bare minimum of parameters and the user is never lost in endless lists of options. The device also displays a brief explanation of most settings of this Tech Gadget.

The reactivity of the Sony Alpha 380 is very good: the development is fairly rapid and automatic reacts appropriately. The image stabilization is built directly into the camera, not into the optical as Canon and Nikon.

The device has a mini HDMI port for connection to a TV. It's a good idea ... except that the cable is not provided, and no analog output alternative is available.

The desire to simplify to the extreme shown by the Sony Alpha 380 is commendable, but careful to assess your needs. If you want an SLR for use primarily in automatic mode with LiveView, Sony Alpha 380 is an attractive option. But if you want to introduce yourself more fully to photography, then quickly Sony Alpha 380 shows its limitations. In this case, consider instead a Canon 500D or Nikon D5000 which, although slightly more expensive, include a video mode.

Price: This Gadget is it marketed to less than 600 Euro.