• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Home
  • About
    • Stephen Foskett
      • My Publications
        • Urban Forms in Suburbia: The Rise of the Edge City
      • Storage Magazine Columns
      • Whitepapers
      • Multimedia
      • Speaking Engagements
    • Services
    • Disclosures
  • Categories
    • Apple
    • Ask a Pack Rat
    • Computer History
    • Deals
    • Enterprise storage
    • Events
    • Personal
    • Photography
    • Terabyte home
    • Virtual Storage
  • Guides
    • The iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Guide
      • The iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Troubleshooting Guide
    • The iPad Exchange ActiveSync Guide
      • iPad Exchange ActiveSync Troubleshooting Guide
    • Toolbox
      • Power Over Ethernet Calculator
      • EMC Symmetrix WWN Calculator
      • EMC Symmetrix TimeFinder DOS Batch File
    • Linux Logical Volume Manager Walkthrough
  • Calendar

Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat

Understanding the accumulation of data

You are here: Home / Everything / Ask a Pack Rat / Why Buy a NEX-7? Why Sony NEX At All?

Why Buy a NEX-7? Why Sony NEX At All?

October 17, 2011 By Stephen 1 Comment

I got a great question via email this week. So good that it demanded a long, detailed answer worth sharing!

Your tweets about your NEX have intrigued me a bit…I get tired of lugging my Nikon D90 around with my kids, yet I find the quality of most point-and-shoot cameras terrible…so the NEX seems like an interesting compromise.

I’m trying to decide between the NEX-5N, Nikon 1 v1, and the NEX-7.  I’ve read all the reviews, and for the price, the NEX-5N seems like the obvious choice…with one potential fatal flaw: no viewfinder.  I’m often trying to get three kids to look at the camera, and waiting for that one nano-second where they are all looking and maybe smiling, or at least not making ugly faces….just can’t see doing that on the screen on the back.

What has been your experience?  Are you happy with composition on the LCD panel?  Any other thoughts on whether the NEX-7 is worth the significantly higher cost? Much obliged…

Great question!

The first part is simple: Compact System Cameras like the NEX and Nikon 1 are an amazing combination of image quality, flexibility, and portability. They’re nearly (but definitely not quite) as good as DSLR cameras. Why not as good? Well, there’s the lack of a viewfinder, the slow and imprecise contrast-based focusing, and the dearth of lenses. But they’re so much more portable (not to mention generally less expensive) it’s a compromise lots of folks are willing to make. And there’s just no comparison to a compact digital camera – it’s night and day with the big sensor and interchangeable lenses.

You should also read my Sony NEX-5 Camera Review and Hands-On Review: SLR Magic 35mm Sony NEX Lens

Owners of compact system cameras like the NEX, Nikon 1, and Micro Four-Thirds handle the lens issue with adapters. I’ve got a Minolta adapter for my old SR-mount lenses, and lots of folks use Nikon, Canon, and even exotics like Contax and Leica screw-mount. The main issue with these is that they’re not generally auto-focus capable (with some exceptions like the amazing Sony NEX LAEA1 and LAEA2 Alpha-mount adapter), they don’t have image stabilization (so you must use a tripod with your telephotos) and they add significant bulk to the camera. But real system lenses are coming along, and some are really quite good (the Panasonic pancake, Sony Zeiss 24, etc). And there are some awesome third-party lenses like my SLR Magic 35/1.7!

The Nikon 1 V1 is awfully expensive for such a small sensor and unproven lens system

These cameras are really awesome, but the next decision is why to go NEX rather than Micro Four Thirds or Nikon 1. I picked the NEX due to its larger APS-C sensor (twice the size of the MFT and three times larger than Nikon’s) and the promise of better optics that brings. In reality, it’s not much of an advantage. But Sony’s sensor development is setting the industry on fire (everyone is switching to them) and the 14 megapixel sensor in the NEX-C3 and NEX-5N is amazing! Then there’s the 24 megapixel sensor in the NEX-7 and initial reports are very enthusiastic! So the Sony is a great choice, even though the Panasonic, Olympus, and Nikon cameras are nice too.

The NEX-C3 is a good camera, and fairly inexpensive too. But the lenses cost the same (since they are the same) as on the NEX-5N and NEX-7, so the savings is quickly wiped away. The NEX-5N is really a better choice, thanks to a solid metal body and the possibility of a viewfinder (at $350 extra). The touchscreen control is kind of cool too, but it can’t mask that the NEX operating system is difficult to use quickly in the field.

I’ve become pretty good with the screen, really. I can focus quickly (now that I’ve gotten used to the “peaking” setting for my manual lenses) and have adjusted to shooting “from the chest”. The flip-up/down screen is actually pretty nifty in some situations. Sure it’s not a viewfinder, but it’s acceptable if not awesome. Although you can buy an accessory viewfinder for the NEX-5N, it’s kind of weird and definitely expensive.

The Sony NEX-7 adds just about everything I could want to the NEX system, including a viewfinder and better controls

So why spend twice as much on a NEX-7? It addresses every shortcoming and complaint I have about my NEX-5 as well as the current cameras. It has a well-received OLED viewfinder. It has a microphone input for movies and a Sony Alpha-standard flash shoe rather than the weird NEX flash mount. But most importantly it has the “Tri-Navi” control system that makes if super simple to adjust aperture, white balance, ISO, shutter speed, etc on the fly. Seriously, the NEX-7 controls look even better than those on real DSLRs, and that’s saying a LOT. It’s also got the 24 megapixel sensor, but I’m not all that excited about it really. I don’t need more pixels, I need a functional camera!

My suggestion is first to look at the NEX system as a whole. Do you want to buy into Sony’s compact system? Are you going to be happy with just half a dozen purpose-built lenses and a universe of non-AF/non-IS adapted lenses? The lens situation is the major drawback of this system, really. But the walk-around-ness is the saving grace. It’s astonishing to slip a NEX-5 into a jacket pocket for a family trip.

The Sony NEX-5N is a great all-around camera

Maybe consider buying a NEX-5N first to give the system a test drive. Get the 18-55 kit zoom and an SLR Magic 28 or 35 mm “fun lens”, as well as an adapter for your existing SLR lenses. See what you think. You can always sell it later and apply the resulting $400-$500 to an NEX-7 if you decide you like the system. That’s what I did!

You might also want to read these other posts...

  • Electric Car Over the Internet: My Experience Buying From…
  • Scam Alert: Fake DMCA Takedown for Link Insertion
  • How To Connect Everything From Everywhere with ZeroTier
  • What You See and What You Get When You Follow Me
  • Liberate Wi-Fi Smart Bulbs and Switches with Tasmota!

Filed Under: Ask a Pack Rat, Features, Personal, Photography, Terabyte home Tagged With: digital camera, Lens, NEX-5, NEX-5N, NEX-7, NEX-C3, Nikon, Panasonic, SLR Magic, Sony

Primary Sidebar

The movie never changes. It can’t change; but every time you see it, it seems different because you’re different. You see different things. – 12 Monkeys

Subscribe via Email

Subscribe via email and you will receive my latest blog posts in your inbox. No ads or spam, just the same great content you find on my site!
 New posts (daily)
 Where's Stephen? (weekly)

Download My Book


Download my free e-book:
Essential Enterprise Storage Concepts!

Recent Posts

How To Install ZeroTier on TrueNAS 12

February 3, 2022

Scam Alert: Fake DMCA Takedown for Link Insertion

January 24, 2022

How To Connect Everything From Everywhere with ZeroTier

January 14, 2022

Electric Car Over the Internet: My Experience Buying From Vroom

November 28, 2020

Powering Rabbits: The Mean Well LRS-350-12 Power Supply

October 18, 2020

Tortoise or Hare? Nvidia Jetson TK1

September 22, 2020

Running Rabbits: More About My Cloud NUCs

September 21, 2020

Introducing Rabbit: I Bought a Cloud!

September 10, 2020

Remove ROM To Use LSI SAS Cards in HPE Servers

August 23, 2020

Test Your Wi-Fi with iPerf for iOS

July 9, 2020

Symbolic Links

    Featured Posts

    Edward Snowden Is Right: We Must Protect The Internet

    March 19, 2014

    VMware’s Hardware Partner Strategy: Heads I Win, Tales You Lose

    February 11, 2013

    Virtualized and Distributed Storage: This Time For Sure!

    September 2, 2014

    Electric Car Over the Internet: My Experience Buying From Vroom

    November 28, 2020

    Debit or Credit? Always Choose Credit!

    December 19, 2013

    Donate Your Swag to School Kids In Need

    July 28, 2010

    The Rack Endgame: Converged Infrastructure and Disaggregation

    September 19, 2014

    My Core i7 Macintosh SE

    May 25, 2017

    How To Keep Your Family Activities In Sync With A Shared Google Calendar

    April 18, 2010

    Microsoft’s Overlooked Innovation

    February 15, 2010

    Footer

    Legalese

    Copyright © 2022 · Log in