Pages

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Nikon Coolpix P500, the P100 successor

As expected, Nikon released the successor to the P100 that was released in 2010, the Nikon CoolPix P500.

Here's the official ad:



At first, I was a little enthusiastic about it, and also felt a bit bad that it would render my P100 obsolete, until I came to the conclusion that it's not better by much.
If they would be released by number versions, and P100 would be 1.0, Nikon P500 would be 1.5 to give you an idea.

There are some updates here and there, the most noticeable being the 36x zoom( P100 has 26). Essentially the new camera is able to take wider shots and better telephoto, but the difference is not massive. I also noticed that the new zoom lens only push out a single cylinder, as opposed to 2 in P100.

When I saw the the step up to 12 Mp, I initially thought they included a bigger sensor for better quality images and better light sensitivity in darker conditions. I was disappointed to find out that it still uses a 1/2.3-inches sensor.
I also see a new addition near the lens, a seconds zoom control for fine zooming. It can be modified to adjust the focus too, and seeing the official ad video I suspect that it will now be possible to adjust the focus during video capture, which is really great.

And the third greater update is the new LCD screen,with basically doubled resolution (921k pixels)


Still no hotshoe. Still no microphone input. Same maximum 240fps in HS. And I wonder how the picture quality will justify the 12mp considering the same sensor size...

Oh well, we'll see. I can't wait for a review. I will post it here as soon as I see one.

2 comments:

  1. hello my language is Spanish, so excuse me any error, I need to decide for nikon p100 or p500, it's those small differences that have made it to the p500, then tell me which is better, thanks
    yuniorgarciadiaz@yahoo.es

    ReplyDelete
  2. I am sorry I observed your comment almost a month later.

    Well, it's simple. If you want optic quality you should choose P100(I don't know if 'quality' is the good term here, but the P100 lens have better specs than the P500). Also, P100 has a greater exposure range (8s-1\2000s compared to 8s-1500s of P500).

    If you want more user friendliness you can opt for Nikon P500. There aren't major improvements other than some added retouch functionality and the better resolution screen(but hey, you're going to watch the photos on your computer, right?).

    Have a nice day!

    ReplyDelete