Sony Alpha 77 (SLT) vs Canon 5D Mark II (SLR) vs Sony Alpha 580 (SLR) – Raw High ISO Performance Comparison!!

Hey Jay,
Thank you so much for doing this comparison.
I guess the Sony A77 is the first camera to fail because it has to many megapixels.
The Canon is a great camera and excellent customer service something that at Sony if close to not existing firmware updates are so rear that user think is some typo error
About the A580 great camera but not good enough the images tend to be a little soft. and hopes for a firmware update are Zero.
for now I will Stick to my Sony A200 which never got a firmware update thank you sony and my new Canon T3i that should arrive today!!!

Thank you so much my Friend for this great Reviews and the tutorials at this site.

Have a great Day

Frank

Thanks for the review. It was obvious before reading that the FF Canon would win above ISO 1600.

If you haven’t tried the A580 before making the plunge to the t3i, you may be missing out. Not that it matters if you don’t go over ISO 1600. I think the A580 is one of the best overall bodies for its price range. I own it, and yes, I have gotten keepers at ISO 6400 printed to 11 X 14.

Canon makes great gear, but they have not innovated much in recent years. Try the new SLT’s or the Fuji mirrorless bodies. You might understand what I mean after you look through the EVF/hybrid viewfinder. Maybe they are leaving well enough alone? Anyhow, congrats on your new purchase.

Hi, I’ve read the review u posted and albeit thorough, I can’t help wondering why the A77 has to be compared against an FF camera that costs… more than double the price of the A77? the FF camera would obviously trump the 24mp apsc sensor that A77 sports…

Wouldn’t it be more fair for the A77 if it’s compared to other brands within its own class? (i.e. for canon, i believe it’s the 7D if not the 60D).

Thanks

The laziness of your dog is highly commendable!

I’m not a Sony user and own none of their cams. Your real world test showed that A77 is not as bad as DPR users say everyday, under every comparison post. as a Nikon user I hope to see this sony sensor in D300s replacement body

Just came across your site. I’m new to Sony from Canon where I used a 5D MkII for a few years with nice L glass etc but I thought the smaller cameras had reached a point where I could ditch the big heavy camera and go light.

So I sold everything and tried 4/3 first and a few others before settling on the 5N with the external EVF and a bunch of Contax G lenses and a few others for now. Very happy with the Contax G – so super sharp.

Anyhow back on topic – love the site but would like to see the comparisons directly rather than 3 pages of all ISO for each camera it would be great to see each ISO together so we can compare. Bit frustrating the way it is now to flip back and forward. Not to hammer your bandwidth but it would be awesome to download a RAW file of some of the files too eg 1600 ISO across all three cameras. BTW ISO 3200 is missing for two of the cameras?

Amazing to see the old girl still holds her own against the new cameras but as another poster points out the 5D is double to price and therefore should do better as does the D3s.

Thanks again for your work with the site I’ll be visiting alot I think Roll on the NEX-7!

Many thanks for the test. Yes Canon is better in extreme twilight. (0,1 % of my shoots)

However the many other points (viewfinder, weight, speed, AF videoquality, gps, price! etc.) outweight for my opinion the higher noise by far.

I moved from Canon (except for the little S100) to Sony and I like the Innovations and the longterm quality of Sony.

I think for the money I spend Sony A580 is the best

Jay,

I’m still split up between getting an A57 vs the A77. Aside from weather sealing, faster shooting, better auto focus in low light, GPS… what would sway you one way or the other? I’ve seen lots of forum posts on why the A57 really does take better shots due to the 16MP sensor, while others swear that the A77 doesn’t suffer at high ISO and low light because of the higher density sensor.

I want a camera to capture candid family pictures, my children’s school and theater events, my children while at fast play. I would say that there will be many indoor pictures with CFL lights and a few with dim light. I won’t be printing really large pictures, maybe <.5% will be almost letter sized(8×10), but most will be 4×6, 5×7 and 6×8. Will anything of the described types of shooting/printing justify an A77? I was really concerned that the A77 did capture more noise than the A57. Oh, and I will most likely capture RAW+JPEG, but will sporadically process the RAW captures(only when capturing a very special occasion).

Best Regards,
Luis