Sony megazoom resolution rises, price falls
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-H50
(Credit: Sony Electronics)
Though it can't match the stalker creds of Olympus' SP-570 UZ, Sony's latest top-of-the-line megazoom has its own attractions. Like the recently announced H10, the H50 offers a modest update over its predecessor.
Though Sony increases its resolution to 9.1-megapixels, it incorporates the same f/2.7-4.5 31mm-465mm-equivalent 15x zoom lens (naturally with Sony's Super SteadyShot optical image stabilization system). That 31mm wide-angle remains a bit narrow compared with Olympus' 26mm and the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ18's 28mm. On the upside, it also retains the tilting 3-inch LCD.
As with the newly announced W300, the H50 introduces user-selectable noise reduction and a host of other trademark Sony in-camera features made possible by updated image-processing firmware, such as smile shutter, child-priority face detection and autoexposure adjusting D-Range Optimizer.
When it ships in the beginning of May, the Cyber-shot DSC-H50 will be replacing the H9 at the more popular $399 price point of the H7.
On Sale Now: $599.99
View the latest prices for Sony Cyber-shot DSC-H50 (Black)
Senior Editor Lori Grunin has been covering digital imaging for two decades, but her memory's kind of sketchy on the details. You can hear about it every week on Indecent Exposure, the podcast she co-hosts with Matt Fitzgerald. 
