Hey everyone, I'm John Sison and today we're taking a look at the Sony RX100 mark 5.
Now the RX100 series has been going on for quite a few years now and since then manufacturers
like Canon and Panasonic are trying to steal away that market share from Sony in the premium
compact camera space.
Now with the Sony RX100 mark 5, Sony have quite a few standout features to separate
itself from the rest of the crowd and I'll actually get into that within this video.
So stay tuned because I'm going to put it through its paces and at the end of the video,
I'll let you know what I personally think of it.
Like Sony's other RX100 cameras, it features the same design with a black finish and a
simple button layout.
On the rear of the camera, you have a 3 inch tilting LCD screen that can be used for different
angled shooting as well as taking selfies.
There's also a built in high resolution viewfinder for people who find it difficult to see the
LCD screen in bright situations but it would've been good if Sony changed the way it implemented
its viewfinder.
By this, I mean allowing it to pop up and being ready to look through like the RX1R
mark 2, rather than popping it up and awkwardly pulling it out.
On the top you've got a built in flash that you can also use to manually tilt back so
you can use it for bounce flash.
And also a mode dial and a rocker switch to zoom in and out which is also shared with
the shutter button.
On the side you have your NFC badge for one touch pairing and on the other side you have
a micro USB port for in camera charging and transferring and a mini HDMI port to view
your photos and videos on a HD TV.
On the bottom there is a tripod mount and a battery door which is also shared with a
memory card slot and finally on the front a control ring on the lens to adjust for different
settings and an AF illuminator to help the camera to focus in low light conditions.
The camera weighs about 299 grams and that's with the battery and memory card included
so its not going to be a burden when travelling around casually and it actually feels very
solid in the hand.
The only thing I would recommend is that you use the supplied wrist strap because there
is no grip on the camera and it can be a bit slippery.
Since there is a massive amount of features and settings that you can play around with,
it can be a bit overwhelming for some people but like always, I do recommend people play
around with the camera just so they can familiarise themselves with it.
Just a quick, you could always assign different features and settings in the quick function
button and to different buttons on the camera itself.
Now one of its headline features is of course its autofocusing speed and after playing around
with it for a couple of weeks, I have to say by far its one of the best focusing cameras
in the premium compact camera space.
So its going to be great for anything fast moving like sports, pets, kids and even wildlife.
Now what makes it so good to focus is that the camera has 315 phase detection autofocus
points and that's spread throughout the frame and Sony has also claimed that the camera
can focus as fast as 0.05 seconds.
While this video is not a scientific review where I can test that claim, I think its safe
to say that with the shots that I've been getting, its certainly impressive.
Not only is the autofocusing system impressive but the camera can shoot up to 24 frames per
second at full resolution which is extraordinarily fast and it can manage to shoot at this speed
for up to 150 shots.
And this is all thanks to an LSI processor that Sony implemented into the camera which
can manage massive amounts of data.
Now one of my most favourite things with the RX100 mark 4 was that you had slow motion
recording for a few seconds and that was up to 1000 frames per second.
And now with the RX100 mark 5, you can do that for twice as long so you can capture
more action in a single clip.
Among the new features, this camera has Wi-Fi, playmemories, dual recording, sweep panorama,
picture effects and a whole lot more.
The camera is still a bit slow to start up to take a photo taking about two seconds and
it takes about a second and a half to shut down.
On a casual day of taking photos, I managed to take about 300 shots on a full charge so
if you're travelling around, you may want to bring a spare battery or two.
The Carl Zeiss 24-70mm definitely delivers, offering sharp images and thanks to its F1.8
aperture, very nice and smooth out of focus blur.
For a compact camera, I would say this is one of the best ones to get but it doesn't
really offer a lot more in terms of quality from its predecessor which isn't necessarily
a bad thing.
I just wished that Sony offered something different now in terms of lens focal length
or aperture since its competitors are catching up.
In terms of low light performance, I would say the camera does very well up to ISO 6400
and I would leave ISO 12800 as a last resort.
Now I love the video quality you get out of such a small camera.
You have a variety of frame rates and codecs to choose from.
The autofocusing speed is very quick which is great and just doing a quick shot of my
dog and her yellow toy behind her, it shows that the camera doesn't seem to struggle at
all.
It can shoot in 4K video but don't expect it to last too long since the camera will
overheat.
Although, I did manage to get a solid six minutes of video before it shut down.
There is no mic input unfortunately so you can't attach external microphones but on the
plus side the stabilisation works very well so whether you're walking or taking a video
zoomed all the way in, you can still get some really stabilised footage.
Now the RX100 mark 5 definitely delivers in terms of autofocusing speed and its speed
that Sony has really focused on with this camera.
However, it is a shame to see things like startup time not really improving since its
predecessor.
Now in terms of features, there are so many things that you can do with this camera and
while that's a good thing, it can also be a bad thing because it always take time to
setup a shot and you always have to dive into the menu even if its customised.
It still takes a bit of time to do that.
And while I think its great that Sony have improved things like video performance and
continuous shooting, I feel like Sony should have focused on things like usability, like
perhaps implementing a touchscreen just like the Canon G7X mark 2 and the Panasonic LX10.
Now they've also been using the 24-70mm Carl Zeiss lens for a very long time and I feel
like its time for Sony to either use a faster lens or maybe use a wider or longer telephoto
lens in the cameras.
Now if you have an RX100 mark 3 or a mark 4, I don't really thing its worth the upgrade
to the mark 5 unless you really need the increased video performance and autofocusing speed.
However if you're just looking at the RX100 series now, I think the RX100 mark 3 is definitely
good value for money, especially for what it offers and the design of the camera but
if you want the latest and greatest tech from Sony, I don't think you would be disappointed
with the RX100 mark 5.
Now if you have any questions, please feel free to leave a comment below and if you already
own one, let me know what you think of it and remember to like this video and subscribe
to my channel for more Sony camera reviews and tutorials and you can also follow me on
Facebook and Instagram for more sample photos and photo updates.
Now until then, happy shooting and thanks for watching!