Hi, I'm Yogi from Indonesia and interesting to buy SONY DIGITAL CAMERA. Which one is the best, SONY MAVICA 500 OR SONY DSC-717. I also need to know where to buy in singapore with the cheapest price. pls. inform me. tks.

-- yogi tantra (yogitan@mailcity.com), May 18, 2003

Answers

Hi,

if technical specifications doesn't matter much to you, the storage media might help with your decision. the MAVICA 500 saves its pictures into small CD-Rs and CD-RWs, which after being finalized, can immediately be read from any computer's cd-rom. this can prove to be both a convenience and a nuisance, the latter being if you are using a CD-R (non-rewritable), once you finalised the CD-R you cannot use the same CD-R to save photos, and have to use a new CD-R. This is a minor problem, as MAVICA is very compatible with CD-RWs, and as such using CD-RWs would eliminate this problem.

the CYBERSHOT DSC-717 uses MagicGate, so it's less convenient to share the photos unless the computer that you want to access the memory card with has a MagicGate reader. what is good about having / starting a memory card system is that you now also have a high- capacity (depending on your memory card) storage device.

technically the CYBERSHOT feels more like an SLR camera, having the zoom switch located at the long lens area instead of the thumb. ie: you operate the zoom with your left hand, just like a normal SLR camera. both offer pretty much the same CCD, size, and quality optical lens. you might what to try your luck at the PC SHOW 2003 coming early this JUNE. due to time constrain, i'm sorry i have to end here. feel free to post questions!

cheers and how's everyone?

-- Reeve (yahlar@yahoo.com), May 22, 2003.