Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-S650 Digital Camera

For the last year and a half, I have been annoying everyone who knows me by snapping pictures of every random event possible. I have over 10,000 pictures in a folder on my computer. All of those were taken on my Sony Cyber-shot 5.1 megapixel DCS-W1. That was the best camera I have ever owned.

But alas, a bad decision on my part led to its' demise. My 16 year old skater son asked to borrow it while he and some friends skated in a farm shop. He made 14 videos, some of which are now on youtube. The final video is pretty good actually, my son was riding his skateboard while filming. The final second of the video shows the picture going forward, and then sideways and down. The guy at the camera repair shop quoted me $200 to fix, which was more than I paid for it in the first place.

With my sisters wedding the following night, I had to have a camera. So, off to Wal-Mart I went. I found this Cyber-shot DSC-S650 on sale for $89 and was ecstatic! Having been very happy with my previous Cyber-shot, I snatched this one up without hesitation. I rushed home and quickly skimmed the owners manual, set the camera up, and took a few test shots.

It takes wonderful pictures in daylight conditions. My daughter even took pictures of clouds, geese, and other cars while we were driving down the highway. It took excellent pictures of oncoming traffic, and geese in flight, without the 'drag' in the photos my old camera took.

At the church, my husband attempted to take photos for me. The church was candlelight only, and this camera took horrible pictures in those low-light conditions. With my previous camera, I took photos in the same church at a candle light Christmas Eve service, and they were gorgeous. I thought perhaps it was user error, so I did photos at the reception myself. Unfortunately, I had the same results on all settings. There just is not a setting on this camera that will take decent low light pictures at a distance of over 3 feet. It did great at under 36 inches from the subject.



Technical Details
Sensor type: 1/2.5-inch CCD
Effective pixels: 7.1 million
Maximum resolution: 3072 x 2304
Image ratio: 4:3, 3:2, 16:9
ISO rating: Auto, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1000
White balance override: 5 positions
Aperture range: f2.8 - f4.8
Shutter speed: 1 - 1/2000 seconds
Built-in flash : Yes
Flash modes: Auto, Red-Eye reduction, On, Off, Slow Sync
Optical zoom : 3x
Digital zoom : Yes
Image stabilization: No
Auto focus: Yes
Manual focus: No
Auto focus type: TTL
Focus range: 35cm - 5cm
Exposure compensation: -2 to +2 EV in 1/3 EV Steps
Metering: Multi-Segment, Spot
Movie clips: Yes, 320 x 240 at 30 fps
Self timer: 10 seconds
Storage types: Memory Stick Duo / Pro Duo + Internal (adapter needed to use memory stick in card readers on computers or kiosks, but was included with my memory stick)
Storage included: 24 MB
Compressed format: JPEG (EXIF 2.2)
Quality levels: Fine, Standard
Viewfinder: Optical
2 inch LCD display
LCD pixels: 115000
Video out: Yes
USB: Yes
Firewire: No
Battery type: AA batteries (2)
Dimensions: 3.6 x 2.4 x 1.1 inches
Weight: 6.3 ounces


I purchased, separately, a 1GB Pro Duo memory stick. I still have not figured out how to change settings to where I can fit more images on the memory stick. I did finally figure out how to resize images while still on the memory stick, but it is a pain to have to resize every picture individually.

My old camera was much simpler in that it had a setting on the selector dial that allowed me to review pictures and access the menu. The menu is set up differently on this camera, and is harder to navigate. Guess I need to dig out the owners manual. This camera is also slower to respond when attempting to zoom, and has a longer shutter lag.

Overall, I do like this camera. I guess maybe I will learn to love it once I've really 'learned' it. After all, I've only had it a week now. I still need to play around with it and discover all of its' quirks. I think maybe this camera knows how my younger siblings feel when being compared to big sis :)