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Sony Alpha 230, 330 and 380: dSLR leakski

Sony's Russian Web site has acidentally revealed details of the forthcoming Alpha 230, 330 and 380 dSLRs. We reveal those details to you, complete with lazy national stereotyping... comrade

Richard Trenholm Former Movie and TV Senior Editor
Richard Trenholm was CNET's film and TV editor, covering the big screen, small screen and streaming. A member of the Film Critic's Circle, he's covered technology and culture from London's tech scene to Europe's refugee camps to the Sundance film festival.
Expertise Films, TV, Movies, Television, Technology
Richard Trenholm
2 min read

Those crazy Russians. They've only gone and leaked details of three new Sony Alpha dSLR cameras: the 230, 330 and 14-megapixel 380.

Details of the new dSLRs briefly surfaced like the Red October on the Russian Sony site before disappearing again. Fortunately for us, photoclubalpha was on hand to capture and composite the various new features listed, albeit with a Google translation about as convincing as Sean Connery's Russian accent.

Sony Alpha

The A230 is a lightweight, entry-level model. The top-end A380 and middle child A330 boast flip-out screens. All three boast HDMI output to TVs, but do not appear to shoot video of any definition. Features shown include a new user interface, showing aperture and shutter speed on a sliding scale, pictured left.

The leaked pages mention APS-C format sensors, presumably for all three cameras. The sensors are protected by a dual dust-reduction system. Sony's Bionz sensor handles the thinking, while a dynamic range opimiser handles tricky, contrasty images to keep detail in both highlights and shadows.

Sony Alpha metering

Another feature is a smart teleconverter, which magnifies the image by 1.4x or 2x on the camera's screen, for more precise focusing. We also like the look of a 40-segment metering system, pictured right.

Finally, Sony has gone all green, pointing out that the cameras' shells are made using polycarbonate byproducts of CD-ROM manufacturing. Very reassuring. It also appears that one or all of the cameras supports two types of memory card. We've got our fingers crossed for SD cards, but we'll settle for CompactFlash, like the Alpha A300, alongside those pesky Sony Memory Sticks. Do svidaniya!