Sony, a major force in the compact camera market for years now, has come on strong in the SLR arena in the past two years. The company’s entry-level SLR, the Alpha A200,  demonstrates the company’s ability to deliver a lot of bang for very little buck. It lacks some of the bells and whistles of it’s higher-priced brand-mates, including the Live View capability in all other other Sony SLRs, but it does have image stabilization build right into the camera, which allows for very inexpensive add-on lenses. In fact, the 10.2-megapixel A200 is available today with an 18-70mm lens for $499.99 or with both a 18-70mm and 75-300mm for only $549.99, which is quite a deal.

The A200 looks much like any other SLR. It has a matte black body, with a rubberized large grip (in this case substantial enough for even the largest-pawed user). The quality of the body belies its low price. It has a nice heft in your hands, and feels as though it can take a bit of rough-housing if needed. The A200 measures 5.24 x 3.74 x 2.8 inches, and weighs 1 pound, 3 ounces.

Our one major problem with the camera’s body is the location of the Control Dial, which is placed just in front of the shutter button. It's on the top of the camera, rather than the front the way these things are usually arranged, and it barely pokes out of the camera body. It's a very inconvenient place to have this frequently used dial, as you need to take your finger off the shutter to change it. If you're trying to use the Program shift, which maintains the initial Program mode exposure but allows tweaking of the balance between aperture and shutter speed, you have to half-depress the shutter while rotating the dial, which takes the agility of a lock-picker. The other, less serious problem we found with the camera's body was that it uses a proprietary flash hot shoe, rather than the industry standard, so you're forced to stick with Sony for your lighting needs. Of course, the camera does include a built-in flash, and we don’t expect an external flash to be a routine purchase for entry-level buyers.

In 2005, Sony purchased Konica Minolta, which gave them a widely supported lens format and access to a substantial variety of already-existing lenses. Additionally, since the A200 houses its image stabilization in the camera, you don't have to pay for more expensive stabilized lenses, as you would with a Canon or Nikon SLR.

We like the 2.7-inch LCD screen on the camera back. It's bright and highly legible even in bright sunlight, and offers a very useful camera settings display so you can see your shooting parameters at a glance. The pop-up flash puts out a light of light and does so in an even pattern, though we would have preferred the pop-up to pop up a little higher, to lessen the chance of red-eye in flash portraits.The camera shoots just shy of 3 frames per second in burst mode, which is pretty standard fare, but it can keep shooting at that rate as long as you hold down the shutter and have memory space and battery power available, where some cameras impose limits on continuous shooting or simply choke up as the shutter whirs along.

The A200 has nine auto focus points, arranged in a grid, and you can chose between spot, wide (the most prominent object in frame is focused on) and local (where you select the square you want to focus on). The camera supports a generous ranges of ISOs for an entry-level SLR, running from ISO 100 to ISO 3200. For white balance controls, you get Daylight, Shade, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent and Flash modes, each of which can be further adjusted using the four-way controller along a seven-step range from reddish to bluish. Alternatively, you can rely on auto white balance, take a reading yourself yourself by shooting a white or grey card under current lighting conditions, or manually enter color temperature, a feature usually found in sophisticated SLRs. For shutter speeds, the A200 proves the fairly standard range of 1/4000 to 30 seconds, with Bulb (which keeps the shutter open as long as the button is depressed) also available.

Performance (read in-depth lab performance at Digitalcamerainfo.com)
In our rigorous lab testing, the Sony displayed average performance. In no one test did it perform amazingly well, but there was no area where the camera failed miserably either. In terms of color accuracy, resolution, dynamic range and image noise, the A200 scored well. It struggled a bit with automatic white balance, but made up for it when using the presets. It also scored a bit below average in our low light tests, but still well enough that it won't give you much trouble. On balance, what you’re getting in terms of image quality is entirely respectable performance across the board, which seems more than reasonable for a camera at the price.

Comparisons (read in-depth comparisons at Digitalcamerainfo.com)
Compared to most other entry-level SLRs, like the Canon XS and XSi or the Nikon D60, the Sony Alpha 200 come up a bit short. It doesn't have as many features or settings, and it couldn’t quite match the lab performance of the others mentioned. The Sony. Doesn’t have as many auto focus points as a number of other SLRs on the market, and it doesn’t include the increasingly common Live View feature, which lets you line up a shot using the rear LCD screen instead of peering through the viewfinder (the Nikon D60 also lacks Live View).  However, this is a camera that successfully delivers on its promises. You get a well-built SLR that delivers attractive photos. You have access to a wide range of interchangeable lenses. And particularly in the two-lens kit, which delivers both mid-range and telephoto zoom lenses for just $550, you’re getting an extraordinary value for your money.