whats better an 1/1.8" or a 1/2.5" sensor size??

zer0tech

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Aug 29, 2006
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Hi guys! I'm planning to buy a digital camera and it has kept me a little bit obsessed reading stuff about it, and one thing that's kept me intrigued is what's better on the size of the sensor.
and why...

THANK YOU ALL!
 

Creig

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
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The most important questions regarding CCD image sensors involve resolution and physical size. When comparing CCDs, physically bigger is better for two reasons. First, because of the size of the pixels. Larger CCDs have larger pixels and larger pixels mean less noise due to a better signal to noise ratio.

Second, the larger your CCD, the more effective your optical zoom magnification becomes. Magnifying an image on a 1-inch square CCD 4 times is better than magnifying an image 4 times on a ¾-inch CCD.

http://www.ftpplanet.com/digital_photo/getting_right_camera.htm
 

ElFenix

Elite Member
Super Moderator
Mar 20, 2000
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that is in general, and there are a few exceptions, notably that canon SLRs use CMOS, rather than CCD, based sensors, and Fuji's super-CCD. both offer improved noise performance. canon's lead isn't what it used to be and can basically be ignored. the fuji super CCD offers DSLR-like noise performance, which is incredible for such a small sensor.

also keep in mind that a larger sensor featuring more megapixels might actually be noisier than a smaller sensor with fewer megapixels. and that above 7 megapixels on small sensors doesn't seem to improve image quality (sharpness is limited by the lens, and the blurring that is used to remove the noise reduces the sharpness).