Any idea on Firmware upgrade for A580

[Lamboram]

Dear Members,

I am a student residing in Germany. I have a Sony Aplha 580. I was initially rooting for a A55, but then bought A580 because of its wonderful sensor, image quality, battery life and the SLR feel. But i am huge fan of features from A55 like

1. The digital Level Gauge [of course A580 has it, but only in Focus check mode]

2. EVF details

3. Video Focussing

4. Quality

apart from these size and SLT..

But i recently got restless with Sony releasing the Firmware version 2.0 for Nex and SLT series.. They have added 7 new picture effect including the selective color effect !! Cmon thats not fair .. Do you think Alpha 580 & 560 owners will get a firmware update any soon with upgrades like “Picture effect”, bringing up level gauge in Live view mode, some manual operations in Video, other improvements which are often seen in reviews of leading camera review websites???

Looking forward your reply !!

Lamboram

[Jules74]

Hi kevie000,

a FW update would not help using a reverse adapter. The lens is attached with the filter thread to the A-mount via adapter, leaving the aperture lever on the front with no contact to the camera body. This is exactly the same with current Nikon cameras and lenses and similar to Canon as well, because they all do not feature an aperture ring on the lens.

That means that the aperture cannot be selected or changed during shooting without applying some tricks or using an old lens that features an aperture ring. But you can use reverse adapters with any Alpha or NEX camera, because the operation is purely manual.

Here are the options:

1. Medium costs: Try to find an old manual focus Minolta lens (or other lens), which has a filter thread that matches your reverse adapter for A-mount and is suited for this purpose. Old Minolta lenses have an aperture ring on the lens. By turning the aperture ring you can open and close it to match your subject and shooting situation.

2. Low costs: Some reverse adapters include a second ring/adapter that you can attach to the normal lens mount (the side with the contacts and the aperture lever). This ring/adapter grabs the aperture lever and by turning it, you can open and close the aperture.

3. Budget DIY solution: Just attach the lens with the reverse adapter. Now the aperture is closed to max position. To open and close the aperture you can use your fingernail or a match stick or whatever is slim enough to fit into to gap and move the aperture lever. The you can fix it with tape, blue tack... and you are ready for shooting.

One important thing to be able to release the camera when you do not have an A-mount lens attached: Go to the menu and set: "Release w/o lens" to "Enable". Now you can shoot with any lens attached in A and M mode, but of course without AF. But this should not be an issue as MF in focus check LV will be better suited for macro shots anyway, because of the extremely shallow depth of field.

I found this interesting blog, which might be helpful as well...

http://photo.blogoverflow.com/2011/07/take-macro-shots-like-this-for-less-than-the-cost-of-a-pizza/

Good luck with the macros!

Jules

[gimp69]

The camera is still doing what it was doing when you bought it.  If it is lacking a feature then you should have reasearched it before buying rather than expect Sony to cater for your lack of forethought.

[pirate77]

@gimp69.

A bit harsh bearing in mind that Sony have released camera bodies with inherrent issues such as the A700 that didn't allow for noise reduction to be turned off for example which was finally addressed with v4 firmware.  I'm sure there are numerous tweaks to the A580 that firmware would help enhance the camera's functionality and useabilty (Lord knows A700 owners have been asking for v5 for years without success and naming what would be required) which could've been forthcoming by Sony, but as new models and types (now SLT) have hit the streets, the discontinued bodies have become redundant and been left behind in terms of firmware updates including their full frame A850/A900 pro body models which doesn't bode well for the future as it seems Sony are going the same way as Panasonic . . . . forget the firmware, knock-out another model with any improvement to earlier model issues addressed.

One area that firmware is an absolute 'must' is the ability to have the option to turn off settings such as DRO and in-body NR, notwithstanding better NR algorithms which Sony are still struggling with as it cannot seem to get high ISO and low noise to work anywhere as good as Nikon.

As for SLT, well that may be th way Sony are going, but personally it's not for me as I prefer OVF, so as a former A700 owner and now an A580 and A850 owner, I can live with the limitations, though improvements can be made by firmware, and as it's technically a free upgrade, but at the same time certain menu and functionality should've been already sorted before releasing onto the High Street for retail sale, though the ability to offer improvemnts and enhancements are much appreciated (another example was the A850/A900 exposure bracketing increased from +/- 2 to +/- 3 EV so came as a welcome enhancement for those that utilise such a feature in PP, so in conclusion, it would be like saying if it was OK when released, it should be OK now, but that isn't always the case as I'm sure Sony will attest to,  The bottom lin is don't wait for a firmware release, send Sony emails or post on their blogs, Facebook, Twitter etc and tell them what is needed for whatever models and get them to respond.  Also, don't think that th latest model will be any better than your previous model, so don't be fooled into the upgrade path without first waiting to see what those who 'must have the latest model' have to say about it after 12 months or so, and see how many are being sold on the used market after a short while, which are both indicators as to how well it's been received and if it has known performance issues (as in the case of th A65/A77 JPEG output quality - THE most basic of any camera requiremnt), so please don't say firmware won't sort that out, but it shouldn't have been an issue to start with.

Stick with the models that work, and if you're still not happy, jump ship for another brand.

Message was edited by: pirate77

Text amendments and spelling corrections.

[pirate77]

A580 is superior to A55 irrespective of the firmware updates.  A simple check will verify this.  Take a look at: http://snapsort.com/compare/Sony_Alpha_DSLR-A580-vs-Sony_SLT-A55

FWIW, if you want to shoot video, get a camcorder.  At least they don't record the sound of the lens AF.  If you want to shoot stills, get a DSLR.  Gimmicks such as video are wasted on a DSLR/SLT and Sony would do far better to release better noise algorithm firmware for all models to at least match that of the A580, but need to aim for clean images between ISO 3200-6400 as per Nikon.

There is no firmware update for the A580 and likely as per all the other modls that are discontinued, never will be.  I also use an A850, but would settle for the A700 if reverting back to a cropped sensor.  Shame Sony didn't put the A580 into the mag-alloy A700 chassis and retained the LCD articulation, but dropped the video. 

As your post is quite old now, what did you buy?  If an A55, I suspect you've sold it by now.