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THE PANASONIC LUMIX FZIOOO PROVES THAT SOME CAMERAS REALLY CANDO IT ALL
LARGE-SENSOR superzooms are a relatively new category of camera. Sony was first, with the 1-inch sensor RX10, and now Panasonic is offering up a direct competitor in the form of the FZIOOO, also sporting a 1-inch, 20 MP CMOS sensor.
Though the RX10 and FZIOOO look quite similar from the outside and have comparable sensors, the Panasonic does have a leg up on the Sony in two areas: Video and zoom range. Let's start with video. The FZIOOO is a mean video machine, offering 4K capture (directly to memory card) and clean HDMI out (the Sony only does 1080p HD capture).
The Panasonic also offers nearly twice the zoom range of the Sony, a full-frame equivalent of 25^100mm; the Sony, 24-200mm. At its heart is a Venus Engine processor, the same one that's in the GH4. The FZIOOO also shares the same 2.359 million-dot OLED EVF as the GH4.
In the Lab
The Panasonic FZIOOO earned our second-highest rating of Extremely High in image quality at ISO 80-400. At ISO 80 it scored a total of 2420 lines of resolution, a hair under the 2500-line cut off for Excellent, the top rating.
We have not run the RX10 through our test lab yet, but a similar 1-inch sensor compact, the RX100, picked up 2270 lines of resolution at ISO 80, also putting it into Extremely High territory at its lowest ISO. Unlike the FZIOOO, though, by ISO 400 resolution on the RX100 had dropped below 2250 lines, bumping it down to Very High.
The FZIOOO scored Very High resolution numbers up to ISO 1600 with 2075 lines read, and it stayed in High territory up to ISO 3200- impressive for a superzoom.
In color accuracy, the Panasonic scored Excellent, with an Average Delta E of 7.8. The RX100 also scored an Excellent, besting the Panasonic with an Average Delta E of 6.6.
Noise stayed Low or better up to ISO 1600 (it remained at Extremely Low to ISO 200 and was Very Low at ISO 400 and 800). The RX100 was only able...