Olympus SZ-10 vs Pentax Q-S1

Its time to take a closer look at the Olympus SZ-10 and Pentax Q-S1, former being a Small Sensor Superzoom while the other is a Entry-Level Mirrorless by competitors Olympus and Pentax. The resolution of the SZ-10 (14MP) and the Q-S1 (12MP) is fairly well matched but the SZ-10 (1/2.3") and Q-S1 (1/1.7") enjoy totally different sensor size.

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The SZ-10 was introduced 4 years before the Q-S1 and that is quite a big difference as far as tech is concerned. Each of these cameras come with different body type with the Olympus SZ-10 being a Compact camera and the Pentax Q-S1 being a Rangefinder-style mirrorless camera.

Before we go in to a comprehensive comparison, below is a brief overview of how the SZ-10 matches up versus the Q-S1 in terms of portability, imaging, features and an overall grade.

The following is a sample of the gallery pictures for Olympus SZ-10 & Pentax Q-S1. The whole galleries are available at Olympus SZ-10 Gallery & Pentax Q-S1 Gallery.

For anyone who is going to lug around your camera frequently, you need to think about its weight and size. The Olympus SZ-10 comes with external dimensions of 106mm x 67mm x 38mm (4.2" x 2.6" x 1.5") with a weight of 215 grams (0.47 lbs) whilst the Pentax Q-S1 has specifications of 105mm x 58mm x 34mm (4.1" x 2.3" x 1.3") having a weight of 203 grams (0.45 lbs).

Examine the Olympus SZ-10 and Pentax Q-S1 in our completely new Camera & Lens Size Comparison Tool.

Take into consideration, the weight of an ILC will vary depending on the lens you are employing during that time. Following is the front view overall size comparison of the SZ-10 vs the Q-S1.

Considering size and weight, the portability score of the SZ-10 and Q-S1 is 90 and 92 respectively.

Generally, its hard to visualise the difference between sensor measurements merely by looking at specs. The visual underneath might provide you a stronger sense of the sensor sizes in the SZ-10 and Q-S1.

As you can plainly see, the two cameras posses different megapixel count and different sensor measurements. The SZ-10 with its tinier sensor will make shooting shallow DOF more difficult and the Olympus SZ-10 will give more detail using its extra 2 Megapixels. Greater resolution will also let you crop pics somewhat more aggressively. The older SZ-10 is going to be disadvantaged in sensor technology.