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Examining the results from the A65 on their own, noise appears to be very well controlled, with very clean images at the bottom of its sensitivity range. Noise starts to appear around ISO 400, although its remains unobtrusive right up to ISO 1600. Past this point, we were still able to get usable images up to ISO 6400, beyond which point we'd only recommend venturing if it's an emergency.
Our analysis shows that all four cameras produce good results, but whilst the JPEG images from the Sony Alpha 65 are comparable with the Sony Alpha 55, Canon EOS 60D and Nikon D5100, the raw files just have the edge over the other cameras. Examining the signal to noise ratio results for the raw files (after conversion to TIFF) reveals the Sony Alpha 65, Canon EOS 60D and Nikon D5100 are similar, with the Alpha 65 producing the best results at the lower end of the sensitivity range. It is only just beaten by the Canon 60D at higher sensitivities. TIFF dynamic range results show an even contest between the Nikon D5100 and Sony Alpha 65.
We shoot a specially designed chart in carefully controlled conditions and the resulting images are analysed using DXO Analyzer software to generate the data to produce the graphs below.
A high signal to noise ratio (SNR) indicates a cleaner and better quality image.
For more more details on how to interpret our test data, check out our full explanation of our noise and dynamic range tests.
JPEG images
JPEG images from the Sony Alpha 65 are more-or-less on a par with those from the Sony Alpha 55, Canon EOS 60D and Nikon D5100.
Raw images
TIFF images (after conversion from raw) show an increased signal to noise ratio and an improvement over the Sony Alpha 55.
Dynamic range
JPEG images
JPEG images show a slight drop in dynamic range when compared to the Sony Alpha 55, despite this drop the camera still captures a wide tonal range across the entire sensitivity range.
Raw images
This chart indicates that the Sony Alpha 65's raw files have at least a 0.5EV higher dynamic range than the Sony Alpha 55 and the Canon EOS 60D up to a sensitivity of ISO 3200.
