Canon SX40HS vs Pentax X90

Canon SX40HS vs Pentax X90

Two ten-year-old bridge cameras, head to head. It's clear when they are looked at closely that the Canon is the more solid, better made and no doubt more expensive camera. The latest version, the SX70HS, is still available. The Pentax is more plastic, but does score very highly on the speed of start up and the menu system and general ergonomics, which trump the Canon on virtually every level. However, familiarity will even that out to some degree.

They are a similar size, the Canon being slightly larger and definitely heavier.



In terms of performance, AF speed is similar, but the Pentax fails miserably in the low red light of sunsets. In terms of quality of results, at wider settings the Pentax is crisper and sharper, at long telephoto settings the Canon has the edge.

Canon


Pentax



Canon


Pentax



Canon


Pentax



Canon ISO 100


Pentax ISO 100



Canon ISO 400


Pentax ISO 400



Canon ISO 1600


Pentax ISO 1600



Canon ISO 3200


Pentax ISO 3200



Pentax ISO 6400



Both cameras do well on ISO, but the Pentax is better and has a wider range. Having said that, ISO 6400 is a bit mushy and probably best avoided. In general, the Canon is the one of choice at this point in time, especially as the Pentax had a sensor fault and a number of hot pixels in an obtrusive line. So that has to go back. But it held its head up well, and the lens was sharper than the Canon lens. My verdict is that there's a real place for bridge cameras as an excellent all-in-one solution, especially for travel, and newer models are no doubt much better. Wildlife is tricky because of slow response times and poor viewfinders, but not impossible with practice. It's been an interesting exercise.