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Move over Sony, Canon is trying to take the lead in bleeding-edge tech for mirrorless cameras. The companys new $4,300, 45-megapixel EOS R5 II offers advanced features like eye-tracking autofocus (AF) that cant be found on any recent Sony model. The new camera is also pushing Sonys A1 and other models in the key areas of speed, video and autofocus. And its arguably more desirable than Canons own upcoming flagship R1 as it has nearly double the resolution. Ive had the R5 II for a few weeks, evaluating not only its practicality and speed for both professionals and serious amateurs, but also how it stacks up against Sony's A1, the gold standard for high-resolution mirrorless cameras. And frankly, I'm impressed. Design and handling I love the handling of Canons mirrorless cameras and the EOS R5 II may be its sweetest design yet. The body and controls are very similar to the R5, apart from a couple of changes. Canon moved the power switch to the top right where its easier to access, and added a dedicated photo/video switch on the left. The company gave photo and video modes their own settings, making it much easier to jump from one to the other. Canon also made a rare change to its menu system, adding a new olive green tab for control customization. This new tab also contains the settings for eye control AF tracking. Otherwise, the R5 IIs layout is similar to its predecessor. Thats a good thing, as the control placement is the most natural of any camera Ive used, from the comfortable grip that provides a secure place to hold, to the nicely tactile controls that fall perfectly to hand. Moving to the displays, the R5s 2.1-million-dot fully articulating rear touch screen was already sharp and easy to use, so Canon didnt mess with that. The R5 II has the same sharp 5.76-million dot OLED electronic viewfinder as before, but the company boosted the brightness and redesigned the optics to accommodate the new eye control autofocus. Steve Dent for Engadget The R5 II supports CFexpress Type B cards for capturing 8K RAW video, along with SD UHS II if youre okay with cheaper and slower media. Other key features include headphone and microphone ports, a full-sized HDMI input and a USB-C port for charging and transfers. Canon also released three new battery grips, including one with a cooling fan that extends video shooting times, as Ill discuss soon. Im a big fan of the R5 IIs design, and my pro photographer friend agreed, saying that like most Canon products, the R5 II's ergonomics are so good the device is comfortable to hold for long periods of time. He also said he slightly preferred the R5 II's handling to his Sony A9 III and A1 cameras, thanks to how easy it is to use with one hand. Performance Steve Dent for Engadget The EOS R5 II offers a blend of speed and resolution that rivals and sometimes even surpasses the Nikon Z8 and Sony A1. That's mostly due to the new stacked 45-megapixel sensor and updated Digic X processor to crunch all those pixels. The R5 II can shoot bursts at up to 30 fps in electronic shutter mode with a blackout-free view. Thats slower than the R1, but Ill trade a small hit in performance in exchange for the extra resolution. I was able to capture about 100 RAW frames before the buffer filled. Speeds drop to 12 fps with the mechanical shutter, but theres rarely any need to use it because theres no issue with rolling shutter distortion thanks to the stacked sensor. The R5 IIs new pre-capture mode can record up to 15 photos when you half-press the shutter. Thats great for photojournalists or wildlife photographers who may otherwise miss a shot by a fraction of a second. Canons "Dual Pixel" autofocus has always been good, but on the R5 II its the best Ive ever seen. When shooting bursts with a subject biking toward the camera, 80 percent of my shots were in focus. And the EOS R5 II now tracks animals, birds and vehicles, on top of faces, eyes and bodies of people. Steve Dent for Engadget The camera also has a couple of new autofocus tricks, including one called action priority. That keeps the AF focused around the ball in three specific sports: volleyball, basketball and soccer. I didnt notice any particular AF improvement, as my hit rate seemed to be about the same without it, but dedicated sports photographers might see the difference. Another new function keeps the tracking point on your subject even if someone crosses in front of them. That did seem to work well most of the time, but it would occasionally wander off and lock onto someone else. When Canon launched the R5 II and R1 in July, it introduced pre-registered person priority AF that lets your camera memorize up to ten specific people, like star athletes for instance. This feature functioned as advertised, switching AF to a registered person and tracking them instead of other people in the scene. Finally, I tested Canons famous eye control AF that detects where the photographer is looking and moves the subject tracking point there. This is an undeniably cool feature and has improved compared to the first implementation on the EOS R3, but is still too unreliable for professional use. Steve Dent for Engadget In fact, the pro photographer friend I mentioned pointed out that though eye control feels futuristic, its still a bit too flakey for paid gigs where focus reliability is paramount. On the R5 II, in-body stabilization is the best Ive seen on any Canon camera, keeping the sensor rock-steady for handheld shooting, with up to 8.5 stops of shak reduction. It was so reliable that I never felt the need to carry a tripod when using slow shutter speeds. Ive always found Sony cameras to be slightly superior to Canon when it comes to autofocus and speed. I can no longer say that, as the EOS R5 II is very even with Sonys latest models. My Sony-using photographer friend agreed, saying he couldnt see any real difference between the R5 II his A1 or A9 III. Image quality Image quality on the R5 II is largely the same as the R5, and thats a good thing. The 45-megapixel sensor produces photos as good as or better than the Sony A1 at a much cheaper price, and compares favorably to Nikons similarly priced Z8. When shooting in RAW mode at lower ISOs, the R5 II offers good dynamic range in high contrast bright and dark scenes. Like other stacked sensor cameras, though, theres a bit more noise than with regular CMOS sensors. Quality also drops slightly in electronic shutter mode, so its better to use the mechanical shutter in tricky lighting conditions. High ISO performance isnt too bad for such a high-resolution camera either, with noise staying under control up to ISO 12,800. After that, the R5 II doesnt quite measure up to models like the Nikon Z7 II or Sony A7R V, as both of those offer cleaner images with less grain. Steve Dent for Engadget If you dont want the hassle of processing RAW, JPEG rendering is excellent straight out of the camera, with well balanced sharpening and noise reduction. For low-light shooting, skin tones are flattering at all ISO settings, and the best among all cameras in this price range. One new notable feature on the R5 II is the AI-powered upscaling applied after the photo is taken. The result isnt quite as good as a dedicated app like Topaz, but its not bad considering its in-camera processing. Video The original EOS R5 would have been a darn near perfect video camera if not for its pesky overheating issues. Canon has improved this to a degree with a new passive cooling design and $400 fan grip. With those updates, heat is only really an issue at the highest resolutions (8K 60p and 4K 120p). However, these limitations are less severe on the rival Nikon Z8. Steve Dent for Engadget Aside from the heating issue, the EOS R5 II has impressive specs. It can shoot up to 8K 60p and 4K 120p video, but does so with far less rolling shutter than the R5, again thanks to the new stacked sensor. The camera now has Canon Log 2 (CLog 2) capability that allows for higher dynamic range capture than the R5. Video autofocus is outstanding at all resolutions, with rapid acquisition of the subject and reliable tracking. Face- and eye-detection work very well, and I only occasionally noticed AF lag with fast-moving subjects. As for stabilization, I could shoot smooth footage while handheld in optical mode with no crop, provided I didnt move the camera too much. Digital stabilization allowed for more movement while only cropping in a touch, and the enhanced setting let me shoot smoothly while walking with a 1.5x crop. Panasonics S5 II is still the best in this regard, but the R5 II is close behind. As for quality, video on the EOS R5 II is extremely sharp, particularly with supersampled 4K HQ. Other 4K modes are subsampled, but nearly as sharp. Rolling shutter is well managed, so you wont really notice it unless you do whip pans or jostle the camera while shooting. Canons excellent color science delivers warm skin tones and accurate colors. RAW video allows lots of room for adjustments in post, while the CLog 2 brings dynamic range up to 14 stops to enable shooting in contrasty conditions. With all this, the Canon R5 II is now my go-to camera for shooting video even over Sony and Panasonic models. Wrap-up Steve Dent for Engadget The $4,300 EOS R5 II is Canons best camera in years, thanks to improvements in key areas like autofocus, video, shooting speeds and overall feel. Newly introduced tech like eye control AF is less useful, but its still nice to see Canon try to innovate, and the feature should improve in subsequent models. The R5 II is up against some great competition in this price range, especially the $4,000 Nikon Z8 that holds its own against this camera in most situations. However, Canons autofocus is slightly faster and more reliable, and I greatly prefer the R5 IIs handling. The only other full-frame option with a stacked sensor and similar resolution is the Sony A1, which costs $2,200 more. The main issues with the R5 II are overheating, the wonkiness of action priority and unreliable eye control autofocus. However, it now stacks up extremely well against Sony's A1 in terms of speed and autofocus, while offering superior stabilization and handling. Which one you choose may simply come down to brand preference or existing lens collection. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cameras/canon-eos-r5-ii-review-canons-most-powerful-camera-yet-puts-sony-on-notice-160013865.html?src=rss
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Qualcomm has canceled its Windows on ARM PC dev kit, otherwise called the Snapdragon X Elite Developer Kit. Refunds are going out, sales have ceased and support for the kit has stopped, according to reporting by The Verge. It was originally supposed to ship in June before being delayed. In an email to customers, Qualcomm chalked the whole thing up to quality control. It said the mini PC comprehensively has not met our usual standards of excellence and we have made the decision to pause this product and the support of it, indefinitely. Interestingly, some kits had already been mailed out to consumers. It remains to be seen if those who have received the unit would also be refunded. As previously mentioned, it was originally supposed to launch back in June alongside the chips that powered those first Copilot Plus PCs. Qualcomm hasnt given a reason as to why it took months to make the decision to cancel the product. Developer Jeff Geerling received the kit and gave it a teardown and review. He said it landed with a thud and called out the lack of Linux support and resale restrictions. Geerling also found that the unit was missing an HDMI port, despite having all of the chips in place for an internal DisplayPort to HDMI conversion. Some have speculated that this HDMI port issue caused the production delays and even led to the eventual cancellation. To that end, Qualcomm emailed customers last month to alert them they were planning on shipping the dev kit with a USB-C to HDMI dongle instead of a traditional HDMI port. Whatever the reason for the cancellation, this kit was supposed to be a crucial item of hardware to help devs port apps to Windows on Arm. Microsoft and Qualcomm have been urging developers to ready their apps for Snapdragon X Elite laptops.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apps/qualcomm-axes-its-windows-on-arm-pc-dev-kit-153303185.html?src=rss
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The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is investigating Tesla's Full Self-Driving (FSD) feature in relation to four crashes. The collisions took place in reduced-visibility conditions with either the beta or supervised versions of FSD enabled. In a November 2023 incident in Arizona, a Model Y fatally hit a pedestrian, as TechCrunch notes. An injury was sustained in one of the other three collisions, which occurred between March and May this year and all involved Model 3 EVs. The NHTSA says conditions such as sun glare, fog and airborne dust lowered visibility in these incidents. The agency's Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) is looking into FSD's ability to "detect and respond appropriately to reduced roadway visibility conditions." It will also try to determine if there have been other crashes in similar circumstances with FSD enabled. The ODI will also probe any changes by Tesla to the system "that may affect the performance of FSD in reduced roadway visibility conditions. In particular, this review will assess the timing, purpose and capabilities of any such updates, as well as Teslas assessment of their safety impact." In April, the NHTSA closed an investigation into hundreds of crashes in which Tesla's Autopilot system was engaged. It said 13 of those crashes were fatal. The agency determined that, in many of the crashes, the drivers were not sufficiently engaged and that "the warnings provided by Autopilot when Autosteer was engaged did not adequately ensure that drivers maintained their attention on the driving task." Tesla CEO Elon Musk just last week claimed that the Model 3 and Model Y SUV will be able to operate without supervision in California and Texas starting next year. At the same event, Musk unveiled the Cybercab, a two-seater robocab with no steering wheel or pedals that the company intends to start producing by 2027. Tesla does not have a media relations department that can be reached for comment.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/transportation/evs/teslas-fsd-is-under-federal-investigation-after-four-reduced-visibility-crashes-140248063.html?src=rss
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