Sony A230 has a
10.0MP APS-C (23.5 x 15.7 mm ) sized CCD sensor and features Bionz processor. On the other hand, Olympus E-PL5 has a
16.0MP Four Thirds (17.3 x 13 mm ) sized CMOS sensor .
Olympus E-PL5's sensor provides 6MP more than Sony A230's sensor, which gives a significant advantage in real life. You can print your images larger or crop more freely.
On the other hand, please keep in mind that Max sensor resolution is not the only determinant of resolving power. Factors such as the optical elements, low pass filter, pixel size and sensor technology also affects the final resolution of the captured image.
Below you can see the A230 and E-PL5 sensor size comparison.
As seen above, Sony A230 has a 1.6x Larger sensor area than Olympus E-PL5. Larger sensors give photographer more control on the depth of field and blurry background compared to smaller sensor when shot in same focal length and aperture.
DxOMark Sensor Scores
DxOMark is a benchmark that scientifically assesses image quality of camera sensors. It scores camera sensors for color depth (DXO Portrait), dynamic range (DXO Landscape) and low-light sensitivity (DXO Sports), and also gives them an overall score. Sony A230 and Olympus E-PL5 sensors have been tested by DxO and the results show that E-PL5 has a better overall score of 72, 9 points higher compared to A230's score of 63.
Model |
Overall |
Color Depth |
Dynamic Range |
Low-light ISO |
Sony A230 |
63 |
22.3 bits |
11.4 Evs |
531 ISO |
Olympus E-PL5 |
72 |
22.8 bits |
12.3 Evs |
889 ISO |