Sony NEX-3N over Nikon D3100. Decided & Purchased!

I have recently bought a new camera. It's a Sony NEX-3N. In case you have no idea how it looks like:

Sony Nex-3N with accessories

Oops, in the box. But you can check out the exact camera here where I talked about why I'm getting a new camera.

First of all, this is not an article about a review of this camera. This merely talks about my experiences and considerations before I landed my hand on this new device.

I'm the kind of person who's willing to spend in order to learn a new skill. Some say this habit is good as it encourages one to learn new skills. In my case, I think it's bad. You see, whenever I bought myself new devices, in the beginning I felt very excited but after few days, I got bored, easily, and no longer fondling, er...I mean, playing around with these device anymore. I got myself a guitar (now, nowhere to be found), a 76 keys keyboard (last I checked, it's still functioning) and now, this camera. Because of this habit of mine, I told myself not to spend too much on this new camera as it may ended up just like the rest. (somehow I feel this device will not ended up like the rest as i'm going to use this for my work, though)

I budgeted RM1,500 for this new camera and my requirements are:

Speediness

Speediness in terms of start up time, auto focus and shutter speed. Start up time being the moment you press the on/off button until the camera readies to operate. Auto focus being the camera's ability to focus on your subject while shutter speed being how fast the camera capture the photo the moment you hit the shutter button.  I have being researching for quite some times and I found out that one of the reasons for the overall speediness of your camera is to buy a camera with larger image sensor. Image sensors comes in many sizes and the larger it is, the more expensive the camera is. Most point and shoot cameras have smaller sensors (the size of a camera indicates so) so I tried to aim for APS-C grade sensors and most of these can be found in DSLR or Mirrorless cameras. Of course there's full frame 35mm image sensors but for my budget, i'm not ready for that yet. The full frame 35mm image sensors can be found in most premium grade DSLR.

Image Sensor

Sizes of Image Sensor

Portability

The camera has to be extremely portable. I want to be able to bring the camera whenever and wherever. It has to be small and light and fast enough to allows me to access and capture my subject fast. Of course for this point, my mobile phone camera can always get the job done better than any camera in the market but image quality of my subject may be compromised. (Honestly, I still find myself reaching for my mobile phone cameras whenever I need to capture a subject spontaneously).

Learning 

I want to be able to learn photography and so, i'm aiming to get a camera with more manual controls over the photos I have taken. By manual controls I mean controls in terms of Apertures, Shutter Speed and ISO sensitivity. Most point and shoot cameras do not have many manual controls to play around except for few factory presets that you can choose from to take certain kind of pictures, for example, landscape, portrait or night mode.

Now, with my budget, at this time (mid-2014), at this place (Malaysia) and with my above requirements, I have two choices on hand, a Nikon D3100 and Sony Nex-3N. 

Speediness wise, both cameras are equipped with APS-C grade image sensors so they are equally fast. In terms of portability, the Nikon D3100 is bulky obviously as it's a DSLR and weighted about 505g vs Sony Nex-3N with smaller body profile weighting about half of Nikon D3100. In terms of learning, both have quite lots of manual controls to play around. 

The deciding factor may seems obvious for me to choose Sony Nex-3N over Nikon D3100 but initially, I planned to get the Nikon D3100 instead. The reasons being that firstly, the camera has the capability to be expanded in terms of external flashes (fixed built-in flash for Sony Nex-3N) and secondly, there are over 205 Nikor lenses to choose from for image preferences/upgrade (Sony only has 21 lenses for Nex-3N) and thirdly, Nikon has being in the imaging industry far longer than Sony.

I have chosen Sony Nex-3N in the end because firstly, the camera will be used mostly for learning instead of professional photographing. Secondly, it's portability and thirdly, it's technology (released end of 2013 vs 2010 for Nikon D3100).

That's about it, a brief write up of my experience in getting the Sony Nex-3N. If you have any question, please drop a comment below. 

By the way, if you need a better analysis before purchasing a new camera, you can visit Snapsort. I have also purchased this particular unit at Miyanmondo as the camera is not available via local authorized distributor so that being said, this camera will not have warranty by Sony Malaysia but by the Miyanmondo instead.