Now that the Canon EOS M, Canon’s first attempt in the mirrorless market, is going on sale (mainly in Asia, for the time being neither Amazon nor Adorama and B&H have the EOS M listed as in stock), there are more and more reviews showing up in the web. Shawn Low at c|net Asia reviewed the Canon EOS M and he has some good things to say about. The highlights, according to c|net Asia are excellent low-light performance and image quality, compact size and a responsive touchscreen interface. It is interesting to see that all reviewers are impressed by the small size of Canon’s foray into the mirrorless camera world.

The autofocus system doesn’t get much appraisal here neither, yet the accuracy is confirmed. Quoting c|net Asia:

In terms of autofocus (AF) performance, we were quite disappointed by the EOS M’s general sluggishness. In indoor lighting, the EOS M (in “Single” AF mode) took about one second to get a focus lock on our subject; speeds will differ in different lighting conditions as well. Also, we realized that the camera’s focusing speeds also varies according to the AF mode that you’ve set, with the “Single” mode setting being the fastest.

The video below gives an idea:

From the conclusion:

The EOS M should appeal to beginners looking for dSLR-like quality minus the bulk, as well as Canon users who require a secondary body–especially when they already own an existing stable of Canon dSLR lenses.

[…] We were impressed by the EOS M’s excellent low-light performance and fluid touchscreen interface, but were let down by its slow autofocus performance–a factor which prevented us from awarding it with our Editors’ Choice.

I guess it will not be possible to update the AF performance with a firmware update. The AF definitely appears to the Canon EOS M’s weakest point. The small size, the image quality and the possibility to use all of Canon’s EF and EF-S lenses (through an adapter) are its winning points.

Canon EOS M price and availability check: [shopcountry 6091]

Lenrentals owner Roger Cicala got a batch of Canon EOS M cameras and immediately tried out what this cute little mirrorless camera has to offer. Very few spoilers here since I think Roger's hands-on is worth to be read. Just some excerpts…

For those who don’t want to read this but do want to tell everyone what I said later, here’s the summary: it is the best of mirrorless, it is the worst of mirrorless, it is the camera of wise choices, it is the camera of foolishness, it is the epoch of accurate autofocus, and it is the epoch of slow autofocus. In other words, I’ve got mixed emotions.

Unfortunately, the auto-focus sluggishness is confirmed, but also its high accuracy. The Canon EOS M features an auto-focus system that isn't best suited for fast paced street photography, but works perfectly fine for portraits and landscape. The AF works best with the EF-M 18-55mm lens. Indeed, it looks as if the AF is acceptably fast when used with the EF-M 18-55mm lens (at least au pair with other mirrorless cams).

The EF adpater gets an appraisal:

No one has done adapters better. No one. We shot a variety of Canon EF lenses on it and they all were flawless. Autofocus like a dream, at least as fast as the native EOS-M lenses […], automatic vignetting control works perfectly, it was wonderful. Even some third-party lenses adapt rather nicely.

That's good to know, I ordered the EOS M with the adapter and I am happy to learn that Canon did it right. Another thing that positively impressed is the very small size of the EOS M, it may be the smallest mirrorless camera around.

DigitalRev has the Canon EOS M in stock and ready to ship. Various kits are offered, click here to see all their EOS M related bundles and items. Prices look good, also if shipped to Europe. I contacted DigitalRev and they confirmed me that the price you see in check-out is actually the price you have to pay, taxes and customs included. That sounds good.

Canon EOS M price and availability check: [shopcountry 6091]