With all due respect Peter, those cameras have native 1440x1080 1/3 inch sensors. The current XD HD is also native 1440x1080, but 1/2 inch.

But the point remains the same. Thomas was a bit off with the claim that no 1/3 inch chip available had HD resolution.

This is where on chip lens technology helps. It gathers and focuses light precisely onto each pixel. That has helped to make some of the smaller sensor size cameras more sensitive over the last several years. That technology is also used on the 1/2 XD HD cameras.

-gb-

I never said a 1/3" wasn't HD. In fact I even said most people would find it very hard to tell them apart. What I did say is that as far as I know no 1/3" 3 chip camera has the full 1920x1080 pixel raster while actually resolving that much detail.

Isn't the XL-H1 1920x1080?

Dead wrong. Actually the Canon H1, G1 and A1 all have native 1440x1080 sensors.

Nope... see above... the Canon XL H1, XH G1 and XH A1 (same chips in all three camcorders) are definitely native 1440 x 1080. From there, they get a resolution boost from Pixel Shift in the horizontal axis, so it's practically "as good as" 1920 x 1080, but most assuredly native 1440 x 1080.

Quite correct. There is no 1/3rd-inch three-chip camera that has the full 1920x1080 pixel raster. The maximum in the 1/3rd-inch realm is the CCD used in the Canon XL H1 & XH camcorders, at 1440 x 1080 (and pixel shifted from there).

Hope this helps,

I forgot about the Red One. You are correct the sensor size is over an inch. A 3/4" chip wouldn't be that great a difference over a 2/3rd inch, like mentioned in another reply.

Yes they are measured on the diagonal, but... no sensor is anywhere near the size that is reported. A 1/2" sensor does not, in any stretch of the word, actually measure 1/2". That's why the proper nomenclature is to say that it's a 1/2" TYPE sensor.

For example, a 2/3" chip doesn't measure .667 inches (17mm) across in any dimension; it's actually 9.6mm x 5.4mm, for a diagonal of about 11mm, or 0.433 inches. Yes, a 2/3" chip actually measures less than half an inch.

So, if one were to classify the Red One sensor by the diagonal measurement, using the same terminology as existing video sensors, it'd actually qualify as a 1.7" type sensor. About 2.5 times larger, on the diagonal, than a 2/3" sensor.

FYI after attending the Sony demo on the EX the way they get away with processing so much information is there is an A to D converter on each of the 1980 rows of each sensor. So no danger of a split screen effect with this cam :)

Sony have done a good job here of speeding up processing with parrallel processing and this also minimises heat and therefore noise. Being CMOS you can also point this cam at a light or a sunset with no smear problems.