Sony's latest full frame mirrorless camera may lock you out of cheap lenses — at least for now
The Sony A7 V only recently launched, and so far the reviews have been quite positive, with many reviewers praising both the full-frame camera's photo and video performance. DPReview called it "a genuine hybrid priced for mortals," thanks to its impressive all-round abilities. However, a photography review by Kai W on YouTube has revealed that Sony may have implemented some firmware changes that make the A7 V a no-go for E-Mount users who rely on third-party lenses, which are often a whole lot cheaper than Sony's in-house designs.
Kai starts off his review with a lot of praise for the hybrid camera's speed, autofocus, and video performance, however, when it gets to around the 16:15 mark, Kai tests the A7 V with a third-party lens, problems started to crop up. When testing E-mount lenses from a variety of Chinese manufacturers, including popular brands, like Viltrox and Sirui, Kai found that the camera exhibited a variety of malfunctions, with all resulting in a failure to capture an image. It should be noted that this incompatibility appears limited to autofocusing lenses, which makes sense, because most non-AF lenses aren't electrically coupled in any meaningful way.
There is speculation that the incompatibility with third-party lenses may be a result of pre-release firmware, however, the A7 V is already available in Europe, and there appears to be no firmware update available for the new hybrid camera. Sony also states on its website that "a software update may be required for some lenses," so it's entirely possible that the responsibility for the incompatibility lies with the lens manufacturers, although this disclaimer is only referencing the A7 V's new 60 fps continuous shooting mode. One could then argue that it likely would have been fairly straightforward for Sony to implement a system to detect whether a lens is compatible with the new system in order to warn the user and give them the option to drop to a slower shooting mode.
When asked about the incompatibility, Sony stated that "we do not guarantee third-party lens compatibility," seemingly neither confirming nor denying intentional incompatibility.
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