Re: AG-HPX370 or AG-HPX500??

2/3" chips are not small, unless you're comparing to a DSLR or one of the new digital cinema cameras.

The HVX-200 and 200a both use 1/3" chips. However you're right in that both 200 and 500 use pixel-shift to pull a higher resolution image from their sensors. In my understanding, this makes them a little softer but more light sensitive, and any image noise will be smaller than comparable cameras.

As to the original question - I've had a 500 for several years now and I'm a big fan, but I'd have to do a close feature and image comparison these days to decide between the 500 and 370. The difference in Depth of Field would be the biggest issue for me in picking the 370, but honestly, these days if you want DOF there are lots of choices that do it better. Not saying it's a slam-dunk for the 370, but for roughly half the price and 3 years in tech advancements... it'd certainly be up to the older camera to prove that it's worth the difference.

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Video Photographer / Avid & Final Cut Editor