Canon G7 X First Shots: the Sony RX100-series rival hits our test lab

canon canon g7x first shots g7 x image quality sony rx100 iii

posted Monday, September 29, 2014 at 2:34 PM EST

The Canon G7 X, the "Big C's" answer to the powerful and popular Sony RX100-series of premium, large-sensor compact cameras, was recently introduced at this year's Photokina trade show. Now, our review sample unit has arrived and is already undergoing rigorous testing in our laboratory.

With a large, 20.2MP 1-inch type sensor coupled with and a fast f/1.8-2.8 aperture and a versatile 24-100mm-equivalent focal length range, all packed into a sleek, solid body, the G7 X is undoubtedly going to give the Sony RX100 III -- it's closest rival in the RX100-series of cameras -- a run for its money. That is, if the image quality can cut the mustard.

For all your pixel-peeping pleasure, our First Shots for the Canon PowerShot G7 X have now been published. Head over to the Canon G7 X samples page to download both RAWs and JPEG images of our standard Still Life test target. We've also provided JPEG files with default noise reduction turned to the minimum level (see filesnames with "NR1"). Oddly, the G7 X will only shoot RAW + JPEG pairs with default NR enabled for the JPEG files, so that why you won't see .CR2 files under the "NR1" samples.

So, how does the G7 X stack up against the competion? Head over to our world famous Comparometer to get a head-to-head look against the Sony RX100 III, as well as other large-sensor compacts like the G1 X Mark II, or other 1-inch sensor cameras such as the Nikon V3.