Thad E Ginathom

No clue what that means, so no idea what you did. If you mean all blurred, then maybe you just changed the shutter speed. Own up. Maybe she knows the camera well enough to just fix whatever you did.

As you have compared to another camera which does not misbehave, it looks like a fault. I think you should take it up with the supplier. Vague hopes that something might put it right in the future might remain just that.

Possibly... eye-autofocus, for starters, if your subject is not always in the same place. I don't know. So far, I have only tried moonshots a couple of times, and have not yet even come close to the right exposure, let alone focus. I mostly photograph South-indian classical musicians. There will be three or four people on a stage. For the most part, the focus system works for me. There are times when it doesn't, and I have to take a different approach. I have an a6500. The touch screen, for those choose-a-spot times is sometimes great and sometimes... not. And I have to watch out that I have not shifted the focus without realising. It seems that your previous camera suited you well. Lots of people take truly wonderful pictures using these cameras, and with a range of lenses including native autofocus and fully manual legacy. You've gone for a camera with somewhat different toolsets. Looks like you have to choose now: work with it, or divorce, and return to a camera that you feel works with you. Your choice. Either way is better than not taking photographs :)

I think it does... but if you wanted to use that sort of focus/recompose technique you'd have to use AF-S, or else it would do focus/recompose/refocus. There are vast numbers of videos, articles, etc, on Sony focus, all of which will tell you how wonderful it is, which might annoy you, but which will have the hints how to get the best out of their focus system. Every generation of which is always the best, the fastest, the most powerful, and, of course, so much better than the previous generation, which was also all those things. Frankly though, although I can mock the marketing (I'm waiting for it to be so fast it focuses on your subject when you only think about it) it mostly suits me. But I never had a full-frame DSLR. And my model is lower down the Sony chain than yours. It hurts that you were put off your art, though. I'm sorry.

This is what you are supposed to be doing while that battery is charging! 🤣 And... no doubt it differs in different countries, but there may be regulations that prohibit shipping charged lithium batteries. It's great when you already have a device that uses the same battery: you can have it charged an ready and use the new camera straight out of the box.

But thankfully, Microsoft did not make your camera. You'd need to point to Sony doing that to cameras: that would be relevant. Although, on the whole I do sympathise with a policy of not doing unnecessary firmware updates just because they are there, but only if there is actually relevant fix or desired functionality in them there release notes

True. But IBIS might come in handy.

Oh dear, that sounds bad. Each one may have added harm rather than good. A professional might be able to help. Asking on the internet... no.

Welcome and good luck :) You seem settled to it being a hardware problem and probably permanent. Good luck too, with the part only costing $50! But I don't have the experience. Youtube probably has the disassembly/reassembly covered. (If it's hunchtime, I'd agree about the moisture. I've heard of over-wet computer-monitor cleaning causing this kind of failure. On the other hand... any chance the ribbon cable simply came loose?)

I'd be happy to have taken that picture. It's very nice, and if this is where you are starting, things can only get better :)

Yes, that picture looks unacceptable. For proper assessment, though, you need to upload the original image file, not a screenshot from a phone. You are out and about in daylight? You should be going for a much lower ISO. If you need high shutter speeds (hint: unless your subject is moving, you don't) then you probably want a much "faster" (larger aperture) lens. I was initially very disappointed with the kit lens that came with my a6000. Now I know that I'd much rather walk around with my Sigma 30/1.4 on the camera than the 16-50 zoom of the kit lens. You'll get a new sort of discipline from the prime (fixed-focal-length) lens photography too. At first, "real-camera" photography can seem a lot harder than simply pointing the phone at something. I certainly had that experience three years ago. Persevere! You'll enjoy. Shooting for perfection... You need to practise for perfection. Maybe for ever! But you also need kit that will be kind to you. Your camera will have as much potential as you can fulfil and much more. That lens... Maybe not. I could have taken a nice, cleaner, picture of your dog, indoors with just dim artificial light. It would stand cropping into the face like that too. Here's a couple more things to experiment with.... 1, try popping up the flash! Just to see. 2. Try your camera's auto mode: Sometimes it may get stuff way wrong, sometimes it might show you what the camera can do. ??? What, continuous shooting? Don't. Fine, when you are ready to take mid-air-leap portraits of that dog. Until then, concentrate on getting single frames that you like

Measure twice and cut wrong is more my style! I think I'd prefer the manuals if they came on paper, but age, and the sheer amount of stuff that machines do these days, has robbed me of much of the pleasure of ploughing through the entire thing.

Have to say... yes, marketing material tells us what the marketing men want us to think, whereas user manuals tell us what a thing actually does, and how, and how difficult it might be. Thus, reading the manual gives us much clearer pre-purchase expectations. Certainly I do this to check out what options other models might have that my camera does not.

It's a small forum. If you didn't get an answer, it's because nobody who read your question had a good one at their fingertips. Don't take it personally. On the other hand... you can if you must.

I don't know, but I'd be surprised if the RX has more to document than the A. And I'd be more surprised if you got anything useful out of the exercise of reading either. You'd get more from an hour of youtube watching.