that again results in shooting flat-nosed people only... ;-)

I compared the PEAKING strength and possibilities between my PANA DVC200 (~JVC dv5000) and the f330 (1.5" VF):
The F330 can peak the signal even THAT strong that you nearly see no content anymore... though the pic in the VF looks totally distracted it can help to focus greatly. After my work with the loaner f330 I tried similar settings with the DVC200 but it does not peak that great and detailed like the f330 did.

NOW I would say (forgive me) focussing was easier with the f330 than with my Panasonic... at least in kinds of using the peaking function.

The CCD photo sites on most imaging chips only make up a small fraction of the surface area of the chip as some of the control and readout electronics is often also on the chips surface, between the light sensitive bits. That's why sony came up with Hyper HAD which uses an array of small lenses to focus as much of the light falling on the CCD onto the light sensitive bits. This increases sensitivity, but is a compromisesystem and there are still gaps. Maybe with these new CCD's thay have moved the control electronics of the face of the CCD allowing for larger photo sites.

That is a possibility. Not so much the control stuff, but the usual area of blanked pixels surrounding the active pixel area. Sounds like they eliminated the inactive pixel area and made the active pixels larger. And these sensors are Power HAD EX that have a concave microlens at the top layer, as well as a convex internal lens that concentrates the light even further and reduces vertical smear.

All I can say is that it works beautifully.

-gb-

One of the advantages of a CMOS sensor is the larger % of area that can be used for the light collection part of each sensor vs the surrounding electronics (compared to CCD).

I don't think we know if this is CCD or CMOS yet do we (the EX)?