Does it make sense? An $1800 Full frame DSLR from Canon

[Daniel Browning]

It's not just pixel size that reduces noise, it's the on-chip (or software) noise reduction algorithms.

I'm aware of when and where noise reduction occurs.

If you took the raw data (without noise reduction being applied) of two chips (with same physical size), the one with larger pixels will appear to be less noisy.

I disagree.

There is always a tradeoff when changing a single parameter.

Yes, there is always a trade off, but noise is not one of them. The trade off for smaller pixels is stronger in-camera processing power, more storage space, slower demosiac and post processsing, etc.

Smaller pixels (higher MP count): bigger enlargements but more noise at
high ISOs.

I think that is a common misconception. For a given sensor size the "noise per detail" (i.e. noise power per spatial frequency) stays the same no matter what the pixel size. The only difference is that smaller pixels allow one to use higher spatial frequencies. This is illustrated in the link I provded above for the 50D/40D.


http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=29801&view=findpost&p= 241562


When you compare them at different spatial frequencies (detail) by using 100% crop, the 50D appears to have more noise. But when you compare them at the same spatial frequency (amount of detail) by resampling both to the same resolution, it becomes clear that their noise is in fact the same.