Sony
today announced that they will be licensing their MemoryStick technology
to six other companies: Fujitsu, Aiwa, Sanyo, Sharp, Pioneer and Kenwood.
This in an attempt not to repeat the Betamax debacle. (04:00 GMT)
Thanks to Derek W who posted this
link to a Nikon official list of D1 Set Contents and package pricing."The
Nikon D1 Set will be sold in the United States by Nikon Inc. through
Authorized Nikon Professional Digital Products Dealers and Authorized
Value Added Retailers. The D1 Set will include the D1 camera body,
EN-4 Battery Pack, MH-16 Quick Charger, Video Cable, Nikon View DX
Browser Software, Nikon D1 Neck Strap, and Nikon's One Year Limited
Warranty. The manufacturer's suggested retail price for the Nikon
D1 Set is $5,580.00. Local prices may vary. " (04:00 GMT)
LEXAR DROPS ALL CLAIMS AGAINST
SANDISK RELATED TO THE COMPACTFLASH ASSOCIATION
SanDisk Corporation (NASDAQ:SNDK) announced today
that Lexar Media Inc., in response to a motion to dismiss filed
by SanDisk, has dropped all claims against SanDisk related to
the CompactFlash Association (CFA). Lexar agreed to remove any
allegation that SanDisk used its position in the association to
engage in unfair competition, commit trade libel or interfere
with Lexar's prospective business advantage. (04:00 GMT)
District Court Judge Grants Lexar Motion for Preliminary
Injunction
Sept. 27, 1999--Lexar Media, a leading supplier
of High Performance Digital Film(TM), today announced that United
States District Court Judge Charles R. Breyer has granted Lexar's
motion for a preliminary injunction against SanDisk(Nasdaq:SNDK
- news) in a false advertising lawsuit (Lexar Media, Inc. v. SanDisk
Corporation, Case No. C99-02463 CRB). The Court's ruling relates
to a chart distributed by SanDisk, which contains claims that
a SanDisk memory card product was faster than Lexar Media digital
film memory cards in specific digital cameras. Judge Breyer described
SanDisk's chart as false and deceptive, and ordered SanDisk to
stop distributing the ``Capture Time Comparison'' chart. The Court's
decision to grant the motion for preliminary injunction is a major
win for Lexar Media. (04:00 GMT)
Nikon
today announce the Coolpix 800, a half-way ground between the
Coolpix 700 and Coolpix 950. The 800 features the same proven
2.11 megapixel CCD with an all new 2x optical zoom lens (38-76mm,
35mm equiv) in a similar small package to the Coolpix 700. The
800 also has a couple of new interesting (if questionably useful)
features. Competition to the upcoming Canon S10 ? MSRP $700.
[UPDATED: 8:40PM Tokyo
Time, includes Nikon US press release](04:00 GMT)
PC Watch Digital Camera Sales Charts:
In Japan, the Olympus C-2000Z pops to the top of the charts, but the
Fuji MX1500 holds strong at second place. New entries in at six and
seventh places are the Fuji MX1700Z and Olympus C-2500L. (04:00 GMT)
CompactFlash and SmartMedia Slug It Out for Dominance
In the Digital Camera Market, IDC Says:
While most digital camera vendors easily agree that flash memory is
the most effective method to capture digital images, the debate rages
on as to whether CompactFlash or SmartMedia is more effective. According
to International Data Corporation (IDC), the two camps won't come
to an agreement any time soon. (04:00 GMT)
At long last and after a lot of anticipation Agfa
have sealed their tie-up with Iomega with a real product. It's
a 1 megapixel digicam with a fixed lens, the damage? $549!! Yeah..
right. Here's what they say:
"Agfa Corporation's Desktop Products Group
(USA-DTP), a leading provider of award-winning digital cameras
and desktop scanners, introduces the ePhoto CL30 Clik!(TM) digital
camera - a high-performing, USB-compatible digital camera offering
40 megabytes of removable storage on Iomega Clik! disks. The ePhoto
CL30 Clik! digital camera is the first digital camera to offer
a built-in Iomega Clik!(TM) drive." (04:00 GMT)
Minolta
have finally announced (although many of you knew of it already)
the quirky RD3000. This odd looking digital SLR features two 1.5
megapixel CCDs to produce a total resolution of 2.7 megapixels.
It takes Vectis lenses and is priced at 360,000 YEN (US$3,240).
These samples, taken by their resident pro photographer
Yamada were taken using what PC Watch call a "production body"
in RAW format then compressed back into JPEG for viewing in a web
browser. Note: my D1 gallery contains combinations of straight JPEGs
and RAWs exported from Nikon View DX as JPEG. (04:00 GMT)
Say What? Yup... they've dropped the official price
to $549, other than that it's the old camera:
Agfa Corporation's Desktop Products Group (USA-DTP),
a leading provider of award-winning digital cameras and desktop
scanners today introduces the ePhoto 1680 LE (limited edition)
- a streamlined version of the award-winning ePhoto 1680 digital
camera. The ePhoto 1680 LE will be available in the U.S. in October,
for the suggested price of $549. (04:00 GMT)
EXCLUSIVE:
I have had an exclusive hands-on preview and shooting session
with the latest pre-production model of the Nikon D1 (Sample 235),
this generation three pre-production camera is said to be very
close to the final production unit.
Updated Nikon D1 article
along with 28 exclusive sample shots (with untouched original
images).(04:00 GMT)
Introducing
a new level of interactivity to readers of Digital Photography Review.
Do you own a Digital Camera? Probably, in a recent survey we conducted
over 65% of you do. Noting a recent trend on the Forums of people
posting mini-reviews we've now extended the functionality of the Cameras
Database to accept Owners Ratings and Owners Reviews (in short Owners
Opinion). (04:00 GMT)
Fuji
today announced their latest in a now vast range of digital cameras,
the budget MX-1200 aimed squarely at the $300 price level. It's a
1.3 megapixel, 38mm fixed lens, SmartMedia digicam with tiny proportions
and light weight. (04:00 GMT)
A very short item this one, but I've had a rumour (and
I don't normally publish unconfirmed rumours but this one is just
TOO interesting). The rumour is that the D1 will indeed have an interchangeable
CCD, that means that in its current configuration it'll be 2.74 megapixels.
Nikon would then in the future release upgrades (probably only installable
by their service centers) which would allow you to always be on the
cutting edge of image resolution. If this is true it makes the D1
a very, very economical purchase and almost future-proofs it (especially
if the firmware is user-upgradeable which we can assume it will be). (04:00 GMT)
PC Watch's resident professional photographer Yamada
has updated his large array of sample images from most of the current
(and upcoming) digital cameras on the market, a great way for you
to see how the image quality of one camera stands up against another.
Updated (now fine weather shots): Toshiba PDR-M5, Casio QV-2000UX,
QV-8000SX. Fuji MX1700Z UPDATED: ADDED SONY
DSC-F505 Samples (04:00 GMT)
I
often get requests from readers for "more flesh tone photos",
well these aren't mine but are some I found on a popular Japanese
site "ASCII/DOS V", their resident professional photographer
Kazuhisa Nishikawa has posted two small galleries of F505 and C-2500L
shots, there's even a Canon EOS D2000 (Kodak DCS520) gallery to compare
them to. (04:00 GMT)
Steve's
been busy again, this time with the Casio QV-2000UX, which looks to
be an interesting camera with some neat features (not least of being
the ability to create HTML index pages within the camera)... "The
QV-2000UX proves that Casio is up to the challenge, it is a 2.1 megapixel
camera that easily competes (and beats) many other cameras. It features
a CompactFlash Type II slot that handles any size CF Type I card or
the IBM Microdrive. There's USB connectivity for very fast downloads
to PC or Mac computers. Inside is a large internal RAM buffer that
allows capture of up to 5 full-size images at the rate of one picture
every 1.5 seconds. " (04:00 GMT)
Thanks to Andy Williams who sent over this hot news
story from the excellent UK technology journal "The Register":
You could soon talk on your mobile phone for much longer between battery
recharge sessions, thanks to some nifty research from Tottori University
in Japan. If the breakthrough gains commercial acceptance, the life
of a lithium ion (Li-Ion) battery could be 30 times as long. (04:00 GMT)
PC Watch report on another day at PC Expo 99, Japan.
This time not that much on the Digital Photography front other than
a MemoryStick USB reader/writer, Lexar's JumpShot USB CompactFlash
card, HP's new printer with SmartMedia and CompactFlash slots. (04:00 GMT)
PC Watch's resident professional cameraman Yamada reports
on the World PC Expo 99 in Japan for the second time, this time he
visits Kodak, Casio, Ricoh, Canon, Epson, Toshiba and Panasonic (Matsushita
in Japan). (04:00 GMT)
Panasonic
have today announced the PV-SD4090 which can save images onto the
120MB SuperDisk diskette format as well as traditional 1.44MB floppy
disks. The PV-SD4090 is a 1.3 megapixel 3x zoom (34 - 102mm equiv)
with a 2.5" LCD display is an interesting move from Panasonic.
Especially as you can buy a 10 pack of 120MB SuperDisks for US$85
($0.07/MB). Although of course you'll need a SuperDisk drive in your
computer... The damage? US$899... (17:35 GMT)
PC
Watch have posted the specifications of Toshiba's upcoming PDR-M5,
it has the fairly generic 2.14 megapixels, 3 x zoom (40mm - 120mm),
up to 2 minute motion JPEG AVI video, SmartMedia and USB. More specs
inside. (Anyone else think it looks like a whale?) (04:00 GMT)
PC Watch Digital Camera Sales Charts:
In Japan, the Fuji MX1500 still holds the number one place closely
followed by the Olympus C-2000Z (they're selling a barrel load of
these!) and the Sanyo DSC-SX150. Amazingly the ever faithful Olympus
C900-Zoom (D400Z) hangs on for fourth place. The Nikon Coolpix 950
surges on the back of new stock. (04:00 GMT)
The observant amongst you may have noticed the addition
of "www.dpreview.com" under the logo in the side-bar.
This is an indication of our new domain name, you can now access
the site at our new address of www.dpreview.com,
we intend on leaving the old photo.askey.net address for
as long as possible. (04:00 GMT)
Many
thanks to Steven Dong who posted this hot tip on the forums, Canon
have put specifications and two sample images from their tiny 2.1
megapixel marvel the Canon PowerShot S10. From what I can see of the
sample images the quality of shots from this camera is very
impressive. (04:00 GMT)
PC
Watch's resident pro photograph Yamada reports on the digital cameras
on show at the special preview day of World PC Expo 99, Chiba, Japan.
Sony and Nikon steal the show, Sony with a 40:1 scaled-up model of
the DSC-F505, Nikon give visitors opportunity to have hands-on with
the D1 (still prototype). (04:00 GMT)
Sony Core technology announce ICX252 series of 3.24
megapixel (2088 x 1550) CCD's, ushering in a potential new wave of
3 megapixel digital cameras. The CCD comes in two different packages
and two different colour array patterns. (04:00 GMT)
This is the second big comparison PC Watch have posted,
their resident professional photographer Yamada has compiled this
large array of sample images from most of the current (and upcoming)
digital cameras on the market, a great way for you to see how the
image quality of one camera stands up against another. Added this
time are: Olympus C-2500L, Sony DSC-F505, Fuji MX1700Z and Casio QV-2000UX. (04:00 GMT)
Delkin Devices Introduces the Highest Capacity CompactFlash
Card On the Market, new 128MB CompactFlash card. We previously reported
on Delkins announcement of up to 80MB (soon to be 224MB) CF type II
cards, this 128MB monster is a type I card which means it will work
in the majority of CF digital cameras. (04:00 GMT)
The
previously-thought-of-as-vapourware company Imagek has changed
its name to Silicon Film and is now touting a 24 shot, 1280 x
1024 insertable digital film cartridge solution for traditional
35mm cameras.
Thanks to Steves-Digicams for the lead on this
story. (04:00 GMT)
Potential advertisers, there are now more reasons
than ever to advertise on Digital Photography Review. Over
the last nine months we've seen a progressive climb in visitors.
We're now helping to keep over 10,000 unique visitors per day
informed of the latest in digital photography and digital imaging,
helping thousands of people each week make informed decisions
about the digital photography product purchases.
If your company is in any way related to digital
photography or digital imaging you should be seriously considering
advertising on Digital Photography Review.
A new feature on this site will soon be the ability
to search the news archives, free text, "plain english"
and logical searching will be supported, the search engine is
currently undergoing testing, as part of this I'm making the search
page (still in BETA) available for any brave souls who wish to
test it.
Please don't "TRY" to break it but use
it as you would normally and feedback any bugs or suggestions
you may have. (04:00 GMT)
Here
from an anonymous source is a shot of a prototype Epson PhotoPC 850Z,
this interesting 2.11 megapixel camera has a fast F2.0 - F2.8, three
times zoom lens (35mm - 105mm), flash hot-shoe, USB and can take CompactFlash
type I or type II (meaning it can take the new larger capacity CF
cards such as IBM's 340MB Microdrive). (04:00 GMT)
Sony
today announced that they will be licensing their MemoryStick technology
to six other companies: Fujitsu, Aiwa, Sanyo, Sharp, Pioneer and Kenwood.
This in an attempt not to repeat the Betamax debacle. (04:00 GMT)
Nikon
today announce the Coolpix 800, a half-way ground between the
Coolpix 700 and Coolpix 950. The 800 features the same proven
2.11 megapixel CCD with an all new 2x optical zoom lens (38-76mm,
35mm equiv) in a similar small package to the Coolpix 700. The
800 also has a couple of new interesting (if questionably useful)
features. Competition to the upcoming Canon S10 ? MSRP $700.
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