The newer Olympus cameras, from the C-3040Z onwards, are seen by the computer as a removable drive. But this has nothing to do with the firmware upgrades.
I don't know about anyone else, but I'm given great pause at even
considering another Olympus brand camera when I finally make the
move past my Uzi/Ezi. (Unless maybe I could find a like-new E-10
for $400)
The primary reason is that they obviously knew that a good number
of the early Uzi run units had a problem with the power board that
induces SDS. IMHO, every camera with that revision of power board
is simply a ticking time bomb, and rather than acknowledge the
defect, they've publicly kept quiet about it hoping a bunch of
cameras will be out of warranty when the bomb finally goes off.
That's not the way I like to see the companies I do business with
operate -- especially for high ticket items.
A few other reasons I may switch camps:
Firmware "hard coded". Canon and Minolta have released
user-installable firmware upgrades that have significantly improved
the operation of their cameras, and at no cost. I wouldn't even
mind paying for an upgrade if it didn't cost me a $294 "minimum
repair cost".
The stupid Olympus panorama "feature". We all know you can do
panos without it, or hack up a card to enable the thing -- that's
not the point. It's that they sell/market it as a feature of the
"special" SM/XD cards when the feature is really in the camera's
firmware and it's disabled unless you give in to their
"blackmail" to unlock the feature. As a consumer I find that
disingenuous and insulting behavior.
So... am I alone? And does Olympus care? I don't think they do.
I think as long as they're moving product off the shelf today, they
could care less about building good faith and brand loyalty for
long term sales tomorrow.
My Uzi is fine thanks. I think I'm in pretty good shape personally. I sent it in for a few hot pixels before its warranty was up and specifically asked them to check the power board. They acknowledged, and said it was ok. I got the extra 2 years "just in case" for other things, since there's so many mechanical things inside.
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I don't know about anyone else, but I'm given great pause at even
considering another Olympus brand camera when I finally make the
move past my Uzi/Ezi. (Unless maybe I could find a like-new E-10
for $400)
The primary reason is that they obviously knew that a good number
of the early Uzi run units had a problem with the power board that
induces SDS. IMHO, every camera with that revision of power board
is simply a ticking time bomb, and rather than acknowledge the
defect, they've publicly kept quiet about it hoping a bunch of
cameras will be out of warranty when the bomb finally goes off.
That's not the way I like to see the companies I do business with
operate -- especially for high ticket items.
A few other reasons I may switch camps:
Firmware "hard coded". Canon and Minolta have released
user-installable firmware upgrades that have significantly improved
the operation of their cameras, and at no cost. I wouldn't even
mind paying for an upgrade if it didn't cost me a $294 "minimum
repair cost".
The stupid Olympus panorama "feature". We all know you can do
panos without it, or hack up a card to enable the thing -- that's
not the point. It's that they sell/market it as a feature of the
"special" SM/XD cards when the feature is really in the camera's
firmware and it's disabled unless you give in to their
"blackmail" to unlock the feature. As a consumer I find that
disingenuous and insulting behavior.
So... am I alone? And does Olympus care? I don't think they do.
I think as long as they're moving product off the shelf today, they
could care less about building good faith and brand loyalty for
long term sales tomorrow.
--http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1008&message=4708660
Basically it points out that Oly cameras can be very sensitive to
Windows or other OSes writing to the card. The old "format in a
Fuji" thing.
To me that says they have done a less than thorough job of
implementing a proper file system for handling media cards.
Sure... not their fautl if someone reformats a card in Windows to
FAT32 when they only use/understand FAT, but why should extra files
present that conform to the FAT standard set the firmware into a
tailspin?
The "worst" thing is that it can refuse to even let you try to
format a card when that happens. The worst case should be it
says "I can't figure this card out... would you like me to format
it?"
Then we'd have less of a need for threads like this one:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1008&message=4513656
I don't know about anyone else, but I'm given great pause at even
considering another Olympus brand camera when I finally make the
move past my Uzi/Ezi. (Unless maybe I could find a like-new E-10
for $400)
The primary reason is that they obviously knew that a good number
of the early Uzi run units had a problem with the power board that
induces SDS. IMHO, every camera with that revision of power board
is simply a ticking time bomb, and rather than acknowledge the
defect, they've publicly kept quiet about it hoping a bunch of
cameras will be out of warranty when the bomb finally goes off.
That's not the way I like to see the companies I do business with
operate -- especially for high ticket items.
A few other reasons I may switch camps:
Firmware "hard coded". Canon and Minolta have released
user-installable firmware upgrades that have significantly improved
the operation of their cameras, and at no cost. I wouldn't even
mind paying for an upgrade if it didn't cost me a $294 "minimum
repair cost".
The stupid Olympus panorama "feature". We all know you can do
panos without it, or hack up a card to enable the thing -- that's
not the point. It's that they sell/market it as a feature of the
"special" SM/XD cards when the feature is really in the camera's
firmware and it's disabled unless you give in to their
"blackmail" to unlock the feature. As a consumer I find that
disingenuous and insulting behavior.
So... am I alone? And does Olympus care? I don't think they do.
I think as long as they're moving product off the shelf today, they
could care less about building good faith and brand loyalty for
long term sales tomorrow.
