Gamdek
Member
This is because that way you can choose what card to get instead of getting one that maybe you will not want.
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No. 1 new user complaint.
- Thread starter ludwik123
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Steve110587
Senior Member
yup.. my EM1 has a 'test shot' mode.. you can experiment all you want with the settings without a card.
M
MPrince
Guest
I am not, in fact, certain that you're wrong. I don't know that you're right, either, since you have so far refused to document your claim. You can try to copout if you want by telling me to do a Google search, but you made the claim, and the burden of proof falls to you.
Dan Marchant
Senior Member
Thanks Steve. Really enjoying black n white. Been going back through my old images with a new eye looking for ones that make good B&W. Interesting how many of the images that were uninteresting in colour make stunning black n whites.
Sorry but sad storage in a phone or tabet is different than just a single 64, 128, or 256 GB memory card installed in a card slot. Fundamentally different and costs are not the same.
Cameras are certainly not going away, but they are moving from a mainstream product to a specialty product. Sort of like vinyl records, or CB radios.
Take a look at the number of "imaging devices" shipped in 2013:
- 1,009,000,000 Smartphones
- ...195,435,004 Tablets
- .....62,839,653 Cameras
- 45.7 were P&S cameras
- 13.8 million were DSLRs,
- ..3.3 million were MILC
Over 1.2 BILLION imaging devices, and only 1.3% of them are ILCs. The other 99.7% are pretty much point and shoot devices, designed for snapshots and casual photography.
And this might explain why cameras are getting more expensive, sensors are getting larger, and optical zoom ranges are going through the roof. The manufacturers are taking their products to places where smartphones can't go.
At lest, not yet.
More likely, they will buy a memory card. I suppose in your world, people only drives their cars until they runs out of gas and then they go back to taking the bus.
I have never bought a camera with no battery included, nor a car. Never bought a car with not enough fuel to get me home, and I have bought more than a few new ones, many from more than 50 miles away. Never bought a printer with no starter ink cartridges.
However, all recent cameras have not had a starter card. This does not worry ME, but for someone having a camera for the first time, perhaps as a present, it is very frustrating. One £ or $ to include a bit of internal memory or a 500meg card would result in all people, not just those in the know, being satisfied and happy with the unwrapping and initial experience process.
Hi Marty,
I agree with much of what you say, but there is one point that seems to be worth making:
While there are 1.2 BILLION imaging devices sold, my bet is that, while we can be fairly certain that a camera was bought as an imaging device(!), many of the smartphones and tablets will not have been. In the last two years I have bought a smartphone, 2 tablets (first one broke), a top range DSLR and a waterproof camera. I barely use the smartphone to take photos, and have never used the tablets to take photos.
I agree that smartphones/tablets have replaced many P&S purchases, but some are not being used as cameras at all, and some are people who would never have bought a camera if they had not bought the smartphone/tablet.
Mike CH
Veteran Member
The sky is falling, the sky is falling, the sky is falling. No, it's not.
That's great, isn't it? People can buy devices which fit their needs.
Before smartphones and tablets came, where there ever 1 billion imaging devices sold in a year? If not, where is the problem? Replacing P&Ss? Why is that a problem? So DSLRs and MILCs are shrinking a bit? Who said that they could continue growing? Market is saturated.
Yes. And? They will still be here, 17 mil devices is still a big number, right? Unless of course producers and consumers alike start wailing, "gotta be nr 1, gotta be nr 1, gotta be nr 1 - or I won't play"
That is not a reason to make cameras like smart phones, now is it? Because if you do that, well, then they will disappear completely. Before smartphones can enter their territory.
I so wish people would stop being scared of smartphones... says the guy with a FF DSLR...
Regards, Mike
enemjii
Senior Member
Lol Signed by Steve Jobs? --Yes, if they're "collectible" cards someone mentioned.
Mike CH
Veteran Member
dmartin92
Senior Member
That is exactly right.
I mean, what's the deal here ? The winter is setting in and people have too much time on their hands ?
What exactly is being said here ? Just trying to trace it out, I think the idea is that the failure of digital camera companies to include an inexpensive storage card in the box that the camera comes in is going to disillusion new camera buyers, this in turn will result in lower digital camera sales, and that will cause problems for the industry, and we're all going to end up paying a fortune for our next digital camera.
And we're already up to over 130 follow-up comments.
Just taking a step back from it, and looking at the thread with open eyes, it gives me a chuckle.
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Gerry Winterbourne
Forum Pro
Consider the concept of consumables.
The ink is consumable (as indeed, as mentioned in other posts, is fuel in a car). If the maker puts in a small or large amount you use it until it's consumed and then you top it up. You expect that - it's the same thing whether the maker puts it in or you do. Either way, you buy the machine expecting a constant series of replacements of consumables.
The battery sometimes isn't consumable, sometimes is. The non-consumable type is effectively part of the machine (removable for charging, of course) and there's no big decision about which sort is needed. So there's no wastage by including it. Consumable batteries are just that, and follow the same logic as above.
The card isn't consumable, so if thrown away because it's not what the user wants it's a waste. I've written in another post about waste.
So the fundamental difference is what I've said. Putting a small amount of memory in by way of a card - in every camera, even though most will be discarded - is simply a gross waste of resources. Putting it into the camera itself may be easy or difficult, wasteful or not (I don't have the knowledge to judge) but it certainly increases complexity for the new user and, in practice, doesn't really help.
Complexity? You buy a camera whose mainstream storage system is a removable card. When you switch it on does it just use its internal memory without warning? If so, you take handful of shots and then hit the same wall - no more pictures.
Or does it come up with a warning when you switch on for the first time "This device can take X photos that you have to upload to a computer with a cable; after that you need to use a card that can be uploaded in different ways (see manual)"? If so, after someone has tried it in a shop it's no longer on first switch-on so the new user doesn't see it.
Or does the message come up until the user buys a card and then goes into a menu to cancel the message? As I said, complexity for someone new that doesn't really understand the thing in the first place. And, of course, an irritation for the majority of buyers who already know about cards.
To say that you are splitting hairs and arguing for the sake of it, is an understatement. There is nothing more wasteful than disposable batteries or fuel or ink for printing. Not only do they constitute more bulk and more toxic waste but more cost than a low capacity card weighing a fraction of an ounce and costing about 1 unit of currency. And of course, memory, although reusable, is storable and tends to be added to.
This is about the usability of a camera to a new user, out of the box. 'Customer satisfaction' for new users.
Morever, if the card is not needed, which it won't be by a high percentage of people, probably the majority, they could always donate it to a good cause or to someone that will appreciate it more than they do. It does not deteriorate with storage and is durable and eminently useful to someone, if only as an emergency storage for a limited number of images [or any other data for that matter].
It's all about customer satisfaction and convenience. The argument about a waste is rubbish in a world led by consumer consumption of things way more wasteful than a dollar's worth of plastic card, including the whole camera itself which is an extravagance of grand scale on its own account and in comparison. Especially coming from an American [which I assume, possibly wrongly, you are] who wastes more of the Earth's resources daily than any other being on the face of the planet and where an ounce of extra plastic pales into complete insignificance compared with just the extra fuel you use on a ten mile journey compared with the same journey undertaken anywhere else outside the Arab States.
Mike CH
Veteran Member
No, he is not.
Maybe
Not at all
Even if it is a cheap one collecting dust in the drawer two days later? As the happy buyer realised that a) it was a bit crappy and b) only there anyway to permit the producer to write Card Included! on the box?
Ah, yes. Instant gratification. What would we do without it? It is getting more and more difficult to imagine a world where can be expected to think a bit...
Well, if Gerry is splitting hairs (which he is not), then you are really, really reaching
Reagards, Mike
Gerry Winterbourne
Forum Pro
Mike has already given most of the appropriate answers so I won't repeat them.
As I've already said, http://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/54873397. "... mentions excess packaging - we should want that reduced, not use it as an argument in favour of yet more waste."
I've already covered the relationship between a few new users and the informed majority. See my next paragraph ...
... what you are suggesting is that the informed majority, who don't want the cards, should be put to the trouble of finding a home for them to save a little inconvenience to the ignorant few. In other words, trade widespread customer dissatisfaction in favour of a localised increase.
See above.
Why assume when it takes one click to look at my profile to see that you are wrong. It would have taken less time than to type what you have ...
But this generalised running down of a race prompted the title of my post ...
I thought they are in fact the same type of memory. Granted one can get sd cards that are sdhc, sdxc and such and even though they have some subtle differences in speed and connectors, overall they are the same style of memory. Now solid state drives (ssd) for computers on the other hand are different than the phone and sd card storage.
If you can prove that I'm wrong then I'm certainly welcome to learning something new.
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