On 03.6.4 3:45 PM, "Roland Mabo" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Pentax is not alone, Fuji is delaying also. What a relief! :-) There has been a chronic parts shortage in Japan in the recent few months and the delay was not just by Pentax but across the board. Looking through some of the news articles in Japan, it started as the shortage of lenses for compact digitals. Then SARS hit China, causing the shortage of other parts (no kidding!). There are a lot of parts coming from or being assembled in China (transplanted factories etc) these days and the parts shortage is said to be serious. Most camera makers have 90% of the parts ready but cameras cannot be cameras without the rest 10%. Things like low pass filters and A/D converter chips etc and other small parts are in shortage. CCD is also in a shortage (initial reason why Pentax could not assemble *istD). I interpreted that the components or things to assemble CCD were in shortage. There was a rumour that Nikon tried to steal as many CCDs as possible from Sony which was a deliberate attempt to crush *istD. This is a "rumour" but I tend to believe it as it is a common knowledge in Japan that N always interferes with Pentax. N's DSLR is really lagging behind and they might be a bit desperate? :-). Poor Pentax was hit by this situation just when they were ready to launch *istD. A few months difference in digicam biz is huge and hope Pentax is taking advantage of this slack time to bring their design further forward to meet the expectation at the time of the release. Cheers, Ken
