I am sorry but you are grossly mistaken on the entire issue. This isnt about things lasting forever. This is about compatability vs support. The K/M lenses are in NO WAY incompatable with the current mount (FA). What they are doing is DISABLING the features of these lenses even thought there are millions of them out there in perfect working conditon because they were made so well. **IF** and it's a big IF, there was some new feature or progress needed in the mount that necessitated the K/M support removal in order to move on or support something new and improved like imagae stabilization,etc then it would be reasonable to consider it because often progress is more important than compatiblity but this isnt the case, this is pure removal of support of a COMPATABLE lenses, millions of them, not just mine, WITHOUT ANY PROGRESS or new lens mount feature that necessitated it. Why is that so hard for you to understand??? jco
-----Original Message----- From: John Forbes [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, September 20, 2005 3:28 AM To: pentax-discuss@pdml.net Subject: Re: Camera engineering (was Re: Rename request) We know that Pentax have lost one sale, so far. Not a lot, really. And all they have lost is the sale of a body. It is quite clear that the person in question won't buy another lens if he lives for four hundred years. I'd love to know what car /cart he drives, and I'm surprised his old Apple II can manage to access the Internet. His clothes must look a bit ragged as well. But he's absolutely right to insist that things work for ever. Change is such a difficult thing to handle. He makes the Amish look positively groovy. John On Tue, 20 Sep 2005 06:27:22 +0100, Mark Erickson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > J. C. O'Connell wrote: >>> see my last post, engineering dollars? >>> that cam sensor was engineered 35 years >>> ago dude. Do you even know what we are >>> talking about here? Its ONE pot with >>> three wires on it read by a single A./D channel? >>> That's freakin' childs play. >>> >> Yes, the actual part is insignificant $, and most of the R&D is >> already paid for. I say most because each camera has pretty much its >> own unique firmware, so there is a piece of firmware (and R&D) that >> has to be added to every camera mode in order to support this. But >> this small delta cascades in many directions, i.e. in the user >> manual, it has to be documented, I already mentioned the firmware, >> the chip has to have that extra A/D channel you are talking about or >> you need a different more powerful (more expensive) chip, the support >> of that extra A/D channel plus voltage to the pot requires more >> power, hence reduced battery life, more wiring, a place on the >> circuit board to accept the wiring, hence requiring more space, more >> testing to make sure the firmware works in all the different modes, >> more testing to make sure the aperture simulator works, etc., etc. >> the list goes on I'm sure. > > Exactly. In addition, you can divide the costs into two parts: NRE > (non-recurring engineering, which is done once per model type and not > once > per unit manufactured), and per-unit costs due to parts, assembly, and > testing. > > Even if the per-unit costs are zero (i.e., the additional parts and > manufacturing are free), it may not be worthwhile to add a feature if > the development costs cannot be recovered via additional sales. My > guess is that the number of people who refuse to buy a Pentax DSLR because of > their > lack of support for K/M lenses is not that big. What are the NRE costs > involved in including full K/M compatibility in a camera? I don't know. > I'm not a high-volume digital camera engineer. > > Anyone here with manufacturing engineering background care to actually > make > some estimates? Say in the number of engineering hours, broken down into > design, development, integration, and test? Anyone care to estimate the > number of lost sales of *istD and *istDs cameras due to limited K/M > support? > 100 cameras? 1000? 1 million? > > --Mark > > > > > -- Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/m2/ -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.344 / Virus Database: 267.11.1/104 - Release Date: 16/09/2005
