Godfrey wrote: > I have several times nearly bought an Olympus E-1. It was the hottest > contender next to Pentax when I was choosing what to buy in late > 2004
When the E-1 first came out (fall 2003), I had been selling cameras for about a year. The Pentax *istD was coming out at the time, and I was trying to decide which I should get. I owned a Pentax ZX-30, plus a couple Sigma lenses, so it would be good to not have to buy extra lenses for the D. I also owned an Olympus C-3030, their first 3 megapixel P&S camera. I loved it, and had become an Olympus digital fan at work. In the lead-up to the E-1's release, none of us thought much of the camera (aside from our boss, who had gotten to try one at PMA that year). It had only five megapixels, instead of the then-standard six in everyone else's cameras. I was disappointed that the camera only used Compact Flash memory instead of Olympus' new XD format, because of the "bent pin" problem I've mentioned in other threads. When we finally got the camera in the store, a few of my coworkers fell in love with it immediately. It was built like a tank (seriously. you should have seen how beat-up the Olympus tech rep's sample was, and it still functioned flawlessly), and the original lens lineup was fast and SHARP! We shot sample pics frequently and printed them at 12x18 (which was the largest size our Agfa printers could produce). The fact that it was the only camera at the time with dust-removal made it relatively simple to sell if the customer wasn't worried about price. Price. That was the downside, for my purchasing choice. The E-1 system was built for professionals, and I just couldn't swing that kind of cash. I got the *istD and the rest, as far as my Pentax obsession goes, is history. At first, my coworkers and I didn't sell many E-1s, because the price was something hard for customers to swallow. We were in an affluent area, but $2000+ (for just the camera and one lens) is hard to sell to most people. The Olympus rep, along with my boss, frequently told us that the E-1 was a great thing to sell, because lenses and accessories couldn't be found anywhere else, so people would come back to us for their next purchases. It made sense, but it didn't help very much. Then Olympus had a sales contest. First person to sell 20 E-1s would get a free outfit. Our best salesmen, who I'll call R and S, went into competition mode and started pushing the camera like crazy. Eventually, the contest was opened to anyone who sold 15 cameras, and then the rest of us started loving the E-1. Before you accuse us of something, I'd like to mention that every camera company offers sales incentives and contests from time to time. Olympus was desperately trying to get its brand-new camera out into the market, so they were a little more aggressive than other companies. Besides, we all loved the camera, and we never tried to push it on people who came in for something specific (like if they asked for a specific camera, instead of "show me some digital SLRs"). That would be unethical. So, we all loved the E-1. I sometimes wished I'd bought one instead of my D because of dust issues, but then I remembered Pentax's much smaller size backwards-compatibility and was content. By the end of the contest, half my coworkers were shooting E-1s, and I was THIS close to getting one for myself. I didn't make it, but I did manage to get myself a really nice pair of Olympus binoculars. Then the lower-end Evolt E-300 came out. Noisy as hell, with it's eight megapixels, and the kit lenses weren't nearly as good as the original E-1 lenses. Still, it was a popular camera, and the dust-removal feature was a Canon- and Nikon-killer for most soccer moms. Our rep kept saying an E-2 would be coming soon, but it never came. The E-500 showed up one day, and it became a big seller. I think its more conventional SLR look helped with that. I'm really not sure why they went back to the flat design for the E-330, but the "live view" thing seemed popular. Let's not mention the E-400. Anyway, enough rambling! The E-1 was a fantastic camera, but later models with higher resolutions have been plagued with bad noise problems. If you ask me, the reason the E-2 has been delayed so many times is because of the noise issue. The 4/3 sensor is just too dang small to handle the kind of resolution that professionals want these days, I think. However, Olympus' digital Zuiko lenses, the pro-end ones anyway, are really fantastic. I saw probably hundreds of enlargements from the E- cameras with a variety of lenses, and they were usually tack-sharp. In my opinion, unless Olympus comes up with something revolutionary to combat noise in their future E-2 model, they're going to lose the dSLR war and disappear from that market, like when they dropped their OM line. It'll be a sad day, considering how much money they invested in the 4/3 system and how good their first entry was. Now we find out if a post this long will make it past the list's size filter... John -- http://www.neovenator.com http://www.cafepress.com/neovenatorphoto -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
