$6999 for the M9, what about M8 and M8.2 prices?

[brachal]

"Once that's out of the way, many DSLR users who secretly wanted a Leica (with the convenience of digital, of course) will go for it."

I don't know. They would still have to buy into a collection of expensive lenses. We continually here overestimate the market for new RF's in general and DRF's in particular.

If I buy a M9, I'll buy a couple of LTM to M adapters and stick my Jupiter-8 and 35mm CV Skopar on it.

 

[dcsang]

Once we enter the digital camera arena, we need to expect cameras to depreciate in a similar fashion as computer do each year. Longevity of any specific digital camera is questionable. We are in the disposable items age.

Raid gets it (in terms of used equipment that is).

Used 1Ds MK III's have recently been going for $5200 CDN - that's about $4800 USD

Initially that was announced back in 2007 (about 2 years ago now) for $8,000 USD MSRP.

The previous version? 1Ds MK II? Well, recently as low as $2600 CDN and when that was announced initially it was $8,000 USD MSRP back in 2004.

Neither of those pro cameras were aimed at computer nerds either. 🙂

The M8 is now going for as low as $2200-$2500 USD here. And it's still being made (apparently) and sold at $4000 USD via B&H. Who would have thought that it would "depreciate" in the used arena unlike, say, M3's that initially held their value and even increased over time.. only now to be coming back to earth due to the supposed "death" of film 🙄 Yet there are the examples of Canon and Nikon and other digital bodies before them that points to such a fact.

Depreciation of this equipment has got nothing to do with how "luxurious" these things are; not anymore at least. This is all about electronics and the fact that there are still advancements and improvements to be made; no matter how small, in the arena. The only reason Leicas will not depreciate is that no one else is making a full frame digital RF camera.

Leica has at least "listened" (this time) to it's constituents and created something that they requested. The value of the M9 will be upheld for the time being. I too don't think it will remain as high we might think though once they start hitting the used market (should they that is) 😀

Cheers,
Dave

 

[Jeff Day]

The inclusion of the Maestro chip, electronics miniaturization leading to a digital-M the size of the M6, better Dynamic Range and noise characteristics... When Leica release the M10 people will find the reasons to upgrade.

I suspect that the time for the M9 to become dated will be about the same as the M8/M8.2, or about 3 years. So I suspect we will see an M10 in 2012.

Nevertheless, I have my M9 on order.

Best,

Jeff

 

[Sonnar Brian]

> not at computer nerds who play memory-hungry games on machines that are more
> powerful than those which NASA used to put a man on the moon.

Many Thousands of times more powerful than the computer that NASA used.

"The Apollo AGC itself is a piece of computing history, it was developed by the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory and it was a quite amazing piece of hardware in the 1960s. It was the first computer to use integrated circuits (ICs), running at 1 Mhz it offered four 16-bit registers, 4K words of RAM and 32K words of ROM. The AGC mutlitasking operating system was called the EXEC, it was capable of executing up to 8 jobs at a time. The user interface unit was called the DSKY (display/keyboard, pronounced "disky"); an array of numerals and a calculator-style keyboard used by the astronauts to communicate with the computer." From:

http://www.galaxiki.org/web/main/_b...nasa-apollo-landing-computer-no-kidding.shtml

I still have my Z80a computer, 4Mhz Z80a w 64KBytes of RAM. It's more powerful than some of the embedded processors that I use these days.

The M9 "only" has 11 times the pixels that my 1.6MPixel 1992 DSLR has. Progress in Sensor technology does not follow Moore's law. It does not double every two years.

 

[Pickett Wilson]

Imsai 8080 here. The computer the kid had in "War Games." Those were the days.

God, I'm old.

 

[250swb]

"Once that's out of the way, many DSLR users who secretly wanted a Leica (with the convenience of digital, of course) will go for it."

I don't know. They would still have to buy into a collection of expensive lenses. We continually here overestimate the market for new RF's in general and DRF's in particular.

Thats very true. Althought it still only takes just one manufacturer to nail an alternative cheaper camera to have the chair completely kicked out from under Leica and their whole design regime.

The higher end of what the M9 can produce isn't going to be realised in a normal 16"x20" print typical of the upper reaches of RF folklore. So up to that size and IQ the Leica world is already having a minor kicking from the likes of Panasonic.

People worry now about what the M9 is doing to the prices of M8 and M8.2, but they should be worried about the residual price of the M9 in the next 18 months as well.

Steve

 

[ferider]

Once that's out of the way, many DSLR users who secretly wanted a Leica (with the convenience of digital, of course) will go for it.

I also predict the spike on well-heeled digital people getting to know this "manual focusing" -thing 🙄

I agree. We'll get a bunch of new (well-heeled) RF users. This also means:

- the used market for LTM and M "cult" lenses will take a hike. Including teles this time. So hold on to your Canon 50/1.5, Summicron v4, rigid Summicron, 135/2.8 Elmarit etc. Might be worth twice in a couple of months if clean. If extrapolating from the Noctilux price increase that came with the M8, the 75/1.4 will be worth twice what it is now in a year or so 🙂

- Don (DAG) will be inaccessible for 6-12 months to come, flooded with adjustments of "focus shift" of new M9 cameras and expensive lenses.

🙄

Roland.

 

[Pickett Wilson]

I had a TRS-80 Model 1. With the expansion interface and two 5.25 floppy drives. Cat would walk across the desk and the thing would lock up! Eventually came up with the buffered cable which helped a bit.

You must be old, too. 😉

 

[Ben Z]

As far as I'm concerned the depreciation on my M8 is just a paper loss until I sell it. I'm completely unaffected by full-frame-fever and though I still think the IR filters are idiocy, I'm used to them. I rarely shoot above ISO 320, and mostly 160. Even if I get an M9, which I probably will but not until there are demos <$5K, I'll still keep the M8 as a backup as long as it's still working. There's no way I'll give my M8 away. I shoot with a 5D but I still have my 20D as a backup.

 

[faris]

I am OLD!!😱

TRS-80
Apple ][
S-100 bus

Good old days. does anyone remember ' Byte ' magazine.

 

[miklosphoto]

I just decided to wait till 10/10/2010 to see if there is an M10 coming out.
🙂 Just kidding.
I am keeping my upgraded M8, period.

 

[tbm]

I took my R8 and 35mm, 90mm APO/ASPH, and 135mm lenses to a special farm event last Saturday halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco near the California coast with three rolls of Acros 100 and got outstanding images! I am still, and always will be, passionate about the extremely high quality of film and cringe at the thought of spending thousands of dollars for an M8 or M9 versus how much film I could buy instead! I love my M6 TTL and my R8 and all the compatible lenses I also have for both bodies and I will never switch to digital.

 

[aizan]

Dear Raid,

What improvements do you expect in an M9.2 or M10?

More megapixels (18 is enough for publication)? A different rangefinder? A different lens mount? Better manual focus? Better metering? More shutter speeds? What? Sure, higher ISO/less noise is possible, but again, if you're merely earnng a living with a camera, instead of buying bragging rights, how much more do you need than ISO 2500? Some do, perhaps, but not many. Likewise you can improve AWB and everything else; but an awful lot of buyers aren't going to care, because the M8.2 is already good enough.

In other words, likening an M9 to a computer, merely because both contain a lot of electronics, is facile and shallow. I really believe that it won't depreciate at anything like the rate of low-end consumer products, because it isn't a low-end consumer product and because it's aimed at photographers, not at computer nerds who play memory-hungry games on machines that are more powerful than those which NASA used to put a man on the moon.

Cheers,

R.

it'll probably depreciate at the rate of high-end digital cameras. there are also a bunch of features they could add without significant alterations:

- sensor based image stabilization
- autofocus, phase detect and contrast based (with live view, tripod work)
- dust filter
- weather sealing
- 920,000 dot lcd with wider viewing angle

 

[Pickett Wilson]

Remember Byte well.

 

[Keith]

Finaciancially I'm a long way from buying an M9 but I must admit if I had a spare lump of money I wouldn't hesitate. If this camera really adresses the issues that irked us all about the M8 then it will be nearly perfect and I fail to see how Leica could make sufficient improvements three years down the track to supercede it with an M10 or whatever. Having created the perfect 18 megapixel manual focus digital platform for their M lens range that is where they should spend their development budget ... lenses.

If they did turn around in three years and offer an M10 what could it possibly have to make people want to trade ... a 24 megapixel sensor, a stop better ISO performance, live view? There's really nowhere to go when you may have already ceated the perfect digital rangefinder because the design is so inherently simple and basic that it has limited scope for technological improvement that can actually be incorporated into it's function.

I suspect that in the future they will have to come up with some totally new designs to keep their meter ticking over and maybe they will venture into the area of video cams ... who knows? In the meantime though I supect they are going to sell a lot of M9's!

 

[Pickett Wilson]

I think the next big innovation will be a digital shutter. No moving parts. No noise. Would that nudge you into an M10, Keith? 😉

 

[ferider]

There are also a bunch of features they could add without significant alterations:

- :
- sensor based image stabilization
- :

"The Leica man knows how to hold his camera. He is never flustered, no matter what may be going on around him. The LEICA's image stabilization comes from the quiet, unflappable confidence inherent in every Leica photographer. " (KR)

🙂

 

[Sonnar Brian]

I am OLD!!😱

TRS-80
Apple ][
S-100 bus

Good old days. does anyone remember ' Byte ' magazine.

Remember Byte and some even older ones.

Funny that this ancient history for computers is about the same age as an M4P and F3HP.

Wang 360 Calculator, Nixie Tubes. Leica M4. Beatles. Shelby Cobra GT500. 1968. The Wang cost as much as a Shelby. But the Wang has a stuck bit in the accumulator...have to take it apart.

 

[snausages]

The thing I love most about the M9 so far is my $100 Olympus OM kit.

 

[Pickett Wilson]

Had a friend that worked was a repair tech for Wang back in the early 1980's.

I actually owned a PDP 11-73 and two huge cart drives back in the late 1980's. Didn't need a heater in the winter, but the neighbors complained about the brownouts every time I booted it up.