[reh321]

We know that the "accelerator" unit doesn't perform any denoising at ISO 100. So there's your solution, even in the completely implausible case that there wouldn't be a better way to avoid the "accelerator" processing. No need for an "off/on signal line".

We don't know what else is triggered by the ISO level .... if they set the ISO level to "100", the 'accelerator' may not boost the DR and CD appropriately and/or do other unexpected things,

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Last edited by reh321; 01-01-2019 at 06:56 PM.

[reh321]

I don't think they will release another FF this year, Reh. And possibly not an APS-C camera either, given the Photokina interview where it was only said development of a K-3 successor had 'started'.

Based on comments by @asahiman at DPR, I'm expecting/hoping for two FF cameras and at least two FF lenses during this "Centennial Year".

[clackers]

Based on comments by @asahiman at DPR, I'm expecting two FF cameras and at least two FF lenses during this "Centennial Year".

Contradicts what a product manager said recently. Asked about the 100th birthday he hinted 'something silver'. That sounds like a limited edition of an existing camera, not a new model.

What did the Oracle Asahiman say?

[reh321]

Contradicts what a product manager said recently. Asked about the 100th birthday he hinted 'something silver'. That sounds like a limited edition of an existing camera, not a new model.

What did the Oracle Asahiman say?

(This was just before Photokina)

Currently nearly all the development power is going into K fullframe SLR. Body and lens development,very interesting and in 2 classes. But, SLR!!

[Class A]

Generally I would agree, but then I find it very fair to use any data that is presented by a biased commenter if even this data is evidence against the claims made by the presenter.

Fair enough!

I 100% agree with you in that it is completely fine to use DPReview's inadequate camera comparison tool in order to point out that their conclusion, or at the very least their evaluation based on competitor performance, is not supported by their own data.

What I objected to earlier is the idea of using DPReview's inadequate data in order to argue that there is no issue at all with mandatory noise reduction of RAW data.

You use the word "harmful", which contains a judgement. I agree that any noise reduction will also remove detail.

Well, if you agree that noise reduction will also remove detail, you agree that some detail is "killed off", right? Killing something off is harmful, no?

I have no issue at all with people not being the least concerned with detail being killed off.
They have every right to be OK with the "harmful" behaviour, but it nevertheless remains "harmful"/"destructive", no?

My main point was that there is a K-1 II camera which outperforms all competing models in one aspect (detail retention in high ISO) even while doing something which in some small way reduces detail. And then it is being bashed big time for the latter.

You are preaching to the choir with respect to DPReview being entirely unreasonable.

I don't hold it against them that they are looking with a microscope at levels of detail that are immaterial to the vast majority of photographers. We could all just quickly agree that the level of detail destroyed by the K-1 II's processing is not worth talking about. However, in the same breath, we'd also have to question who really cares if a nameless star gets eaten by a Sony camera, one of several million in an image? Or that whether it matters that Sony's lossy compression adds a few normally invisible artefacts here and there? The cameras we are talking about are not scientific instruments, so we could forgive them all sorts of things.

However, I think it is fair to keep camera manufacturers honest and point out when they are making step backwards. From the perspective from a subset of photographers, the mandatory denoising of the K-1 II is a step backwards, now matter how small one assesses it to be.

No question that other manufacturers have taken much bigger steps backwards and would deserve much more pummelling for that. However, this is a matter of DPReview's unbalanced reporting, not a matter of whether or not people wishing for the K-1 II to provide an opt-out choice have a valid point.

The other side of the medal is fanboy tactics: write a whole article how something critical is not sooo bad and do this not in all cases but only for your preferred products.

It really is unbelievable.

They are seriously suggesting that running repair tools that patch up images so that artefacts are hidden are a proper solution. First of all, this patching up cannot reconstruct the data that has never been recorded in first place. Second, such patching tools interfere with the workflow of photographers. Am I supposed to batch-process all images before I import them to Lightroom/Capture One, or whatever? Really?

It is unreal what DPReview lets other cameras get away with while giving Pentax cameras a hard time (and assuming that a still photography camera cannot be recommended unless it excels at video, even though the latter can demonstrably impinge on still photography performance).

My frustration with DPReview is aggravated by the fact that they flat out deny their unbalanced treatment. I'd prefer if they owned their bias/mistakes. I could better accept their errors, if they admitted to the fact that they are not as familiar with Pentax cameras/settings/lenses as they are with other brands and hence make mistakes. I could better accept their failings, if they said that they do not have the resources to do justice to smaller players in the market; that they have to focus on the big ones and therefore, for instance, cannot take the time to test the astrotracer feature on the K-1. Instead we get a lame "Seattle weather" excuse.

The worst, though, is that they not only fail to own the fact that they aren't doing the Pentax brand justice, but actually turn the tables and claim that the "zealous" Pentaxians are the real issue. Their position is that they always apply the same assessments, evaluation, judgement, and that they don't use loaded language when describing Pentax products, but it is just the Pentaxians not accepting anything short of (quote) "uncritically gushing praise". With statements like the latter it almost looks like they are trying to see how far they can go before even Canikonyians will point out that DPReview took it too far.

I found it interesting that in their "2019 camera and lens manufacturers' New Year's resolutions", they gave pretty much every brand quite a good roasting but in the case of Pentax, they were rather friendly towards Pentax but instead chose to provoke Pentaxians. Interesting. Works for me, though! I'd rather have them be mad with us than be unreasonable towards Pentax!

[clackers]

(This was just before Photokina)

Okay, well we have the more recent Photokina and post-Photokina interviews, and they're from the horse's mouth.

Someone with good investigative powers could go back and look up all his predictions and give us his hits, misses and percentages.

[Class A]

No, I am thinking of it as a digital device.

OK, then why do you not see the possibility of letting it behave neutrally, even when the ISO setting is equal to or higher than ISO 640?

The "accelerator" unit is just a component in an image-forming-processing chain. You can tell it to do whatever you want it to do. There is no need to have an "off/on signal line".

You had challenged me earlier that I only "assumed" such an "off/on signal line" would be present. We agree now that my argument doesn't depend on a shaky assumption, correct?

EDIT: I just read this:

We don't know what else is triggered by the ISO level .... if they set the ISO level to "100", the 'accelerator' may not boost the DR and CD appropriately and/or do other unexpected things,

The "accelerator" unit is at the mercy of Ricoh's engineers. Ricoh's engineers are not at the mercy of the "accelerator" unit. It is entirely unreasonable to assume that the "accelerator" unit is a custom-designed chip that can only perform one hardwired function. It is much more likely that it is an off-the shelf DSP (digital signal processor) that just runs Ricoh's finely tuned image processing algorithm.

I admit that I do not know the exact chip type, but producing a hardwired, i.e., non-configurable custom chip would not only be cost-prohibitive but also unreasonably inflexible. One wouldn't be able to fix errors, etc.

I forget the exact values now, but 'low' is something like 0.0-0.8 volts while high is something like 4.0-5.0 volts in 'TTL' digital logic;

With all due respect but the times when digital components used such high voltages are long gone. With today's frequency requirements and processing power, such voltage levels would be completely unsustainable.

[reh321]

OK, then why do you not see the possibility of letting it behave neutrally, even when the ISO setting is equal to or higher than ISO 640?

The "accelerator" unit is just a component in an image-forming-processing chain. You can tell it to do whatever you want it to do. There is no need to have an "off/on signal line".

You had challenged me earlier that I only "assumed" such an "off/on signal line" would be present. We agree now that my argument doesn't depend on a shaky assumption, correct?

Incorrect. I said they do have some way of controlling behavior of this finely tuned / optimized system, and suggested two means of doing that. Your idea of forcing it to be "neutral" rests on the shaky assumption that a control signal is used, because most other methods would probably have undesired consequence.

[reh321]

With all due respect but the times when digital components used such high voltages are long gone. With today's frequency requirements and processing power, such voltage levels would be completely unsustainable.

I mentioned 'TTL' logic only as an example. Changing voltage levels would change nothing else - in particular, they still have address, data, and control buses {later is collection of signal lines}

[reh321]

The "accelerator" unit is at the mercy of Ricoh's engineers. Ricoh's engineers are not at the mercy of the "accelerator" unit. It is entirely unreasonable to assume that the "accelerator" unit is a custom-designed chip that can only perform one hardwired function. It is much more likely that it is an off-the shelf DSP (digital signal processor) that just runs Ricoh's finely tuned image processing algorithm.

I admit that I do not know the exact chip type, but producing a hardwired, i.e., non-configurable custom chip would not only be cost-prohibitive but also unreasonably inflexible. One wouldn't be able to fix errors, etc.

There are configurable custom chips, some known as 'ASIC', and some as 'FPGA'. I don't know whether the 'accelerator' is a 'ASIC', a 'FPGA', or a 'DSP' - that is not the point. It most certainly is a proprietary Ricoh device, under Ricoh control, which they are very proud of. There is no reason to believe that Ricoh built in a way to easily by-pass it, and you have provided no evidence that Ricoh has any reason to change that.

[Class A]

Your idea of forcing it to be "neutral" rests on the shaky assumption that a control signal is used,...

No, it does not rest on a "shaky assumption" and definitely not on a "control signal" being used.

My assessment rests on in-depth knowledge about modern digital components, as opposed to assuming that cameras are built using 1980's technology.

...because most other methods would probably have undesired consequence.

(emphasis is mine)
Now, that's a "shaky assumption".

There are configurable custom chips, some known as 'ASIC', and some as 'FPGA'. I don't know whether the 'accelerator' is a 'ASIC', a 'FPGA', or a 'DSP' - that is not the point.

Oh, but it is most definitely entirely the point.

The behaviour of a DSP is entirely controlled by firmware. It would be a piece of cake for Ricoh to change the behaviour of the "accelerator" unit if it is a DSP, including making it behave neutrally for all ISO settings.

If we only had one more person familiar with modern electronics in this thread, they would have to agree with me immediately.

I'll leave it at this now and won't be responding to further posts from you that lack technical merit, unless you have a genuine question to me in which case I'd be happy to answer.

[Larrymc]

(This was just before Photokina)

I think Asahiman had some later up dates that mentioned there was more development going on than he originally knew about. It has been posted by a PF member in one of these threads.

[reh321]

The behaviour of a DSP is entirely controlled by firmware. It would be a piece of cake for Ricoh to change the behaviour of the 'accelerator' unit if it is a DSP, including making it behave neutrally for all ISO settings.

The whole point of this discussion is not technical; I am sure Pentax could make changes. Ricoh would have to want to make this change. That is why I keep asking about the needs/wants of Japanese users .... their needs/wants are what will 'inform' decisions made by Ricoh.

[clackers]

The whole point of this discussion is not technical; I am sure Pentax could make changes. Ricoh would have to want to make this change. That is why I keep asking about the needs/wants of Japanese users .... their needs/wants are what will 'inform' decisions made by Ricoh.

Yes, debate amongst Japanese testers like Tanaka would be taken very seriously.

[reh321]

I think Asahiman had some later up dates that mentioned there was more development going on than he originally knew about. It has been posted by a PF member in one of these threads.

Yes, he said that he had seen only part of the internal roadmap; I inferred that this year will have even more releases. As far as I'm concerned, that means we have lots of reason to hope for neat releases this year.