[Wheatfield]

I disagree with this entirely. I actually think the big companies are struggling because people don't update their cameras as much because the "innovation" doesn't actually translate to many real world tangible benefits. Cameras for stills have barely improved, any changes are minor these days. Longer cycles in this case is actually a huge benefit, as much as certain people may not be happy with that in their insatiable need to spend money.

Excellent points.
I think a lot of people aren't seeing a couple of things. One is how fast digital cameras have matured. It's taken a mere 2.5 decades to go from an infant technology that was barely marketable to full maturity.
I can see the average run for cameras going forward to be several years between upgrade cycles. I do wonder if Nikon and Canon will try to play the hamster wheel game with their mirrorless cameras, or if they will realize that ship has sailed.

There is no doubt that cameras are going to become more of a luxury item in the future. Cell phone camera improvements guarantee that.

[mbukal]

I disagree with this entirely. I actually think the big companies are struggling because people don't update their cameras as much because the "innovation" doesn't actually translate to many real world tangible benefits. Cameras for stills have barely improved, any changes are minor these days. Longer cycles in this case is actually a huge benefit, as much as certain people may not be happy with that in their insatiable need to spend money with this arrangement. And unlike the phone industry you can't basically make your product explode in 2 years or seal in the battery because no one would buy your product.

As for lenses... Once you have an excellent lineup it won't matter how long it took you to get there. And I'd say that Ricoh has been shaping up the top end extremely well.

thanks for understanding, it happened to me with lenses and photo body / I experienced 10 years of using APSC Pentax photo equipment, I felt that I had more choice then, now in FF format approx. 4 years I feel very limited considering the past in which I lived with APSC Pentax for 10 years, I may be rather impatient and yet satisfied with what I am currently using.

[Wheatfield]

Wheatfield English is not my mother tongue ... but I try to purposefully participate in the discussion, and where did you get the conclusion that I am depressed (or troll) about Pentax that you recommend changing Pentax, you misunderstood my post and even worse made the final conclusion, let's talk argumentatively about Pentax ,other names I neither listed nor am interested in , let's talk about what Pentax can provide and what it provides as a whole in its offer of photo equipment, please no hard feelings in any form because as members of this forum and users Pentax we need to talk with arguments

Fair enough, my apologies for the misunderstanding.
Pentax has very long production cycles. They won't upgrade until the technology is there to make it significant.
They are also a very small cog in the company, resources are limited. The R&D money to develop several products concurrently simply isn't there for them.
At that, Ricoh seems satisfied with the revenue stream.
The K1, when it came out, was one of the most affordable full frame cameras on the market. They did it by not making a really high performance camera. Note that while the imaging quality is excellent, things like write times are on the slow side.
The K3 had a very long run, nearly 8 years IIRC, with an upgrade along the way. I anticipate a K1 replacement model within the next little while. I would be surprised if we have to wait until this time next year for a replacement. Until then, the K1 is capable enough, and they need to fill out lenses for full frame more than bodies anyway.

[Rondec]

I disagree with this entirely. I actually think the big companies are struggling because people don't update their cameras as much because the "innovation" doesn't actually translate to many real world tangible benefits. Cameras for stills have barely improved, any changes are minor these days. Longer cycles in this case is actually a huge benefit, as much as certain people may not be happy with that in their insatiable need to spend money with this arrangement. And unlike the phone industry you can't basically make your product explode in 2 years or seal in the battery because no one would buy your product.

As for lenses... Once you have an excellent lineup it won't matter how long it took you to get there. And I'd say that Ricoh has been shaping up the top end extremely well.

Pentax's release schedule, while slow, has put out real improvements with every release. The K-3 II to K-3 III move really has big differences. I expect no less of an improvement when they actually release a K-1 III. Each lens has anticipation and seems to sell well. Even though they are expensive, the DFA * lenses are excellent pieces of glass that shine in the right hands.

When companies release cameras to keep on a schedule, you get relatively minor improvements and they sell against themselves. So you get all of the cameras in Nikon's D5xxx series or now a couple of iterations already of certain Z series cameras. This drives down the price on the older gear and limits the number of sales of newer cameras. I would have thought Nikon would have learned their lens, but it actually would help them if they trimmed their camera line up down a bit.

[Wheatfield]

Pentax's release schedule, while slow, has put out real improvements with every release. The K-3 II to K-3 III move really has big differences. I expect no less of an improvement when they actually release a K-1 III. Each lens has anticipation and seems to sell well. Even though they are expensive, the DFA * lenses are excellent pieces of glass that shine in the right hands.

When companies release cameras to keep on a schedule, you get relatively minor improvements and they sell against themselves. So you get all of the cameras in Nikon's D5xxx series or now a couple of iterations already of certain Z series cameras. This drives down the price on the older gear and limits the number of sales of newer cameras. I would have thought Nikon would have learned their lens, but it actually would help them if they trimmed their camera line up down a bit.

The camera industry has sliced and diced the market into ever smaller pieces, the idea is to be all things to all people.
So, rather than beginner, advanced amateur and pro models, we have models for the rank beginner, soccer mom, soccer mom who shoots the occasional wedding, casual hobbyist, enthusiastic hobbyist, weekend warrior wannabe, part time pro, pro, pro with delusions of grandeur, etc.

Now, rather than a reasonable few models, they end up with a dozen, all slightly differentiated from each other, and all on some sort of upgrade cycle. Canon was a prime example of this, with their lineup being refreshed every few months it seemed.

Pentax was, when I was selling cameras, one of the worst offenders. I think there were, at one time, something like 9 or more film bodies selling concurrently. The problem with this is it leads to decision dissociation for the customer as there are so many models with incremental differences, and a practical guarantee of buyer's remorse.

The last is the part of the game that the companies depend on with this business model. The person who buys a product, and then once he or she is outside of the return period decides that really, the next model up is the one that should have been purchased is retail gold. If a company can latch onto that customer and then give them a constant stream of "upgrade" choices, they have latched onto a miniature profit center.

This works while an infant technology is developing, but at some point the technology matures, and sales stagnate. In the camera industry, the digital ILC technology is more or less a mature one now, and so companies have to come up with some way of making consumers think that they have to latch onto some next big thing, even if it's the same old thing that's been repackaged (hello mirrorless ILC cameras).
Change the mirror box out for a tiny little computer monitor, get it out there that "flippy mirrors" (it's important to denigrate the old stuff somehow to be really effective) are so last decade, and voila, last years camera with sensor XYZ becomes this years darling, still with sensor XYZ.
And people will fall for it over and over again.

[BigMackCam]

Now, rather than a reasonable few models, they end up with a dozen, all slightly differentiated from each other, and all on some sort of upgrade cycle. Canon was a prime example of this, with their lineup being refreshed every few months it seemed.

I seem to recall from a few years back that several of Canon's DSLRs - presumably the lower-end units - were essentially the same camera, using the same motherboard, with features enabled or disabled by links on the PCB. I guess it was more economical for them to produce several models from one system, and it's a sensible approach if the finances work out... but I wonder how I'd have felt, as a customer, paying 50% more for a camera with exactly the same internals as a cheaper model, except for a couple of links on the circuit board

[Wheatfield]

I seem to recall from a few years back that several of Canon's DSLRs - presumably the lower-end units - were essentially the same camera, using the same motherboard, with features enabled or disabled by links on the PCB. I guess it was more economical for them to produce several models from one system, and it's a sensible approach if the finances work out... but I wonder how I'd have felt, as a customer, paying 50% more for a camera with exactly the same internals as a cheaper model, except for a couple of links on the circuit board

It was worse than that. A buddy of mine was a Canon shooter during that time. Apparently some guys in Holland, IIRC, figured out how to hack into the Canon firmware and discovered that features could be turned on and off simply by ticking boxes on a computer screen.

[i_trax]

I seem to recall from a few years back that several of Canon's DSLRs - presumably the lower-end units - were essentially the same camera, using the same motherboard, with features enabled or disabled by links on the PCB. I guess it was more economical for them to produce several models from one system, and it's a sensible approach if the finances work out... but I wonder how I'd have felt, as a customer, paying 50% more for a camera with exactly the same internals as a cheaper model, except for a couple of links on the circuit board

Number of models have the same big heavy battery but the actual usable portion was controlled by firmware depending on price paid.
So , lot of people with limited financial situation were wasting energy ( money ) on carrying "spare" unusable battery.
Not sure if this was mastered by hackers?

[thibs]

I seem to recall from a few years back that several of Canon's DSLRs - presumably the lower-end units - were essentially the same camera, using the same motherboard, with features enabled or disabled by links on the PCB. I guess it was more economical for them to produce several models from one system, and it's a sensible approach if the finances work out... but I wonder how I'd have felt, as a customer, paying 50% more for a camera with exactly the same internals as a cheaper model, except for a couple of links on the circuit board

Indeed.
Not though that most of the time e.g. CPUs are produced in such a way. Features disabled with a little laser pass here or there.

[boriscleto]

I seem to recall from a few years back that several of Canon's DSLRs - presumably the lower-end units - were essentially the same camera, using the same motherboard, with features enabled or disabled by links on the PCB. I guess it was more economical for them to produce several models from one system, and it's a sensible approach if the finances work out... but I wonder how I'd have felt, as a customer, paying 50% more for a camera with exactly the same internals as a cheaper model, except for a couple of links on the circuit board

This has long been a standard in the tech industry. IBM would sell the same computer with different speeds. The he only difference between the two was a board that regulated the speed. The more you paid the faster the computer was allowed to run, if anyone other than an IBM tech even touched the board your service contract was revoked.

Micro$oft Windows is another example. The difference between Home and Professional versions is just a few config files…

[BigMackCam]

It was worse than that. A buddy of mine was a Canon shooter during that time. Apparently some guys in Holland, IIRC, figured out how to hack into the Canon firmware and discovered that features could be turned on and off simply by ticking boxes on a computer screen.

Number of models have the same big heavy battery but the actual usable portion was controlled by firmware depending on price paid.
So , lot of people with limited financial situation were wasting energy ( money ) on carrying "spare" unusable battery.
Not sure if this was mastered by hackers?

Ha ha You couldn't make this stuff up. Incredible...

[Parry]

This has long been a standard in the tech industry. IBM would sell the same computer with different speeds. The he only difference between the two was a board that regulated the speed. The more you paid the faster the computer was allowed to run, if anyone other than an IBM tech even touched the board your service contract was revoked.

Micro$oft Windows is another example. The difference between Home and Professional versions is just a few config files…

Same with motor cars. I remap my turbo diesels. Old Passat 130bhp to over 200bhp (absolutely rocks with the torque) and pulls far better fuel economy if you're easy on the right foot. Got average 83mpg between Bristol and New Barnet (north London). The components of most models of whatever are the same, the software limits it all according to what's paid for it. Going on for decades.

[i_trax]

Ha ha You couldn't make this stuff up. Incredible...

Yes , Tesla was "forced" to unlock the whole battery capacity during catastrophic fires in Australia , I think there was the same situation during fires in California /US .

[reh321]

Pentax's release schedule, while slow, has put out real improvements with every release. The K-3 II to K-3 III move really has big differences. I expect no less of an improvement when they actually release a K-1 III. Each lens has anticipation and seems to sell well. Even though they are expensive, the DFA * lenses are excellent pieces of glass that shine

When I purchased my KP on Black Friday 2018, I really did expect it to be my last camera body, but if Pentax would extend the K-3iii’s focusing to an under $1000 camera, I would have to re-examine that - that focusing does seem to be the sort of thing that might move me, even though I currently have three bodies that I sometimes use {K-30, KP, and Q-S1}.

added: Honestly, I see more ‘pull’ from Pentaxians than ‘push’ from Pentax - members seemingly wanting to spend their money on something new rather than Pentax having a new product.
I have no particular motivation to spend my money.

[deus ursus]

Same with motor cars. I remap my turbo diesels. Old Passat 130bhp to over 200bhp (absolutely rocks with the torque) and pulls far better fuel economy if you're easy on the right foot. Got average 83mpg between Bristol and New Barnet (north London). The components of most models of whatever are the same, the software limits it all according to what's paid for it. Going on for decades.

I believe that has something to do with the durability of the engine as well. A leaner fuel/air mixture wears the engine down faster than a 'fat' mixture, isn't it so?