Originally posted by LaurenOE have been a wonderful continuous evolution
I was thinking much the same but about Ricoh. Which I think (hope) means both companies have a similar philosophy. We use a Ricoh copier/printer/scanner in our office. It is on a 5 year lease arrangement. So the 5 years are up this month and we get a new copier. Sitting side by side I cannot tell them apart except for the (slightly) different model number. At first I'm thinking "five years, and nothing has changed?" Same exact body panels and color. Same buttons, same screen, same lid, same trays.
But a closer look and a little use reveals: slight improvements in the button layout, improved option layout, slightly faster, much quieter and smoother, fit and finish is tighter and nicer, bigger hard drive, faster processor, more scanning options, many more options in the print drivers, nicer web interface, etc. So no, it is not a radically 'different' design just to make you feel you need to upgrade. It fills the same niche in their lineup as the old one and whenever they could make an improvement they did but they saw no reason to come out with a 'new' model just to say it was new.