Early M9 buyers: you guys are HEROES

[proenca]

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You should all receive a Medal. Whatever country you are from.

 

Honestly.....

 

I picked my M9 today ( i-t-s-g-o-r-g-e-o-u-s ) and came with a older firmware and I played around with it before updating to the new one, on puropose to see the differences.

 

Now...

 

HOW THE HELL YOU GUYS SURVIVED WITH THE LONG CARD WAIT FOR FORMATTING ? :confused:

 

You guys are Heroes. Patriots. Dedicated Leica flagship owners.

 

I formated the card 4 times before the new firmware and I was at the point of starting to chewing the camera itself and climbing the walls ( and please note , I do have very high walls at home... ) due to desperation...

 

Just drove me nuts. Now with the updated firmware its a breeze and fanastic.

 

But to those shooting with the M9 since it came out and agonizing for the waiting...

 

My sincere hats off. You guys are my true heroes.

[yanidel]

 

HOW THE HELL YOU GUYS SURVIVED WITH THE LONG CARD WAIT FOR FORMATTING ? :confused:

 

Maybe because we hardly ever need to format the card ?

I just delete the pictures and in most cases and a 4GB card gets me through a day, I don't shoot like a machine gun

[proenca]

Neither do I but after a card is downloaded and then put back into my camera, I've always had the habit of reformat the card , this came with me from the dSLR days... I always do it in a digital camera.

[yanidel]

Neither do I but after a card is downloaded and then put back into my camera, I've always had the habit of reformat the card , this came with me from the dSLR days... I always do it in a digital camera.

 

Just deleting the pictures from the camera works fine. I hardly ever format.

[adan]

"I hardly ever format"

 

The day will come when you find out that that is a bad idea - Here's hoping it won't involve important pictures.

 

I wouldn't call my waits for formatting with the old firmware "heroic" - usually around 15 secs. But I stick with 2Gig cards. Shooting 4 Gigs on a project means I'm shooting video.

[Guest WPalank]

I always reformat a card before going out. This way I know I have a card in the body (camera has to be turned on first before it can beep at you telling you otherwise). I start the format and then run around my house getting my stuff together for the days shoot (checking for an extra battery, card, etc.)

 

A couple minutes later format is done, turn camera off, slip it in bag, and I'm off.

[cheewai_m6]

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although i understand a long formatting time can be annoying, but when you do format the card, it's usually at a time where it's in no urgency. if you're formatting your on location, when your subject about to be in position for the shot, i think your timing is a little off.

 

however, as many have said, something as simple as formatting probably shouldn't be taking that long for a camera released in 2009.

[Alnitak]

Just deleting the pictures from the camera works fine. I hardly ever format.

 

Ditto. Never have with any camera. So it didn't really bother me. Now the zooming....that was a PITA.

[Nitnaros]

I think the issue with the slow formatting was annoying, but not really critical.

 

What is of critical importance for photographs is the red edge issue with the wide angle lenses. For me the ability to capture wider angles with more megapixel was a key argument to purchase the M9.

 

When will that problem be fixed is the real question !

 

Peter

[yanidel]

"I hardly ever format"

 

The day will come when you find out that that is a bad idea - Here's hoping it won't involve important pictures.

Do you reformat your computer HD every day ?

When deleting all files, memory blocks are marked as free to be written over. Basically same happens with formatting. Formatting is useful when you have a corrupt file or several camera file formats, which is hardly ever is my case. Never had any issues this way.

[glenerrolrd]

I have always started every shoot (since last download) with a reformated card and fresh battery. If I take a break and have a few minutes I will change out the card and the battery. I try to take an image right away(this is where I can catch a bad card) and I rarely delete anything in the camera.

 

I don t delete the images until I reformat the card (allowing the card to serve as a backup) until I need the storage. I try to use 8gb or 16gb cards..not because I typically run out but because its an extra margin of safety (that I will not have to change out the card until I need to). Agree that more than 100-200 images on a card is all your eggs in one basket. (I use two bodies so this is a little less critical ).

 

This SOP was beat into me early and I don t have lost images or lost opportunities because of card or battery problems. It will be nice to have faster reformating as I will be using it frequently.

 

But I would like faster transfers ..uncompressed raw slows down ability to shoot.

[Guest ccmsosse]

although i understand a long formatting time can be annoying, but when you do format the card, it's usually at a time where it's in no urgency. if you're formatting your on location, when your subject about to be in position for the shot, i think your timing is a little off.

 

however, as many have said, something as simple as formatting probably shouldn't be taking that long for a camera released in 2009.

 

Agreed - with several 4gb, 8gb and a 32gb card, there is never an urgency ... and the wait wasn't really all that bad afterall

Even before the firmware update the M9 was and is AWESOME.

[Fotomiguel]

Heroes? Not at all but may be very lucky.

[Maximus]

Yes, the long formatting time was annoying, especially if like myself and many others I always format after downloading pics.

 

The new firmware makes formatting a breeze, as it should have been in the first instance.

[Julian Thompson]

It would be very interesting to learn exactly in what way the programmers managed to re-write the coding to extract such faster performance in terms of zoom and formatting. There must have been some much slicker work there to get THAT much difference!

[adan]

Julian, as to the faster zooming, Leica just reverted to the M8 technique of loading the hi-res image "in the background" so it is ready for zooming automatically, instead of waiting for you to START trying to zoom to load the hi-res image (which takes a couple of seconds).

 

If you try and zoom IMMEDIATELY after going into review mode or scrolling to a new image, you'll see there can still be a delay for zooming to begin - but most people stare at the unzoomed image for a moment or two before starting to zoom, giving time for the hi-res to load. You can see the full-frame image jump slightly as the load takes place.

 

I suspect the zoom function was originally changed from the M8 approach to save a little processor (and thus power) overhead with those 18 or 34 megabyte files, since a lot of the time people just review images without zooming, and therefore loading the hi-res image every single time is a bit wasteful. But in the event, the market said, "No, we prefer the faster zoom" and Leica switched back to the old paradigm.

 

I don't know what the ins and outs of the formatting delay and improvement were.

[250swb]

I always wonder what it was that somebody needed to do so urgently that the 30 sec format time became sooooo annoying. It only needs to be done after downloading the photographs, not as you take the camera out the bag to go shooting. But the new shorter time is welcome if it stops people moaning.

 

But it is important to re-format the card, even a reliable card, each and every time. Scraps of code are left on the card if you only delete images, and this leads to a smaller capacity over time. So think of it like doing the laundry and the problems that arise if you leave a single sock behind in the spin dryer, the knock on consequences when getting dressed in the morning can be frustrating.

 

Steve

[be_sure]

congratulations！You got your M9, I have to wait it.....

Yesterday, I asked my Norway friend something, Norway have stock....