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M8 Perpetual Upgrade Programme


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Ok, Bill. But can you, or anybody else for that matter, tell me why 'accurate framelines' are classed as some sort of luxury upgrade? Surely the M8's innacurate framelines are a fault! Does the M9 come with innacurate framelines? If it did, would that be acceptable? Logically, it would be acceptable, if we accept that inaccurate framelines are the norm....

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Ok, Bill. But can you, or anybody else for that matter, tell me why 'accurate framelines' are classed as some sort of luxury upgrade? Surely the M8's innacurate framelines are a fault! Does the M9 come with innacurate framelines? If it did, would that be acceptable? Logically, it would be acceptable, if we accept that inaccurate framelines are the norm....

"Inaccurate" is not the right way to describe the framelines on the M8. "Optimized for 0.7 meters" is. It is the nature of RF viewfinders that framelines will be exactly accurate around one distance and fall off at other distances. Leica decided on the M8 to choose 0.7 meters, the nearest distance that any of their lenses focus, so that the inaccuracy that builds as distance grows is always such that the camera will capture more than you see, never less. Considering the ease of cropping digital files, not an unreasonable decision. The M9 sets the optimized distance at 1 meter (like the M7/MP) and the M8.2 at 2 meters. Some really prefer the 2 meters over the M9, but for both images taken much nearer or further away from the optimized distance will be "inaccurate", and the closer images will capture a bit less than the frame indicates. All of this is just a matter of learning the camera and adjusting, and with an LCD to tell you, pretty easy in the field anyway. Still, it's nice to have most of your images line up with the framelines, and the M8 0.7 meter choice probably results in the greatest # of images that are "Inaccurate". best....Peter

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Ok, Bill. But can you, or anybody else for that matter, tell me why 'accurate framelines' are classed as some sort of luxury upgrade?

 

The M viewfinder is incapable of having accurate framelines at all distances, so the distance at which they _will_ be accurate is a design decision.

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.....LEICA has to return the huge-life saving- help that all M8 owners offer in the company by either upgrading M8 BODIES TO M9 or by offering a refund to the thousands level when an M8 is returned towards the purchase of an M9.Is not a joke is a very serious situation that LEICA is obligated to respond within days.....

 

Angelos... welcome to the forum: if you will continue to surf here, you'll quickly understand that discussing our opinions, even in a rather "heated" way, is one of the main contents of this forum, and moreover when the object of discussions is, in general, Leica Co. policy... :); so, let me say that part of your vision is in my opinion irrealistic considering that Leica, at the end, is a business as any other company; but, other personal opinion of mine, I do not exclude that, SOME DAY, they could offer some cashback for M8 users trading for M9 : this would be not a "refund", but simply a marketing campaign that maybe will have a sense in, say, 9-10 months from now: nowadays, M9 is in startup of manufacturing-selling : they have to sell them at the highest possible net income to repay the investiment, and customers, at the moment, seem to respond well (see the posts on M9 availabilty); in 1 year (or probably less) they can have two possible issues :

1) Sustaining M9 sales after the initial ramp-up.

2) Managing the POSSIBLE intro of something like a "M9.2" (with "voices on the net" that in turn can slow M9 sales")

In such an environment, it could have a sense to try a boost on M9 sales with some marketing campaign, and a M8 trade-in could be a not wrong choice - better than a simple "lowering" of the street price with maneuvers on the resellers' channel.

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In such an environment, it could have a sense to try a boost on M9 sales with some marketing campaign, and a M8 trade-in could be a not wrong choice - better than a simple "lowering" of the street price with maneuvers on the resellers' channel.

 

I love this idea!

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I've said it before, but I'll repeat it here again before getting on to Leica personally (anyone have a good contact for such matters, let me know): I don't expect any hardware modifications to be free or even discounted for my M8. I believe that the camera hardware is all that can be expected of it, and so long as issues such as faulty sensors (which strike me as a known manufacturing fault) are repaired, then I'm happy.

 

However, the one issue that I truly want Leica to re-implement is the choice of uncompressed DNGs as a menu option. I say re-implement because this feature was one of the last items to be disabled in the camera prior to launch - the camera previewed by LFI was shooting uncompressed DNGs when the M8 was first released.

 

Much is being made of the M9's ability to save uncompressed images, and in my view if Leica refuse to allow those of us who have bought the M8 the ability to also choose the trade-off of a slower camera in return for uncompressed images, then they are acting in bad faith towards their existing and loyal customers - forcing us to buy an entirely new camera to achieve this aim, when the camera we have is fully capable of this functionality, were it not intentionally crippled by firmware.

 

I just want to underline what I said at the beginning - I'm really happy with the camera and have no expectations of a free ride. But intentionally crippling the camera to keep some sort of artificial 'space' between it and the M9 is just poor customer relations.

 

Anyone who is uninterested in this feature can naturally switch it off in the menu, those of us who want to use it (even if only for special images) will have to put up with slower write speeds. But the choice should be there, imho.

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the distance at which they _will_ be accurate is a design decision.

 

Appears to me that Leica are incapable of making that decision !

 

We've had 0.7m, 2.0m and now 1.0m. One must assume that Leica have been developing their thinking on this and that they now believe that 1.0m is the optimum. It's not a user select option, they're taking care of it for us.... and us..... and us.

 

IMO it should be a really cheap upgrade to get it fixed , as IMO at 0.7m it is broken.

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However, the one issue that I truly want Leica to re-implement is the choice of uncompressed DNGs as a menu option. I say re-implement because this feature was one of the last items to be disabled in the camera prior to launch - the camera previewed by LFI was shooting uncompressed DNGs when the M8 was first released.

 

Agreed. Forum noise will be the vehicle to get this changed as happened with the Discrete Mode.

 

IMO, Leica needs to update the M8 firmware with every feature that can be added via an SD card. The cost is incidental for the benefit of happy customers and a common M digital working platform.

 

I trust they will in time, but a bit of encouragement from us will advance it. :)

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Agreed. Forum noise will be the vehicle to get this changed as happened with the Discrete Mode....

I trust they will in time, but a bit of encouragement from us will advance it. :)

 

Indeed - my fear is that interest - both on this forum and at Leica - has moved on. Evidenced by how slowly this subsection updates these days in comparison with the M9 subsection, for instance.

 

Imagine being the poor fellow at Leica charged with the loathsome task of upgrading the M8 firmware! He or she is probably a pariah in the company, sitting alone in a darkened room where no-one else ventures; shunned in the canteen; leaving the office every day at four-thirty to go home to a TV-dinner in front of German Idol; and then bed by nine-thirty, crying him or herself to sleep at the evil turn of fate that has landed them in this dead-end position...

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Forum noise will be the vehicle to get this changed as happened with the Discrete Mode.

 

IMO, Leica needs to update the M8 firmware with every feature that can be added via an SD card. The cost is incidental for the benefit of happy customers and a common M digital working platform.

 

I trust they will in time, but a bit of encouragement from us will advance it. :)

 

Totally agree - this is the thinking behind my original post.

 

So dear M8 forum members - please stay noisy on this matter!

 

Steve'

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Totally agree - this is the thinking behind my original post.

 

So dear M8 forum members - please stay noisy on this matter!

 

Steve'

 

I agree! But it feels inevitably like our puny voices are being drowned...

...by the sound of Silence.

 

Last one out of the M8 forum, please switch off the lights. :(

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Last one out of the M8 forum, please switch off the lights. :(

 

It's dark in 'ere! :eek:

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

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It's dark in 'ere! :eek:

 

So this is how we define a photographic negative, but as photographers we usually turn negatives into positives.

 

I see no reason yet why we should be turning out the lights on the M8. Its IQ is for practical purposes, still damn good and not that far removed from the M9. The M8 isn't dead yet and as long as we keep Leica on side, then, to paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of its death will definitely be greatly exaggerated!

 

Steve'

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Indeed - my fear is that interest - both on this forum and at Leica - has moved on. Evidenced by how slowly this subsection updates these days in comparison with the M9 subsection, for instance.

 

Imagine being the poor fellow at Leica charged with the loathsome task of upgrading the M8 firmware! He or she is probably a pariah in the company, sitting alone in a darkened room where no-one else ventures; shunned in the canteen; leaving the office every day at four-thirty to go home to a TV-dinner in front of German Idol; and then bed by nine-thirty, crying him or herself to sleep at the evil turn of fate that has landed them in this dead-end position...

 

A lot of the M9 forum is now occupied with new users and how Leica missed the boat with the M9 and it should have all the gizmos found on DSLRs. Remember those here, are you really missing them?

 

Jeff

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A lot of the M9 forum is now occupied with new users and how Leica missed the boat with the M9 and it should have all the gizmos found on DSLRs. Remember those here, are you really missing them?

 

Jeff

 

It is such a relief to be able to step out with a camera (M8) that doesn't have all that crap on it. Just enough stuff to allow you to capture an image.

 

I have a pair of D300s and the large Excel sheet (from Nikonians) that I use to record all the settings. I downloaded and printed the D300 manual over a month before I actually bought the D300s. After the first pass, and the first shooting session, how many M8 users felt compelled to go back to the manual again and again? (Not many, I suspect.)

 

So many of the typical DSLR features/options are there because of other features/options. I've said it before in this forum: DSLRs are the true self-licking ice cream cone.

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A lot of the M9 forum is now occupied with new users and how Leica missed the boat with the M9 and it should have all the gizmos found on DSLRs. Remember those here, are you really missing them?

 

Jeff

 

Well now, when you put it like that Jeff - NO I DON'T! :)

 

What a relief, as a matter of fact, to no longer need to wade through those horrific wishlists of LiveView, autofocus, video capture, image stabilization, smile recognition and who knows what...

 

But the lack of numbers here gives me the slightly sinking feeling that we can safely be ignored.

 

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Leica do the right thing and give M8 users reasonable updates that keep the camera as good as it can be! It really is in their interest not to just abandon loyal customers - we're the people who are gonna keep their revenue flowing in the future - if we maintain the feeling we can trust them, that is.

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I've said it before, but I'll repeat it here again before getting on to Leica personally (anyone have a good contact for such matters, let me know): I don't expect any hardware modifications to be free or even discounted for my M8. I believe that the camera hardware is all that can be expected of it, and so long as issues such as faulty sensors (which strike me as a known manufacturing fault) are repaired, then I'm happy.

 

However, the one issue that I truly want Leica to re-implement is the choice of uncompressed DNGs as a menu option. I say re-implement because this feature was one of the last items to be disabled in the camera prior to launch - the camera previewed by LFI was shooting uncompressed DNGs when the M8 was first released.

 

Much is being made of the M9's ability to save uncompressed images, and in my view if Leica refuse to allow those of us who have bought the M8 the ability to also choose the trade-off of a slower camera in return for uncompressed images, then they are acting in bad faith towards their existing and loyal customers - forcing us to buy an entirely new camera to achieve this aim, when the camera we have is fully capable of this functionality, were it not intentionally crippled by firmware.

 

I just want to underline what I said at the beginning - I'm really happy with the camera and have no expectations of a free ride. But intentionally crippling the camera to keep some sort of artificial 'space' between it and the M9 is just poor customer relations.

 

Anyone who is uninterested in this feature can naturally switch it off in the menu, those of us who want to use it (even if only for special images) will have to put up with slower write speeds. But the choice should be there, imho.

 

Amen.

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