Steve wrote: > I'm definitely not saying that Pentax needs a DSLR to stay in business. > I'm saying that my fear is that Pentax might have so much financial > trouble (for any reason) that they will go the Olympus route and stop > producing their better cameras, especially the 35 mm variety. I think > this financial trouble is most likely to come from overall loss of > market share and not from the absence of any single product.
Pentax is financially sound compared to all of the competition except Canon. I believe they have the intention of keeping or increasing their 35mm slr market share. For this they need up-to-date products. >Pentax > serves my needs just fine and I would be more likely to buy an IS lens > than a DSLR. We might see both. I believe the digital slr will be relatively "cheap". > I'm not sure what I think about the so-called flagship 35mm. In my > mind, the MZ-S is obviously in league with the F100 or EOS-3. The > Pentax flagship would be the EOS-1v/F5 counterpart which would cost at > least $1200-$1500. Even if such a beast were available with better FPS, > AF x-sensors, etc., I know that I would still prefer my MZ-S at the > lower price (given my needs). Would such a camera "save" Pentax. I > have no clue. It certainly didn't help Minolta that much. But for Minolta theirs never was a flagship. It was just a boosted up mid-line model without much, or any, technology or feature not available elsewhere in the line-up. Hence, hardly anyone noticed. However, features like IS and USM may be developed for a flagship but lower end models will take advantage of it as well. Theres no doubt that if IS and USM can be used with the MZ-S it's sales will increase as well. P�l
