SeanTech

Cellular - Why I just signed up with Sprint

Note to self: It's the economy, stupid.

I have been agonizing about phone choices for months - even turning my personal foibles into a NY Times article and several online posts.

But finally, I made a decision -- I ended up renewing with the same company I had before: Sprint. Now a lot of things about Sprint annoy me -- especially the fact that one MUST sign up for a 2-year plan. But on balance, I find Sprint the best deal. Here's why:

I want high-speed data possibilities -- on my phone, on a laptop card, or on both. That immediately eliminates the GSM carriers T-Mobile and Cingular -- which are lagging on introducing so called "3G" high-speed data services. So, the choices are down to the two companies with EV-DO data rates: Sprint and Verizon.

(If none of these acronyms make any sense to you, just get T-Mobile. They are really cheap and make you sign only a 1-year contract. Plus, they rated quite high in Consumer Reports latest national survey.)

Sprint vs. Verizon was a tough choice. I was leaning heavily towards Verizon because, some day, they will have a very slim smart phone called the Motorola Q. But no one seems to know when someday will be. The phone has been delayed for months, and we keep hearing about more delays. Then I ask myself: If the Q ever arrives, how trouble-free can I expect a device that has had so many development glitches to be?

On the Sprint side, I'm waiting anxiously for the Palm Treo 700p. It's bulkier than the mythical Q, but it runs the Palm operating system, which I like far better than Microsoft Windows on the Q. The Treo is also delayed, but I have more faith in a company (Palm) that has been making this same basic phone for years than a company that is pretty new to the business (Motorola).

Plus, Sprint's running a great deal right now. In a blast from the cellular past -- nights (i.e. unlimited calling) start at 7PM, as they should. At Verizon, it's still 9PM. And dollar for dollar, Sprint is cheaper, anyway: for $59.99, I get 900 minutes with Verizon vs. 1000 with Sprint (plus the additional 2400 minutes because nights start at 7PM instead of 9PM). Yes, I know, Verizon has "In," giving me free calls to Verizon customers. But I can do the same thing with Sprint customers for just $5 extra per month.

So that's my choice, and I'm sticking with it -- at least for the duration of a 2-year contract.

Sony's Almost-perfect Slim Cam

A few weeks ago I gave my first impressions of Sony's new W50 pocket camera, based on using it for a few minutes at the PMA show. Well, I have now spent a week with it. In most ways, it's as good as I had initially suspected. But in one way, it fails quite conspicuously.

First the good. And the goodest of the good is how clean the photos come out. Sony has found, I believe, the ideal level of sharpening for a snapshot camera. Details are very distinct, without noticeable artifacts. And pixel noise is very low. Even blue skies - a very tricky subject mater -- look fairly smooth, not speckly.

Check these examples by clicking the thumbnail to reveal a larger image (Sony on left, Canon on right):

Color is also quite pleasing. I saw no difference in quality between the colors from the W50 and from Canon's new PowerShot sd600. While the PowerShot line has considerable problems with pixel noise, it is the gold standard for color. And Sony has now met that standard in the W50.

Check these examples from an indoor still life shot with flash by clicking the thumbnail to reveal a larger image (Sony on left, Canon on right):

Sony also matches Canon -- to an uncanny extent -- in design. The W50 is nearly the exact same dimensions as the sd600. They also share rugged metal construction and nearly identical shutter and zoom controls. I could criticize Sony for being a copycat. But fact is, the Canon design is simply superb. So I give Sony credit for recognizing the fact.

The W50 also has some great features that the Canon lacks. One is higher light sensitivity: up to ISO 1000, vs. Canon's ISO 800. The actual specs don't matter, but the end result does. Under the same conditions, the Sony produces images with smooth or virtually smooth surfaces, while the Canon's are mottled with pixel noise.

Check these close-ups of photos shot at ISO 400 by clicking the thumbnail to reveal a larger image (Sony on left, Canon on right):

Sony also, as always, includes the ability to adjust flash intensity-- a huge omission on Canon's PowerShot series cameras -- which live up to their name by blasting most subjects with far too much ugly white light.

So what's the catch? You're going to need the flash, because the Sony performs abysmally in low-light settings. The problem is not pixel noise as with the Canon, but rather color distortion that cause images to turn horribly pinkish - like washing your white T-shirts together with a red towel. Going pink is not an uncommon problem with digital cameras. But as such, it's one that Sony should have remedied before releasing this machine. Sadly, the color shift negates one of the W50's best features - the ability to shoot in low light with minimal pixel noise. Yes, the images come out clean, but the wrong color.

For a glaring example, click the thumbnail image below. Those tiles are supposed to be gray.

The W50 is far from useless. It produces lovely images in daylight or with its flash. But it lacks the ability to capture the true color of indoor settings. It's a better camera than the sd600 and most other slim cams, but still not as good as Sony should be able to do.

Breaking up with Canon

No, no. I don't mean I will no longer talk to Canon. Actually, a lot of nice people work there. But unfortunately, many of the photos taken with their PowerShot cameras break up into a mess of grainy pixel noise.

This is not a new problem. In fact, noise is the biggest cause for buyer's remorse that I have had with the PowerShot sd450 Digital Elph I bought last year. The news, however, is that Canon doesn't appear to have done anything to solve the problem with the new PowerShot cameras it just introduced.

I recently tested the new 6-megapixel sd600 for what would have been a big photography article in the now-defunct Cargo magazine (R.I.P.). This is one of Canon's first pocket cams to boast ISO 800 light sensitivity. (They previously topped out at a very grainy ISO 400.) So I was hoping to see some improvement in the low-light performance, but I saw none.

Look, for example, at these ISO 400 photos shot with the old sd450 (top) and the new sd600.

I stared at them for a while in Photoshop (viewing them in "actual pixels" mode -- which would be way too big to reproduce online), and I found no difference. ISO 800 didn't look much worse, but since ISO 400 is already intolerable, ISO 800 is of no real benefit.

Am I being unfair to Canon, expecting their cameras to do more than is possible? No. Many other camera companies are doing a far better job with low-light/high ISO performance. The new Casio Exilim EX-Z600 and Nikon CoolPix S6, for example, had less noise. See these samples from the Casio (top) and Nikon.

These cameras go "only" to ISO 400, but they do it very well. That's far more valuable than Canon's mottled ISO 400 and 800.

Canon cameras do a lot of things right. They have snappy, slim designs and great, dead-simple interfaces. Canon also does a wonderful job with color -- legitimately earning it the huge popularity it enjoys with buyers.

But every day can't be a sunny day, and camera flash has its own problems. To keep up with our lifestyles (which include cloudy days and dark bars) Canon has to better embrace the darkness.

Cargo Magazine Just Folded

This is kinda tech related, since Cargo had a big personal technology section -- from which I will no longer be getting contracts :-(

Apparently the word just went out around an hour ago, and virtually no one on staff knew -- even, according to rumor, the EIC.

I'm not sure about the rumor, but I did just talk with Tom Samiljan, the former technology editor, who confirmed that Cargo is closing and that it came as a complete surprise to him and his co-workers.

Farewell Cargo, we will miss you!

Sure it was a little flashy and pretentious. But it was a very quick read with some really good advice on everything from wine to hair gel to bluetooth. I actually worked for one magazine, IDG's Digital World, that very consciously borrowed stylistic ideas from Cargo. Of course, Digital World folded even sooner.

The real sadness here from a technology standpoint is that good sources of consumer advice on tech are fading away just as technology becomes truly pervasive.

The NY Times' Circuits section was eviscerated a while ago. PC World (where I once worked) is far smaller than it used to be. I'm not sure of PC Magazine's numbers, but it is hitched to the financially disastrous millstone of Ziff Davis, so that's not a good sign.

Sync, a magazine that tried to be like Cargo but was far dorkier, did exactly what its name sounded like.

C/net is always reorganizing, and it closed sold off Computer Shopper -- which was thicker than a phone book back in the dotcom 1.0 days. It took a while after the acquisition for c/net to murder Shopper, but it finally succeeded. And then c/net lost a bunch of people to Yahoo's upcoming c/net-esque reviews site. I suppose that's the only sing of growth - Yahoo.

OK, gotta go check the help wanted ads…

PMA- What I saw, and what the cameras saw

The one great thing about the Photo Marketing Association show (aside for being near Disney World!) is that it allows journalists (or anyone else) enough time to talk with all the camera companies and actually play around with the equipment. Nearly every company allowed me to pop a memory card into their cameras (even some that were pre-production) and take all the test shots I wanted to -- often shots of the PR, marketting, or engineering reps whom I forced to model for me.

So, rather than summarize everything I saw at the show -- which you can already read about on various Web sites and blogs -- I decided instead to show you some of the noteworthy things I observed. (Click photso to get larger -- 800-pixel-wide -- versions.)

Sensitivity

Everybody wants to take nice photos indoors, where the light is usually low. And some of the camera companies want to help them out.

Sony, for example, is pushing all of its new cameras to ISO 1000 sensitivity. I wrote up several of the new models (with sample images) a few days ago. Here' one that I missed -- The H5. It sports a hefty 12X zoom lens with optical image stabilization like it's predecessor, the H1. But this camera also carries a lens meeting the strict standards set by Zeiss. Such a lens was noticeably absent from the H1.

The H5 did a pretty good job with high sensitivity through about ISO 400, as you can see from these photos (of my victim from Sony PR) that progress to higher and higher sensitivity from top to bottom.

Starting at ISO 80

Then ISO 400

Then ISO 800

And finally ISO 1000

In addition, I took advantage of the new higher resolution still shots (4MP) from Sony's extremely cool new mini high-def camcorder, the HDR-HC3. Not bad for a camcorder.

 

And it really is a tiny machine - at least compared to other HD cams. Here it is in my hand.

Pixel Noise

Both Kodak's V603 and Panasonic's FX01 slim cams are doing a nice job with pixel noise at high ISO. Of course, for them, "high" means ISO 400. But at least they are managing that pretty well. The Nikon P3 didn't appear to do quite as well. But I beleive it was a preproduction model, and the setting was a tad darker. So I'm reserving judgement.

Here, at ISO 400 are:

The Kodak

The Panasonic

and the Nikon

Still no match for a pro camera

But to prove that SLRS are still way better than pocket cams, here are some tantalizing clean-looking images from Canon's new 30D semi-pro camera at:

ISO 800
ISO 1600
ISO 3200

PMA -- Casio's Simple Tricks for Party Pics

With the megapixel race basically over, we're entering a golden age of digital photography in which camera makers can stop competing on specs and concentrate on adding features that make these things really useful -- especially for folks without the expertise (or desire) to constantly fiddle with settings.

Casio is certainly taking on that challenge. For years, the company has been adding "Best Shot" scene modes that go way beyond the usual suspects such as portrait, landscape, and sport in order to optimize settings for various environments.

At PMA, Casio made what I thought was an over-hyped announcement about its new eBay mode for optimizing shots of small objects (such as vintage Fisher Price Little People Dogs) that you might sell on eBay. Essentially, it's a macro mode.

Not a bad idea, but what really excited me was an even simpler mode called "soft flash." And unlike the Best Shot modes, which are getting buried in an ever-growing collection (now totaling 34), soft flash is an easy-to-access flash option, just like auto, redeye reduction, or slow synchro. And all it does is decreases the flash intensity by about 50%.

This is great! Simple, but really great.

Usually, the flash is way too powerful. Since camera makers don't know what we'll be taking pictures of, they just assume the worst-case scenario -- something about 10 feet away. And they make the flash correspondingly supercharged. But I typically use my pocket cam to take close-up photos of friends. And if they are the least bit fair-skinned, they come out looking rather Goth. Take this -- admittedly extreme -- example of my poor buddy Matt taken with my Canon PowerShot sd450. (Click on any photos for an 800-pixel-wide version.)

He looks like one of the glowing white aliens from Close Encoutners -- perhaps fixing to abduct rosy looking Aubrey (who's far enough back to avoid the worst of the flash burn).

I often try to fix this by covering about half the flash with my finger. But I far prefer Casio's method. To see how well it works, check out these two shots taken at PMA with the Z600 camera. The product manger, Scott, was one of the many good sports at PMA who modeled for dozens of test shots with their companies' cameras.

The top photo was taken with standard flash. The second with soft flash. Neither is perfect, but the second is way better. We see something like natural coloring on his face, and a lot less of the shininess from too much flash hitting pale skin. (A redeye reduction version of soft flash would be a nice addition in the future.)

I later learned that Pentax also recently came out with a similar flash option. I hope all the camera makers follow suit. (Canon?)

PMA - Hands on with Sony's New Digicams

During the Photo Marketing Association show -- currently happening in Orlando -- Sony held a press event at the Hard Rock at which reps were handing out dozens of cameras. Unfortunately, they were only for us to take test shots at the event. It wasn't a schwag fest. (Just kidding. I never accept schwag, anyway.)

Among the new models were three -- the 6-megapixel W30, W50 and S600, that I blogged a few weeks ago, when Sony first announced them. I also got to try out another model, the 8.1-megapixel W100.

What had impressed me most about the cameras was their claimed ability to shoot at high light sensitivity (ISO). As I have written again and again and again , high ISO is one key to capturing natural ecolor, becaus it lets you forego the lousy-looking light from camera flash. But replacing lousy flash light with lousy grainy images isn't much of a bargain. So I really wanted to see how the Sonys handled high ISO levels.

Overall, they did pretty well. As with virtually all cameras, you never want to actually use the highest ISO setting (unless you will be displaying the picture at far below its full size -- no more than a 4"x6" print or in an even smaller image online). But Sony's pocket cams did pretty well one or two steps below the top of the ISO scale.

The slim, 6MP W50, for example, handled ISO 400 extremely well. (My fairly new Canon sd450 looks awful at this level -- like a Monet or Seurat painting gone horribly wrong.)

Check out this closeup of a photo of flowers, reproduced first at full size (pixel-for pixel) and again greatly reduce (Click photo to get and 800-pixel-wide version.)

You will see some noise on a big print, but very little at any point under full size. Even ISO 800 (top) and ISO 1000 are acceptable for small online pictures, like these.

I didn't actually shoot with Sony's W30, but the only difference, I believe, is a smaller LCD on the back (2 vs. 2.5 inches) and of course a smaller price up front. So I would expect it to perform similarly.

The low-priced S600 did about as well, also. The main drawback to the S600 is that it's a scale model of a brick. And it lacks some of the advanced control options of the W models. But for $199, it's a pretty good deal.

Finally, I tried out the W100, which goes to ISO 1250. Of course that didn't look good, but ISO 400 looked fantastic, and ISO 800 wasn't laughable. See the ISO 800 photos below. The first is scaled to a reasonable size for online posting (800 pixels wide, click for full-size); the other is the same photo, pixel-for-pixel.

The W100's high resolution (8.1 megapixels), combined with its low noise should enable some respectable large prints.

Fujifilm's three new pocket cams -- one with awesome low-light capabilities

Fujifilm today announced three new compact cameras that I saw in a sneak-peek session at last month's Consumer Electronics Show. The FinePix A600 is a moderately priced 6.3-megapixel model with 3X zoom and 2.4-inch LCD expected to sell for $249 in June 2006.

The other two have some especially cool amenities.

The FinePix F650 (at left), is pocket-sized but with some big features, including a 3-inch LCD screen and an impressive 5X optical zoom lens (equivalent to 36-180mm on a 35mm camera). It will be out in June, listing for $349.

And the FinePix F30 (at left), sounds incredible. It shoots at a light-sensitivity of ISO 3200. This is unheard of for pocket cameras - which generally go to ISO 400, or maybe ISO 800. Just yesterday, I marveled at Sony's cameras that shoot at ISO 1000. Fuji's new camera dwarfs that.

High ISO is a big deal because it means you can capture scenes in low ambient light, without flash. Using flash is pretty much like saying "I surrender. This is too dark to capture with the real light, so I'm going to flood it with an ugly white headlight just so I can get something." (There are exceptions, of course. For example, pros with expensive, external flash units can bounce the flash off walls or other objects to diffuse the light and infuse it with more pleasant color. But that's near impossible with the built-in bulbs on point-and-shoot cameras.)

Fujifilm showed me some photos taken with the F30. And assuming they weren't doctored, the technology really works. ISO 3200 was kinda grainy -- probably good only for a small photo on Web site - however, that's probably where most photos end up now, anyway. And the lower ISOs were impressive. ISO 1600 would be tolerably for at least a 4x6 print (perhaps a bit larger), and ISO 800 was downright nice: Even a print of up to 8.5x11 probably wouldn't show too much grain.

There is no magic to this performance: Fujifilm has just been working hard on it for a long time. The company developed its own charge couple device (CCD) sensors with pixels that are aligned to absorb more light than those in a standard camera CCD. And Fujifilm's Real Photo processor does a good job of removing pixel noise. For example, it makes to passes on each photo.

In addition, the camera has something called i-Flash, which Fujifilm claims results in better pictures "because it can detect more accurately the subtle lighting differences within a scene, and then light the subject accordingly with a wider range of flash intensities.  This is accomplished with an adjustment to the flash’s intensity based on a variety of factors including subject position in the frame, subject size, ambient light and backlight intensity."

I haven't tried this, so I have no idea if it works. But I welcome any effort to improve the generally lousy flashes on compact digicams.

Some other specs: The F30 has a 6.3-megapixel resolution, 2.5-inch LCD, and 3X optical zoom (equivalent to 36-128mm on a 35mm camera). It will be on sale in May 2006, listing for $399.

New Pocket Cams - Sony seems to get it

Sony today announced two new 6-megapixel compact digital cameras - the DSC-W50 ($250, at left) and the DSC-W30 ($230). All I have are specs and photos about these new cameras, but I like what I see -- especially their light sensitivity capabilities. Both cameras go to ISO 1000 - very rare on a pocket camera, most of which stop at  ISO 400.

The higher the ISO, the higher the light sensitivity, but the greater the chance of getting grainy pictures. My Canon sd450, for example, stops at ISO 400, and even that looks splotchy. In fact, I've been using it as an artistic effect, as you can see at left in another picture of my  niece, Brooke. (Click for larger image.)

The biggest benefit of ISO in a pocket camera is that you don't have to use the flash as much. And unless you are taking mug shots or drivers license photos, you probably don’t want flash. It totally kills the natural light and shading, making any photo in any setting look like it was shot in the same spare, overlit warehouse. See the photos at left for examples with (above) and without flash. (Up top is the bride, Melissa, dancing with her dad.)

High ISO capability is a hallmark of pro-style single lens reflex (SLR) cameras. Canon's 20D, for example, goes to ISO 3200. That's practically night vision! SLRs can do it because they have comparatively huge image sensors that suck in a tremendous amount of light. And in my opinion, there is no substitute for size when it comes to image quality.

So far, Fujifilm has pretty much been on its own with pushing high ISO capabilities in pocket cams. And the results have been quite nice. Look for example at the detail crops of two ISO 400 shots of the quirky still life I've been using for camera testing. (Yes, that is a Sigmund Freud action figure.) The one at the top was shot by a 5-megapixel Canon sd400. The one below is from a 5MP Fujifilm FinePix Z1. (Click for larger images. The second isn't focused well: My fault, not Fujifilm's.) It would be interesting to see how these Sonys compare to the good work Fujifilm has been doing.

Other details about the Sony cameras. The W50 has a 2.5-inch LCD and will be available in March. The DSC-W30 has a 2-inch LCD and should be available by the end of February. Both cameras have 3X Zeiss optical zoom lenses, 32 megabytes of built-in memory, and take Memory Stick Duo or Memory Stick PRO Duo cards.

An eBay for hacker and mod code

At the DEMO conference, I learned about a new company called IPswap that is trying to become an eBay marketplace for software hacks and mods. Here's how it works:

People with software-driven consumer electronics devices - like wireless routers, cell phones, or TiVos - post requests for software mods, along with a proposed fee. Programmers can login and offer to provide the code that people request. And the site runs on an eBay model, in which multiple people can make offers, and they can haggle over prices.

In addition to the single transaction, the new software goes into a library, where other people can buy it. Both the programmer and the original requester agree in advance to terms for splitting the proceeds on future sales. IPswap just launched on Tuesday. but a few interesting mod requests have surfaced. For example:

A request to overclock a Linksys Wi-Fi router to extend its range

A request to enable one DVR to wirelessly transfer content to another

I think it's a great idea, and I hope companies will too. Hopefully they won't go ballistic like Sony, which tried to prosecute Aibo fans who hacked the robotic dog's software in order to give it more features.

What could be better than having free focus groups, beta testers, and designers working on ways to improve your product? Of course, there might arise a sticky question about intellectual property. What if the hackers create features that the manufacturer was developing anyway? Could the hackers claim prior art and sue for royalties? Hmmm...