Steve Mullen
November 23rd, 2007, 08:02 PM
I've been concerned about the pricing and competition from the EX1. Earlier I posted: "Therefore, part of the new higher price is the XMOR CMOS chips. Another part is the better manual controls. Plus the higher rez. LCD. So we are looking at a camera that is better much than the Z1, HVX200, and any Canon."
I now think I see how these new camcorders and the EX1 fit into the market.
Think of these two camcorders and the EX1 has being two different concepts of what 2008 HD camcorders should be like. They are like three flavors of fruit juice. None of them is TOTALLY better than the others. None of them is TOTALLY worse than the others. We have 3 camcorders that were designed (likely by different divisions) with different feature sets to meet different needs.
The customer picks the one that most fits their needs.
Pricing seems to have been driven by what each model's competition costs. If Canon and JVC now charge $10K for a shoulder-mount camcorder -- then so will Sony. The competition has demonstrated that tons of folks will pay $10K. At $6K, the HVX200 and Z1 prove that there are folks who will spend this much for a hand-held camcorder.
The old prosumer price range for DV camcorders of from $3K to $5K has been blown away. Today's VX1000 is now 2X more expensive.
Unless, of course, you count last year's V1 as the true VX1000's replacement. This suggests to me that the "V2" will get EXMOR CMOS chips. Thus, it looks like 1/4-in HD CMOS chips have now taken the place of 1/3-in SD CCDs. Which makes perfect sense since the 1/2-in chip is the new 2/3-in chip.
I now think I see how these new camcorders and the EX1 fit into the market.
Think of these two camcorders and the EX1 has being two different concepts of what 2008 HD camcorders should be like. They are like three flavors of fruit juice. None of them is TOTALLY better than the others. None of them is TOTALLY worse than the others. We have 3 camcorders that were designed (likely by different divisions) with different feature sets to meet different needs.
The customer picks the one that most fits their needs.
Pricing seems to have been driven by what each model's competition costs. If Canon and JVC now charge $10K for a shoulder-mount camcorder -- then so will Sony. The competition has demonstrated that tons of folks will pay $10K. At $6K, the HVX200 and Z1 prove that there are folks who will spend this much for a hand-held camcorder.
The old prosumer price range for DV camcorders of from $3K to $5K has been blown away. Today's VX1000 is now 2X more expensive.
Unless, of course, you count last year's V1 as the true VX1000's replacement. This suggests to me that the "V2" will get EXMOR CMOS chips. Thus, it looks like 1/4-in HD CMOS chips have now taken the place of 1/3-in SD CCDs. Which makes perfect sense since the 1/2-in chip is the new 2/3-in chip.