"N.J. Hillary" <josihillary@cox.net> wrote in message news:guBXa.20806$5f.206@lakeread05...
>
> >
> >      1) Companies like Nikon, Olympus, Canon, Minolta, Lecia,
> >         Contax, Pentax, Fuji, (Kodak?, Polaroid?) offer products
> >         of excellent to good quality manufactur and staff an
> >         excellent to good support team with customer friendly
> >         policies.
> >
> >
> >      2) Companies like Sony, Samsung, Panasonic, Casio, Toshiba,
> >         Fujitsu, Epson, Kyocera, Ricoh,  and  Sharp, usually
> >         offer products engineered to fail rapidly (ie. fair
> >         to poor quality) and thier support teams /almost/ always
> >         follow a policy set up under the theme: The Company
> >         Must Always Profit -- Customer Satisfaction comes second!
> >
>
> I am really struggling with the question above.  I am convinced SLR cameras
> offer you more options and the more you are willing to pay the better
> features you will have.  I have to really come to terms with the issue: Am I
> a lazy photographer or am I willing to learn from mistakes and become an
> informed photographer.
>
> This is the context where I am looking for an SLR camera that will give me
> the best value for the money I am willing to spend.  Your comment is I won't
> get that from Sony, Samsung, Panasonic, Casio, Toshiba, Fujitsu, Epson,
> Kyocera, Ricoh and Sharp.

Yes correct.

But olny IF you consider "value" to include: Quality Manufacture, Good
Customer Support policies and facilities, Longer term of engineered
obsolescence and failure, etc.  If you plan to buy a new camera every
two years (3 max with light use, 1 year w/heavy use) then the companies
in paragraph "2)" may be a consideration.  If however, you would like to
retain the option of /keeping/ your camera for 5 or 10 years (or longer)
then it is my suggestion to consider only models manufactured by the
companies listed in paragraph "1)".

This holds true for Digital Still Cameras ONLY.  Other sections of the
companies listed above may differ vastly.  For example I own a $60,000 (US)
video camcorder (last years model) two $55,000 edit decks and one $40,000
PB deck (last years model) made by Sony and I know they are of the best
quality in the industry.  I also have similar equipment from Panasonic
and Sony that is over 10 years old but is still in good working condition
and remains servicable.  So again to be fair and true, this only applies
to Digital Still goods that I know of.  It may apply to other areas of
consumer/prosumer goods like computers and Hi/Fi sets but I have no direct
information and so cannot comment.