I admit, I’ve got no patience; it’s why I write about technology. I’m invariably bored with it after a few weeks and itching for the new thing to arrive. Having said that, I’m also really quite tired of the cycle of phone upgrades – so when my 3GS got broken, I hoped that the new iPhone 4 would do everything I needed. This premium-priced gadget is stacked high in shops everywhere, so why was buying it so hard…

The Consumers, The Crooks and the Myth

Let’s get one thing straight about the iPhone 4. Unlike the original iPhone, which was only available through one carrier in the UK, was locked and was on very expensive contracts, the iPhone 4 is available direct from Apple. Go into an Apple store and you can hand over £499 or £599 of your money and have a SIM-free, contract-free iPhone 4. It’s as easy as buying any other bit of technology, or should be. Apple don’t give stock levels online, Apple stores don’t give out incoming stock dates, and Apple stores are only really in major cities – so travelling in just to buy one can be an expensive wasted journey. That said, if you can stand 11 minutes of James Brown screaming down your ear you MIGHT get an Apple genius to answer the phone and let you know if they have stock. Frankly, if you have the time to wait (3 weeks at the time of writing, 2 weeks according to most forums) order one online and be done with it.

That first bit though, the bit about locking, gave rise to The Myth. The Myth that an unlocked iPhone is a thing of beauty and of value. Complicit in this myth is UK distributor eXpansys, who currently charge an eye-watering £944 for a 32GB iPhone 4. Yes, the exact same item you can buy in an Apple store for £599. I can almost understand it though, as when the iPhone 3 came out, they had a similar charging structure for SIM-free models and were essentially one of the few easy sources for such a thing (short of jailbreaking and unlocking, which is so easy anyone who understands what the process does should be able to accomplish it).

The Myth has fed a whole load of unscrupulous resellers on eBay, and made buying a secondhand iPhone absoutely infuriating. Again, you can expect to be charged £700+ for a device that costs £500 and won’t be new, may have been unlocked using Jailbreaking techniques and at best, has simply been bought at the store you were going into anyway purely to make a profit. It’s like the Wii all over again. JUST WAIT. Eventually these people will run out of things to try and resell and will go back to running private clamping firms or finding other ways of making money from people’s impatience/stupidity.

What feeds the Myth are The Consumers. They don’t wait, and they don’t think “Oh, this device is not out of print. limited production or discontinued so Apple are, in fact, making more of them and all I need to do is wait”. They actually pay the £750 to someone who just paid £500 and walked out of a shop with it. If the first person to list a Wii for £500, or an iPhone for £1000, had had no takers there wouldn’t be an army of copycat eBay sellers trying to replicate their absolute greed and questionable morals remarkable success; and as such the iPhones in the shop would be bought by people wanting an iPhone rather than a profit.

Once the Myth is established, and the Consumers are used to the idea that an iPhone should, in fact, cost more than the RRP, we get the crooks. The crooks are the worst.

The crooks are not, as you might have expected, the people selling dodgy Chinese iPhone-clones or marking up easily available consumer goods. The crooks are the network operators. Right now, top of my list is Vodafone, my very own operator since 1997. They’re charging more for less, and on the whole they’re doing it consistently, across the board, under the guise of legitimate business practices.

My contract was renewed with the launch of the new iPhone 3GS on the aforementioned network. I fully understand that this phone came with contractual limitations; I paid the grand total of £75 for a 32GB iPhone 3GS with a retail value of nearly £700 (depending on reseller, naturally; at the time Apple didn’t offer SIM-free 3GS models in the UK). Whilst other networks are more reasonable about their locks Vodafone’s customer service came back with this nonsense – “Just to let you know that iPhone 3 and iPhone 4 is exclusively for Vodafone and hence can’t be unlock.”

Aside from the absolute inaccuracy of that statement – unless “exclusively” means “available with slightly fewer partners than yo mamma” – there’s even a page regarding unlocking the iPhone on Vodafone UK’s website which says nothing about exclusivity.

Now fair enough, my 3GS is still in contract. However – I dropped it. And I wanted a new phone. After repeated attempts to call the Apple Store in Birmingham, I gave up and decided that one or other of my networks (T-Mobile and Vodafone) would be able to provide me with an iPhone 4, surely for a reasonable cost. They practically give away things like the Samsung Galaxy S, after all. But The Myth has come to play.

T-Mobile would sell me a 16GB iPhone 4 for £500. Okay, that sounds fair – even if it is £1 over. But wait… I also have to pay £20 for a PayG SIM? I don’t want a PayG SIM. I can buy a SIM-free iPhone for £499 direct from Apple and I don’t have T-Mobile’s purchasing power! Surely if you’re not going to subsidise my phone yet are going to lock it, I should at least be able to just buy the phone. So we’re up to £520. No, wait. I need a MicroSIM for my contract. The contract which I can choose to knock back to £10/month and cease using if I don’t have a handset to use with it… yep. That’ll be a tenner.

The Myth allows T-Mobile to charge £530 for something which is less functional than a £499 device from the manufacturer, whilst committing you to using their network. Madness.

So I try Vodafone. They will do a box-only handset at £590 (their website gives PayG handset prices as £480 and £570 for 16 and 32GB respectively; a small saving). Seems fair. They won’t unlock it, though. In fact, they won’t unlock it ever according to Apple’s website or their own customer service people, despite it costing a mere £9 less than the Apple store and as with my point about T-Mobile, encouraging me to continue using their service rather than buggering off and using something else.

If I didn’t have a thorough dislike of O2, formed back when they were BT Cellnet and my contract was (stupidly) bought through Carphone Warehouse, changing my billing relationship and contractual setup (nice of them to draw my attention to that), what I should have done is gone into the O2 store, and handed over £595 for a 32GB… hold on. That’s a locked handset again, isn’t it… well… yes. And despite their generous terms (£15 unlock) for the iPhone 3GS, they’re claiming the iPhone 4 “cannot be unlocked”.

Having bought the iPhone 4, I thought “surely it would be reasonable to unlock my 3GS at least”. I just gave them a load of money for a replacement phone on my contract, so having a phone tied to that commitment would logically free off the older, upgraded phone. Nope. Not even a chance. Won’t be unlocked until 2012.

O2 will unlock an iPhone 3GS free, after a short period, on the sheer common sense understanding that you’re legally bound to the contract regardless of what damn phone you use or how you use it. In no way does unlocking the iPhone get you out of your 2 years handing over £40/month, neither does using another SIM in it harm O2 in any way, shape or form. They’ll even offer reasonable unlocking terms on their PayG handsets – again for the 3GS, not the 4.

Three will unlock; their site doesn’t seem to give iPhone specific details but unlocking for a fee appears to have no term.

Tesco unlock appears to be tied to 12 month terms, but as Tesco are O2 there may be other details elsewhere on this. They do give unlock details for the iPhone 4 though, unlike some others.

Orange will unlock for a fee (£20); it seems to be that they have a minimum three-month term and your account must be in order.

T-Mobile will unlock for a fee (£15) typically – their iPhone help details don’t give information either way.

Vodafone are the only UK operator who do not have a policy for unlocking iPhones other than “we won’t”.

Naturally you’d wonder why this is important – and of course for me, I just want to pick and choose between my contracts to see which performs best. As a new user though, you really are much better off going with almost any network other than Vodafone for the iPhone 4 (when they got the 3GS it was a different matter – their contracts with the 32GB model were amongst the best value); if you’re an existing Vodafone customer then it seems taking any other handset, selling it and buying an iPhone from the Apple store will be cheaper and give you a more flexible device than you would have been provided with by Vodafone. Vodafone in Australia (as with the other networks) will happily unlock, and I really don’t believe that their legal team is so incapable of negotiating a contract that they somehow got a worse deal than, say, Three.

Whilst there is a degree of market demand, if the operators were to sell unlocked phones the supply would be spread out and available across more outlets – it’s not that there are insufficient phones, it’s that in the back of the Vodafone store there are several hundred locked to Vodafone that aren’t in an Apple store. As a consumer you’re losing out on a subsidy for a locked handset; £10 or £5 is hardly comparable to, say, the £70 the Sony Xperia X10 Mini is subsidised by (£180 on PayG, free on contract, £250 SIM-free). So don’t do what I did, don’t be impatient. Buy your iPhone 4 from Apple.

Whilst there are no other charges to the J-10 currently, how does the SSD affect the J-10′s performance?

The first, and most notable aspect of upgrading to the SSD – currently listed as a “build to order” option for £180/128GB and £110/64GB extra – is the lack of heat and a slight drop in weight. Boot times are definitely quicker and I’m regretting not making a note of the boot time with the HD; from a cold start into Windows 7 Home Premium takes 38 seconds. Windows 7 has been designed to use different performance parameters when working from SSD, reducing the overhead of routines designed to optimise operation on conventional hard discs like prefetching and defragmentation. Loading applications is much faster, particularly the relatively small apps I use for controlling my digital camera (at present, the only reason the J-10 isn’t a permanent studio fixture is the lack of a case to protect it).

On the 1GB system the GeekBench score increased from 921 to 925 – a minor improvement, and I expect a similar improvement over 2GB performance. The Windows Performance Index is unchanged at 2.3 – tellingly however the HD benchmark scores 5.9. In real-world use the benefits are generally a more responsive system and lower heat; battery life has gained roughly 10 minutes or so over the HD equipped models in normal use, but can be extended by careful power management. In video and HD-intensive tasks, the SSD is a more significant improvement and can add around 20 minutes – if you optimise power settings it’s possible to get the runtime up to 2 hours at 30% brightness (still a comfortable indoor setting on the bright LED-backlit display); bearing in mind that these tests are performed with sleep and screen saver disabled.

Overall then, the SSD is a moderate improvement across all aspects of the device – rather than a dramatic improvement in a single area. In real world use the improved performance is most apparent in the overall responsiveness of Windows 7, and that alone brings the tactile interface into the same league as most smartphones and other mature touch-based devices.

For existing customers The Tablet Store is offering an upgrade service; if you sourced a machine elsewhere, the SATA drive replacement is easy and straightforward – suitable SATA SSD units are available from a variety of manufacturers (most notably Crucial, who offer a variety of capacities and speeds) and as the technology becomes more mainstream the prices have fallen a long way from the heady four-figure premium a solid-state alternative used to add to many laptops. In general if you want serious capacity it’s still an expensive option, but you can get usable space in a reasonable budget now.

The J-10 is definitely improved by the fitment of the SSD and it shows real promise – I’d like to see more improvements in the runtime, but for that it will need the OEMs to invest a lot more time and money in the battery technology being used, which could push the system out of the budget bracket it currently occupies (for the provided tech). Rumoured N455/DDR3 machines are unlikely to improve on the runtime, with chipsets that have higher power consumption and no indication of improvements to the 3000mAh battery. The Tablet Store is the only reseller with these tablets in the UK and all indications are that rather than merely importing and reselling, there’s an active interest in developing the product and improving the areas that the OEMs have neglected – and each territory around the world seems to be getting their own specialists rather than the flood of people that tried to resell the aPad devices. As such, whichever group of people produce the “Giant iPhone” should be encouraged by the feedback the system is getting from users and their distributors.

Have the Archos 28, 32, 43, 70 and 101 got the spec, pricing and performance to offer a similar experience to the iPad for Android fans – or even, with Android 2.2 Froyo and Flash support, provide an even richer user experience?

The numbers of the new Archos models refer to the screen dimensions; in this case 2.8″, 3.2″ and 4.3″ for the smaller models. It’s fairly easy to dismiss the compact PMP devices as irrelevant; most people have a mobile phone and specification wise they’re pretty much asking for you to spend another £100 or so on a second device to do what your mobile phone probably already does whilst also being generally perceived as free. Whilst the model may be analogous to the iPhone and iPod Touch, the crucial difference is that no-one else is making iPhones/iPod Touches and Apple have an unassailable control on how the devices are sold; even on contract an iPod Touch offers the iOS device for the same or less money. That’s before we’ve considered the wider market for the iPod Touch as a gaming device or media player.

Without the existence of “free on £25/month contract Samsung Galaxy S/Milestone 2/HTC Legend” etc. high-performance Android smartphones, the smaller Archos tablets offer some pretty convincing specifications – £99 for a 4GB and £109 for 8GB in the form of the 2.8″ PMP, with a smartphone beating 800MHz ARM Cortex CPU (not many smartphones of those dimensions carry such processing power) and a high-density 240 x 320 pixel display. Another £20 brings you to the Archos 32, adding not only a 240 x 400 display at a larger size but also Bluetooth and a VGA-res video camera. Finally the 43 comes with a Milestone-esque 480 x 854 display, 1GHz CPU and 2MP camera. With 16GB storage it costs £199; £10 more than an iPod Touch with half the capacity (Apple don’t offer a 16GB Touch). Curiously the 43 seems to make the least sense, as those specifications are so close to the current crop of smartphones that the market for it must be tiny.

All have WiFi, naturally, and are running Android 2.2 with some pre-bundled software and Flash support; Archos often limits access to the market (and users often circumvent this ;) ).

Moving away from the PMP market, Archos’ next entries into the tablet market follow on from the Archos 9 PCTablet (which remains available) and the Archos 7 internet tablet (which is discontinued; the Archos 7 Home Tablet remains on sale). The Archos 70 is an 800 x 480 7″ device with the 1GHz ARM Cortex processor and either 16GB or 250GB of storage, Flash or Hard Disc respectively. Priced at £229 for the solid state model and £269 for the high-capacity device, the 70 is already shaping up to leverage the very usable 7″ form factor and deliver fantastic bang for the buck.

Archos 101

The real stunner – potentially of course – is the 480g 101. Well under £300, the 10.1″ tablet comes in 8 and 16GB versions with HDMI output, MicroSD card slot and USB. The screen is 1024 x 600. With a depth of 12mm, the unit has a stainless steel frame. The 16GB model costs £299, undercutting the iPad by a good £130 and 200 grams; the 101 also claims 36hrs music playback and 10 hours web surfing; whilst experiences of Android vs. iOS devices have tended to show Apple claim lower than “maximum” times (most iPad users are finding 11-12 hours of use is typical for a claimed 10) and other manufacturers claim “best case”, given the similarity of the specifications it shouldn’t be hard for similar usage patterns to give similar runtime. The biggest issue is that of multi-tasking, where Android can and does allow true multitasking apps to use resources without the user necessarily being aware.

eXpansys are now listing the Archos 70 and 101 prices as £229 for the 70 16GB, £269 for the 101 8GB and 70 250GB and £299 for the 101 16GB. The smaller PMP devices start at £99 there too, You can also find the older PMPs and tablet devices there; as always check pricing before hitting buy as eXpansys can sometimes show evidence of solipsism when it comes to pricing; their £944 and £799 pricing for the iPhone 4 32GB/16GB models (respectively £499 and £599 from Apple) suggests that if they think they can get away with it, mark ups will be insane. By comparison, they’re placing the Samsung Galaxy Tablet at £679; bar the 3G and screen technology a very similar device to the £229 Archos 70…

Apple's Newton system, plus relatives

Newton successfully brought two concepts into play which remain part of the iPad (and to an extent, the wider Mac experience) ethos. Soup, and input. It’s hard to correlate the crude, low-resolution display of that first Messagepad with the glossy, rich-coloured display of the iPad just as it’s hard to imagine now that you could specify your entry level Macintosh at the time with a monochrome screen to save some money – yet that single point of interface (Newton, from a UI perspective, had NO buttons) was intended to perform all of the organisational tasks that Newton was supposed to offer.

And offer them it did – early applications allowed site surveys, quick sketched notes, transformable bitmaps coexisting with editable text content. Newton’s “soup” of information allowed massive flexibility, if not easy transportability. That soup also distanced the user from the filesystem and operating system; in an era where people were still adapting (in the workplace) to ever deeper filing systems and Windows users were still tied by 8.3 filenames.

Like the iPad now, the Newton made sense if you had an application for the device. Like the iPad, it was also purchased by people who just wanted the latest thing, and that put users off the concept when they found that – curiously enough – it’s about as useful as a pen and pad when you don’t know what to draw or write. 16 years of technological advancement has seen users become far more accustomed to technology and the limitations, as well as opportunities it offers, and the designers and developers have also realised that if you give the users enough that is entertaining, productivity can come second.

Newton went through two real progressions, with a third progression left almost unfinished. We have the MP100-130 models, which were all based on a slower ARM processor, and then we have the StrongARM based 2000 series where the Newton became a very impressive – albeit expensive – handheld computer. The joker in the pack is the eMate; a deeply prescient system that laid the roots for Apple’s design renaissance whilst pre-empting the netbook’s popularity and – sadly – existing in an unfortunately undeveloped state with a mere 25MHz CPU and without a RAM expansion, 16-bit bus width. Had the eMate been given the same architecture as the Newton 2100 it may well have brought considerably more success to Apple’s Newton division whilst genuinely predating the usable “school” computer concept typified by the OLPC project and subsequent netbook devices.

A poor shot of my old eMate, normally used as a notepad or terminal.

The interesting thing about this parallel is that we’re seeing a similar evolutionary path with the iPad. It’s gone from a concept device, to the iPhone and iPod Touch (the iPod Touch being clearly and directly comparable to that first MP100, albeit with a more 21st Century media bias – it’s the best PDA a Macintosh user can buy) and now the released iPad; which makes me wonder if there’s still room in the lineup for Apple to resurrect the “iBook” name. It’s hard to believe that it could ever be a cheap netbook competitor, but with Apple’s Macbook range starting at £849 there’s a lot of room below it for a fast, efficient notebook system. It wouldn’t need to be any more complex than a current iPad with a keyboard, though it would be more logical to evolve the system a little. Adopting the width of the standard keyboard would give room for stereo speakers either side of the display, whilst that slight increase in surface area would give a little more space for battery. Adding a camera at this stage would make sense.

Such a device could essentially slot into the iPad’s pricing structure as such:

iPad WiFi 16GB – £429, iBook 16GB £479, iPad WiFi + 3G £529, iBook 16GB 3G £579.
iPad WiFi 32GB – £499, iBook 32GB £549, iPad WiFi + 3G £599, iBook 32GB 3G £649
iPad WiFi 64GB – £599, iBook 64GB £649, iPad WiFi + 3G £699, iBook 64GB 3G £749

Which then leaves the Macbook at £849, then the Air and Pro models. Given the Air’s low-power design, it could potentially be brought down in size and cost slightly to replace the Macbook model, leaving that line either to be phased out or marketed for education only.

In terms of usability, with the updates inevitable from the iPhone 4 such as 512MB RAM (maybe an iBook of this type could carry 1GB RAM allowing more flexible multitasking) and potentially higher resolution displays (though at 1024 x 768 the existing iPad display is comfortable and usable) an iPad-derived iBook could deliver the netbook experience that everyone hoped for with the original Eee-class machines albeit at a higher price point. Compact, lightweight and with exceptional battery life with dedicated application development – everything we hoped for with the first Linux netbooks but only got at best two of the requirements met.

What people think they want when they want a PDA or netbook-class device...

One of the important things about iOS devices – particularly the iPod Touch, a device so popular and yet so often overlooked by the mass media in favour of the iconic iPhone and now iPad devices – is that they’ve accomplished something Palm, Nokia (to a lesser extent) and Sony failed to do as well as Apple. The PDA remained a device that you had to sell a bit like the first home computers; no-one really knew what to do with it. The iPod, however – people knew what that was for. Lots of PDAs and smartphones play music & video and have great games as I discovered with my last true PDA, the HP iPaq HX4700. There’s nothing inherently new about a 3.5-5″ device that can carry your media and play a video. The issue was one of marketing; the PDAs were always sold on their organisational strengths, just like an Apple II was sold because it ran VisiCalc. Nevermind that the bulk of owners ran home and started playing Gemstone Warrior on it – it was sold on the utility value (the Apple /// was criminally allowed to carry exceptionally good 16-colour graphics under a bushel; most shipped with greenscreen displays!).

Very few people buy an iPod touch because it’s an amazing PDA. The contacts and calendar synchronisation between it and the target machines is exceptional, the consistent UI makes making full use of it is easy, and you really have to try hard to mess up your database consistency. It’s got excellent notes and third-party app support. It’s the PDA to end all PDAs (well, the iPhone is really because wow, you can like, call your contact RIGHT THERE from your PDA!) in a way that smartphones (a much older genre than people want to admit) rarely managed to achieve. It’s also sold in millions, because people buy it as a media device.

The iPad is going to do the same thing with “computers”. The current situation is that people are buying what are really workstation-class machines for the most mundane tasks partly because the applications to do what they want – Flash, Firefox, the games developed for desktop machines – all have system requirements and OS requirements vastly in excess of what is actually required to perform the tasks they want. Linux remains unfriendly to the user largely because no-one has the development resources to produce both the efficient hardware and the efficient software to sit on top of that whilst also providing a framework and guidelines for developers to adhere to. Android comes close, but Android is aimed at smartphones; it’ll take some time to evolve. An iPad in a keyboard dock is already a lovely stripped-down computer; the post-modern architecturally designed office where the executive need only send out documents, read and prepare and use email and scheduling tools needs nothing more. The creatives still need their powerful computers, the developers, the accountants and the people who do the day-to-day hard work – but not the secretaries, not the admin staff, not the board members. They don’t need quad-core laptops or desktops.

iOS and the ARM-based systems that support it are the best current alternative to “Big Computing”; whether or not the market will use that is another matter. At the very least, there’s a lot more to the iPad than “a big iPhone” – it’s a pointer to many of the flaws in which we currently consume computing in the wider marketplace. And if you think that an iOS iBook is something no-one would want – some people are so desperate for one they’ve made their own!

Windows 7 Starter is provided on the Archos; the 60GB HD includes a restore partition and leaves you with 25GB free for storage; whilst that’s a fair bit more than an entry-level 16GB iPad offers for a pure media device, it’s a long way from the mental association inevitable with a 60GB quoted capacity. Whilst Windows 7 Starter is fairly typical on Atom-Z netbooks due to the lower system requirements it also lacks touch screen functions – the Archos has a suite of touch apps which are of varying quality and consistency and all needed to be updated out of the box; additionally if you do choose to upgrade to a better version of Windows some of these early drivers can cause the system to baulk at the upgrade. If you’re buying an older Archos 9 from eBay you should check/update the BIOS, as early models didn’t support hibernate and as such can fully drain their battery and lose data in suspend mode.

The slim 8.9″ screen device not only packs a true HD into the box, it also sports a 0.3Mp webcam, sensibly located stereo speakers and a very clever infra-red type pointing device – moving your right thumb acts as a very small trackpad, though it does not support taps for clicking; you have two buttons on the left for that purpose. The buttons are placed slightly too low to hold the surprisingly heavy Archos comfortably but you’re unlikely to use them that often since the touchscreen provides a more natural interface most of the time. Despite being a device released in 2009, the Archos carries a resistive touchscreen and – missed, but nevertheless quaint in this multi-touch era – a stylus hidden on the rear panel! The back also carries the large, removable battery and a clever telescopic kickstand. There’s 802.11b/g WiFi and bluetooth on board alongside a single USB 2.0 port plus the headphone and power sockets, but there’s no 3G option and curiously, no HDMI or other video output on the unit itself. The stylus is quite horrible – it’s a thin, flexible bit of cheap plastic quite unsuited to prolonged use or a quality product and I opted to use the fat stylus from my DSi XL.

With a touch screen, it comes as some surprise to find scrolling and other tasks simply don’t work naturally. As it can’t track multi-touch, gestures and flicks are not properly supported, meaning those (again, quaint) scrollbars on either side of the browser have a purpose again. Whilst I can see how and why this situation has arisen, it’s at the expense of past innovation; the Archos 9 is crying out for a jog/scroll wheel. Old-school tech really does deserve old-school solutions sometimes. Even the little IR tracking device seems underused, serving only to randomly relocate your mouse if your hand brushes it when using the stylus. A simple proximity sensor or even software switch could maybe allow that to go from being a pointing device to a scrolling device. Whilst discussing omissions, this is one of the few UMPC/Tablet devices to skip both any form of display output and any form of card reader/storage expansion. There’s no SD reader on a device marketed by a firm specialising in image-tank style PMPs with up to 500GB storage. The single USB port allows the use of card readers but it’s still a shock to find no provision for an SD card.

Finally, Archos has neglected to put a rotation sensor in the Archos 9. Yes, it has a very clear orientation, but the key to tablets is flexibility. An eBook is more comfortable to read in a portrait layout, a video in landscape. The GMA drivers allows rotation of the screen by hand, but this neglects to inform the trackpad.

Underneath there is a dock connector for an optional £69 Archos 9 port expander providing VGA, 2xUSB, audio and 10/100 wired Ethernet. Archos also market a USB keyboard coming in at a weighty £99, which has a cute little design but seems unusually expensive for a non-wireless solution.

Archos include some media and productivity applications with the 9 – as well as the keyboard/touch panel software, IBM’s Lotus suite is included (with all this retro, I’m really tempted to see if it fits in a case with a Filofax…) and some tools for using different media formats with the GMA chipset, leveraging Archos’ reputation for handling a wide range of formats in their PMPs. As it stands, the GMA is best supported by Intel’s own drivers and as such bizarrely delivers the best performance in Windows Media Player 12 – good for consistency but flying in the face of every previous experience I’ve had with WMP!

The tools I use in the studio for camera control work very well on the Archos 9 – and the stylus-driven interface suits the pointer-driven elements of these desktop apps. Camera Control Pro 2 runs without any issues and it’s only the limited storage that affects how useful such a combination could be with 2 16GB cards in the D3S happily providing days of images to process as it is. Archos also provide Xnview for handling digital images no doubt as a result of their PMP devices’ popularity with photographers. With a Windows Experience score of 1.7 and Geekbench benchmark of only 551 (system set for maximum performance, plugged in) it’s unlikely you’ll want to do anything other than preview images, a task already hampered by the slow 1.8″ drive.

The screen quality and speakers are acceptable rather than stunning – and as the tablet market matures, they may even be considered poor. Netbooks offer glossier displays with better viewing angles and contrast for this budget and as capacitive touchscreens become the norm, the slightly opaque feel of an old-school resistive touchscreen is quite a shock. And this is before it’s had a few year’s use; you want a £400 device to last some time and still look pretty after all. Without dedicated media control keys you will want a screen protector as a matter of course, and this will add yet further to the layers between you and the Archos’ LCD. Whilst the speakers are nicer than those on an Eee or similar cheap netbook, the iPad and Dell’s speakers comfortably drowned out the Archos with the iPad showing a clear lead in terms of the bass quality delivered.

SDHC Storage replaces the CF card of the SD14

No other system uses the Foveon X3 sensor – a technology which has been covered here before, but essentially records true colour at every spatial location by providing Red, Green and Blue sensors in each pixel. Conventional cameras only catch one colour per spatial location. The upshot of this is that the SD15′s sensor has a spatial resolution of 4.5Mp, but captures 4.5Mp of red, 4.5Mp of blue, and 4.5Mp of green, a 10Mp camera with a typical Bayer CFA will capture 2.5Mp red, 2.5Mp blue and 5Mp green – which it then interpolates over a 10Mp spatial image to calculate the true colours. You have a choice; interpolate your image up from a pure signal, or never start with a pure signal but try to get enough that the details don’t matter.

Personally, I’m quite a fan of detail. I shoot with a D3S, a camera which only has 12Mp but incredible light gathering performance and speed, but prior to that no camera I tried would tempt me away from Sigma and I still miss the texture and quality of the Foveon’s image. The SD15 is a luxury second body, something to play with the art rather than the job of photography. Has Sigma done enough to let that art be practised without technology tripping the system up?

New menu structure gives flexibility

Physically the SD15 is almost identical to the SD14. The details are modified in that there’s now a backlit, with backlight control, upper LCD, and the rear display is much larger and higher resolution. The controls have been shuffled, but the essential shape and handling of the camera remains much as it was; a pleasant, solid but largely hard-plastic exterior small DSLR. The compact flash card slot has been replaced by SDHC; a side effect of the TRUE-II, and the upper panel controls hint at the new mirror lock-up mode made possible by the two-motor reflex system. Lock up? On a DSLR? Surely there’s a live-view then!

The new LCD and layout of the SD15

No, there’s no live view on the SD15. Possibly for technical reasons as the live view output (coincidentally the same as the resolution of the recorded video mode) of the DP series would occupy a small area of the LCD, and I’ve a suspicion that the TRUE processor can’t provide any more.

The TRUE CPU is an evolution of a 3CCD video camera solution, where data would be directly fed to a stream, and the only use for live view – as we see it – would be feeding an LCD/EVF. Sensor heating could also affect it, though the DP series with their live-view and lack of a mirror box to aid cooling haven’t shown any signs of that.

There’ll be more here soon; this is a quick preview of my review camera and full reviews will be going to their specified outlets – but I can’t resist showing a few little clues.

Amongst these, the Rockchip architecture has been out for ages – the Archos players are based on it – and MIDs have been showing up in various forms at consumer electronics shows particularly in Eastern territories for years. So why the sudden buzz?

It’s not that the Apad devices are that new. In one form or another, these have been floating around China for some time, particularly the Eken M001 device which is based on a VIA architecture. Marketed mostly as eBook readers, they feature sub-2004 quality resistive touchscreens that would be more suited to a Handheld PC than anything trying to compete with a device that can hit prices close to $1000; build quality in general is reputedly variable. Why are they in demand now? Importers are bringing them in by the bucketload, seemingly unable to get enough stock to resell; and reputable, established firms are putting their cashflow and their reputations on the line to resell them.

The key to the appeal has to be marketing; which can vary from very self-aware and impressive to downright deception. The success of the iPad has given the producers a reason to try and market these systems aggressively outside of China; some may appear to be trying to pass the machines off as iPads but in most cases the position is that these machines can be better, with proud demonstrations of particular features and highlighted specifications.

Frequently amateurish in execution, though the 7″ devices may look vaguely like an iPad scaled down they remain the inexpensive MID devices of yore – and even the packaging seems reluctant to make that final effort. Whilst some blatantly go for sticking an iPad picture on the noticeably smaller and deeper box, others have been honest – and show a picture of their tablet complete with error messages and no signal icons. The lack of signal icon is due to the Android installation being pretty much “as it comes”, and as such, targeted for smartphones. These generally lack built-in phone hardware.

Let’s be straight about this. These are not fooling anyone; the people that are buying them – in general at least – are far from technically uninformed or blinded by the opportunity to buy an iPad for under £200. Those “iPad for 31p!” ‘auctions’ probably fool more people. Buying these with your eyes open and without any thoughts of getting an iPad (or the iPad’s functionality) for considerably less money will ensure that you’re happy with your purchase. You might also want to skip to page two at this point ;)

iPad on left, Apad on right

Spot the difference

The value of these is on their own merits, as a compact internet tablet with (hopefully) a decent processor and screen resolution, a known and consistent front end and a well-stocked app store. The low cost also makes them appealing as gadgets for children or for using in more crowded or public situations where a recognised high-value consumer product may present a theft risk. Synchronisation with Google allows the Apad to be a useful travel companion without the potential drama of the TSA stealing/losing it, damage that may not be covered by insurance or even your own carelessness costing you a significant amount of money whilst still allowing private, secure access to your email and other data (and providing a certain amount of entertainment).

For many users the 7″ form factor is ideal; it’s handbag friendly, yet large enough to read eBooks and watch video on without discomfort. Most of them come with an eBook application preloaded, and with the right firmware the screens are surprisingly bright and clear. Offering more flexibility than a straight eBook reader the Apads have a lot of appeal for anyone technically-savvy enough not to get caught up in the rough edges; my girlfriend is familiar with Android via the Google phone and has no problems working around the odd button placements and occasionally incompatible Marketplace apps (Android’s diverse platform availability means that few developers have even considered their apps running on this unit. Archos have exacerbated this by locking the marketplace out of the technically similar Home Tablet). For developers it offers an opportunity to think about Android’s UI on a tablet and get to grips ahead of the (ever closer) wave of machines like the 7″ Dell Streak model rumoured for the end of 2010.

Notably, the two distributors that spoke to me about these machines were very upfront about what they’re selling and the processes behind the machines. Local reseller Digibites (trading as Android-Tablets) provided what fits the description of Rockchip Apad Model 2, with 8GB built in storage; this machine reflects the current typical Apad device on sale and compared to the iRobot branded model (1 and 2GB variations typically) it can be distinguished by the VGA-resolution (640 x 480) camera, which interpolates from 0.3 to 1.3Mp. Android-Tablets are selling the machines in configurations from 2GB to 16GB and bundle a furry pouch case and a screen protector alongside the usual headphones, USB lead and adaptor, universal PSU and terrifying “travel adaptor” to allow the USA-style plug to be used in the UK. The travel adaptor is possibly the scariest, flimsiest thing I’ve seen and no, it does not have a kite mark – let alone CE approval.

http://www.android-tablets.co.uk/ – pricing is £149 2GB, £169 4GB, £189 8GB and £219 16GB. eBay store is here.

The Tablet Store – a trading name for a very established China import specialist – also provided an Apad V2 in iRobot packaging alongside the iPhone-styled Windows 7 tablet PC reviewed here. The iRobot 2GB Apad is the most common unit found on eBay currently, with selling prices around £139 from importers and resellers in Hong Kong asking a compelling $128 – though you don’t have such easy access to your seller, and you will undoubtedly be hit with duty, VAT and customs/shipper handling fees that eat into that initial saving. The Tablet Store brings in larger shipments of Apads and offers more products; alongside the iRobot MID they also offer a 5″ 3G-equipped MID which is probably most comparable to having an HTC Athena with Android on it, and have discussed future MID models coming in. The Apad has apparently been subject to further revisions so their current sales are listing a V3 version, which this article will be updated to reflect when I’ve seen how they perform.

During the course of this review, Jay from Tablet Store pushed out to his customer base two firmware updates that take on board the developments of the Android community around these netbooks – more on this later. The most recent 5.1 Hybrid ROM leaves a very different impression to the original ROM in these systems. As of mid-July, there is a totally custom firmware for Jay’s machines including a custom splash screen and English language right from the start.

There are also new, RK2808a based Apads emerging, which have a blue rather than red LED. These are proper Apad machines with the correct architecture, but once again require a different Flash ROM. Development on third-party offerings is gradually picking up but for hacking, modifying and playing with the machine the V2 Red LED models are still favourable due to the amount of information available and how well understood those machines are.

“True” Apad machines share a common template and a common architecture – the Rockchip RK2808 system on a chip. There are some VIA models being marketed as Apads as well, which really confuses the market; the most distracting of which looks very similar, but claims to have 256MB RAM. Even if it does, it’s running on a processor that is so slow, any media aspirations may as well be forgotten. You can avoid these by shopping carefully, but when they’re cheap and honestly described they’re a fun, interestingly capable WiFi digital picture frame.

For a comparison – here’s a rough roundup of what is out there, and the rumoured followups. Shanzai machines can really move fast, particularly with regards to announcements/supply issues, so aside from the advice about buying from a local importer/distributor with landed, fees-paid hardware you must also be very careful when ordering items on pre-order. One of the reasons this site wasn’t updated for ages was disillusionment with supplier DealExtreme when I wanted to bring some watch-phones in for review in 2008.

Chinese MID comparisons - iPad clones and originals

Non-Apad MIDs

(Updates to this will continue; in the meantime you may want to check out http://www.slatedroid.com/ as well as employing Google).

Inside the Teso J-10

First, shut down the computer (do it from the start menu, don’t trust the power switch in case you have it set to standby). Remove your SIM card. The two screws on the end simply undo – they’re initially held with threadlock, so may be tight – make sure you use the right screwdriver (mine is marked 0×50, I’ll see how that relates to standard Philips sizes and update but if you can’t figure out what the right size is, maybe stop here). Place the case with the screw holes facing away from you and slide the back away from the fixed port panel. Once there is a reasonable gap, the case simply lifts off. If it won’t slide, check you removed the SIM first.

Undo the screws...

Slide the casing away from the USB/Power Switch panel...

Lift the casing...

..fully away from the front panel.

And there you have it - J-10 exposed.

Once open, you have access to the battery, the SATA 2.5″ hard disc (it appears to have sufficient height to take a 500GB drive), the memory (200GB DDR2 SO-DIMM; same as iMac 2.16GHz and pre Santa-Rosa Macbooks amongst many, many others) and the two Mini PCI-E slots – which in this model are populated with a Sierra MC8780 Aircard for 3G Wireless (it also, in some variants, supports GPS) and a generic WiFi and Bluetooth card. The WiFi antenna is near the fan, the 3G antenna is near the battery.

Memory module and antenna connections.

3G Antenna

3G and Wireless Boards.

Upgrading from the included 1GB memory to 2GB made no difference to the overall performance index, but saw Lightroom load considerably faster and the memory performance increase from 4.5 to 4.6.

The J-10 is based around a metal chassis, forming the centre of a sandwich with the LCD, chrome bezel and front panel on one side, and the boards and battery on the opposite site. With the exception of a few smaller components, the component quality is good – the antenna PCBs are a bit thin, and are stuck down (in the case of the WiFi antenna, glued to the battery).

Because the market for these tablets is now very split – with consumers looking for anything “that might be like an iPad”, whilst the geeks as ever are just looking for the coolest toys – I will address the hardware first, and then the user experience.

It starts out as good, solid current, netbook fayre. With the N450 and NM10/GMA 3150 graphics, the WinPad is pretty much ready and waiting for Hackintosh experiments and also represents the more mature, solid end of the netbook market; N-series processors generally seem to deliver better performance than the Z-series, albeit at the expense of greater power consumption. Dell’s current Mini 10 model is N450/GMA3150 based, for example, and most current netbooks share this Pine Trail chipset.

The display isn’t up to the standards of Apple’s iPad, but remains good across a wide viewing angle horizontally – it’s the twist that lets it down and is more apparent on a handheld device than a clamshell. Still – for the money, it’s pretty much industry standard. The 3G/HSDPA wireless comes from a Sierra Aircard MC8781 – equipped with the most current firmware, this hunts slightly for signal compared to a phone but uses a regular SIM and is unlocked. Finally, there’s Bluetooth and WiFi; these are provided on USB by a combined dongle integrated into the machine, and the WiFi finds networks easily.

Whilst Bluetooth was suggested as a path to equipping the device with GPS, the Sierra Wireless MC8781 already incorporates gpsOne capability as long as the right firmware is loaded (AC881U_F1_2_3_15AP). It also includes the ability to use diversity antenna to improve 3G signal quality; so whilst we can strike one of those items off the list (as supplied from the Tablet Store it has the correct firmware) I’ll take a screwdriver and nerves of steel to see if what else can be achieved with this system. Watch this space.

The GPS capability is definitely functional, though without software to fully test it I’ve been relying on this – NMEA Monitor for Windows. I’m getting visible satellites with the J-10 propped up in a window, but no signal yet; when I’m out on the road with it I’ll see how quickly it gets a fix.

(It’s worth noting that the Dell Mini 10 I reviewed also has GPS on the 3G card, but allegedly requires an antenna. Sadly specifying the TV option on that means the MCX connector is already deployed).

Elsewhere inside the WinPad, we find DDR2 memory that gives a respectable score in the Windows Experience index and a 160GB Hitachi HDD, partitioned into 3 with Windows 7 pre-installed. No installation media is provided, but OEM Windows 7 is included and as always you should make a restore disk – it might be worth using one of those partitions to make a quick recovery disk if you really like to tinker. Along with the Windows index of 2.3, GeekBench gives this system a score of 924 on “Balanced” power when running on battery, and 935 on High Performance – whilst running under Windows 7 Home Premium with some Aero effects switched on. Here the system is also identified as a THD(Thread Technology) PX1.

Physically, you’re confronted with a giant iPhone – seriously, if it weren’t for the aspect ratio and vents you’d be confused by the front – made of good quality plastics. The touch panel is reputedly made by the same OEM as Apple’s own – it’s certainly responsive and offers two touch points (so if it is made by Apple’s supplier, it’s not the same level of hardware), and seems to shrug off the occasional wipe down. A screen protector would make sense if you’re not prepared to see just how robust it is, however. The home menu button, power button and backlight buttons are the only physical controls on the unit (aside from a small, unlabelled reset switch) and these all feel well made, the power symbol containing the LED points to a fair bit of thought going into the design of the OEM product as does the ability to use the backlight and menu keys to select and enter startup options. The fit and finish is good and the whole unit, whilst surprisingly heavy at 1.1Kg, feels pretty well made. An added nice touch is that it’s not bothered about being upside-down – the screen rotates to all four orientations.

Interfaces include 3 USB 2.0 ports – two on one side, one on the other where it shares space with a mini-HDMI port, power, and audio. No wired ethernet is included on this model, though I have seem OEMs offering a very similar unit with VGA and Ethernet; if you’re overseas and buying a similar model on the strength of this review, those are signs it’s not the right one. Finally the SIM slot interface, and an SD card reader, complete the hardware interfaces.

A microphone and 1.3Mp camera are also provided; the camera is quick to activate via the menu button and pretty good for a webcam – do remember that in the natural “pad” user position, we can see up your nose. I recommend using a stand, or nose hair clippers – either one. Please. It’s like the Blair Witch project, only there are two forests… (Please note, I have not at this time included a sample picture from the webcam in use as intended. Have a guess why ;) ).

Original Image from J-10 camera

The tablet's camera tries hard...

Where was I? Oh, yeah. Essentially then, if your experience of Shanzai or OEM products has been stuff like those Windows CE netbooks or Elonex’s feeble attempt to market them here (remember their little… um… One+ thingy? With the rubber keyboard and the CPU power of a washing machine? No. Neither does anyone else, thankfully), you can step forward right now – this is better made than my Dell Mini 10.

It’s not all roses, of course. The compromise on this system is the battery; there’s also the inevitable side effect of being able to run a desktop OS on a machine this size and get reasonable performance – heat. The battery, which is built in, is around 3000mAh and lasts for around 2 hours at most, and more realistically just over an hour of WiFi and media. That really limits autonomy; my review unit also had a surprisingly short power cable but was rushed to me with an alternative PSU. The heat is not a performance issue, but it does limit how comfortable it is on your lap.

Having said that, as a geek toy it’s pretty awesome. it’ll run your x86 operating systems as well as any netbook, whilst looking kinda funky and going online anywhere. It will also do some fairly serious jobs; I’ve run Camera Control Pro 2 on it for tethered DSLR shooting, have had a play with Lightroom (it runs – slowly, but it runs) and it plays DVD-quality video well. To be honest I chucked some HD rips onto it, and they were perfectly acceptable; no tearing or stuttering, and sync remained – even when played in Windows Media Player. It’s also a neat presentation tool, offering dual-screen and screen spanning functions apparently (an adaptor is required for the full HDMI port size and I don’t have one currently – this will be updated when I’ve tried it). For £499, it represents good value when compared to similar 3G equipped netbooks which don’t have touch screens, though you may find they have better battery life currently.

Naturally, whilst this is from Tablet Store UK, I know geeks will search; IMO the current pricing is worth buying in the UK. I’ve had excellent support from them during the review (not least supplying the system so we could cover it) and the current exchange rate and import duties make any saving either negligible, or more likely to turn into an additional cost. Given that you’ll be dealing with a UK firm, any issues will be easily resolved and you won’t end up with lost, delayed or faulty hardware – an experience I’ve had with DealExtreme and others have reported from the referral/advertising sites. Now the iPad is well known and popular, the tablet market for clones, knock-offs and misrepresented goods is getting a lot busier – this is a good solid OEM product despite the iPhone-esque styling, and will not be a disappointment if you’ve read the review properly.

Hardware footnote: A listed accessory for this is a case which provides a keyboard. A rubber keyboard. Much like the Elonex One’s, in fact. If nothing else, this machine could be the one for the kitchen, where you can finally risk spilling sauce on the keys when quickly looking up recipes online.

For the non-geeks:

I make no secret that I’ve been impressed with Apple’s iPad. Before it, I’ve owned several UMPCs and have found them distinctly lacking – and naturally the iPad retains the edge in design, with a 10 hour battery life and a solid app store with some really impressive applications.

Those applications aren’t free, and the iPad is not a Windows machine. Short of recognising that it’s the same money you’d probably spend on either, these are totally different devices. The WinPad is a tablet PC, a proper, x86 computer with proper Windows and proper hard disc storage, to run your proper Windows applications. As such, I’m comparing this to the UMPC devices I’ve had more than I am other tablet devices.

Windows 7 has improved how it behaves with touch screens, compared to XP and Vista. It’s still got a long way to go, but it makes an effort. What helps massively is the multi-touch screen – on the WinPad, a two-point capacitive device. Whilst finger-point accuracy is poor, it allows gestures and pinch to zoom to work; Windows itself needs larger buttons and selection menus/boxes to accommodate the visual/touch interface, it’s by no means a failing of the pad. If you want your ‘iPad equivalent’ to run Windows, sorry – this is what you’re going to get no matter what you do, Windows is not geared up to finger touch yet whether you spend £1500 or £500.

And on that note, you will need to spend about £800-1500, if not more, to get the kind of battery life you get from ARM-based hardware. They need different cooling, different processors, different batteries and different industrial design to eke out that last bit of efficiency, and that costs money. When a Ubiquio VIA-based UMPC was £800, a smaller OQO was £1500, a faster Sony was £1800; even the FlipStart, with its little Pentium M and 5.6″ screen, would struggle to get more than an hour and a half from the standard battery and it got very, very hot – it also cost $1999 or £1500.

If you want to run Windows, these are the compromises you have to make. Sorry.

If you buy the WinPad to run Windows, the build quality and touch screen will provide about the best you’ll find for close to the budget currently. As an alternative to a netbook, let’s see what the accessory case is like; currently the on screen keyboard isn’t great for long-term use; another Windows issue. Nothing on the WinPad has frustrated me (a bad idea for a computer to do when it’s hand-held; tempers are short and hand-held things are easily thrown), all the features have worked as advertised.

So from a consumer perspective; if you want to run Windows on a tablet, this is a great device, the compromises made are clear and obvious, and it’s up to you to decide if you want to make a different set. Most of the alternatives involve as much weight reduction in your wallet as they do in the device, though, and often for cosmetic rather than functional gains. The given rating for this would be higher if the battery life were longer, in terms of performance it’s a good 80% machine.

I’m impressed enough that I intend to try it with more tethered cameras and with Elinchroms’ SkyPort software as a studio controller. There’s a lot of potential due to the acceptable Windows performance and robust-feeling build.

See the next page for the gallery.

Sigma DP2s revised markings

Firmware changes, also made available for the DP2, see improved AF performance and low-light focus accuracy, whilst a combination of firmware and hardware revisions contribute to an improved power-saving mode for increased battery life.

Overall, then, the DP2s does not seem like much of an upgrade, and you’d be forgiven for looking at the remaining DP2 models for purchase currently. The DP2s SRP is £599, whereas the DP2 remains available for under £500 in many places.

If you’re unfamiliar with the DP series, a quick refresher: The Sigma DP range currently consists of two compact cameras with large Foveon X3 APS-C sensors – an industry first. The DP1 models feature a 16.6 (28mm equivalent) F4 lens, the DP2 features a 24.2 (41mm equivalent) F2.8 lens. Originally launched in 2008 with the DP1, there are now five variants – the DP1, DP1s and DP1x, and the DP2 and DP2s. The 2009 DP2 model featured a new TRUE-II processor, a completely new button arrangement with rapid access to shooting parameters, interval shooting capability and ISO modes up to 3200, and the DP1x adopts the DP2’s hardware layout.

As intermediate models, the DP1s and DP2s mark minor changes to the cameras. It’s unlikely that there will be a DP2x, the next DP camera expected is an interchangeable model – though the mount format and actual details of that remain unknown beyond the stated intent to produce such a variant.

All of the DP models feature easy access to manual controls, such as a manual focus wheel on the back allowing preset focus, rapid adjustment of aperture and shutter speed (a leaf shutter, using the diaphragm of the lens, rather than a focal plane or electronic solution – maximum speed of 1/2000th) and wheel selection of mode. The LCD is used for composition and on TRUE-II models features a display histogram, configurable grid overlay and quick zoom function in MF mode; the resolution of 230,000 pixels is equal to the video capture resolution of 320 x 240. In fact, the Live View requirement of a camera without an optical viewfinder seems to have driven the appearance of the DP series’ ability to record video, and the QVGA movie capture even has bars (the capture size is 320 x 212) that appear to match the display area given to the status bar.

The screen on the DP series is adequate for the purposes, but as time and technology progresses, on paper the resolution appears not to stack up. As an objective reviewer of cameras, I maintain that the display is usable. As someone with an understanding of technology, it’s now lagging behind the competition, and unlike 2008, there is now a lot of competition. The DP series remains unique with the Foveon sensor and as such, retains advantages as a camera that keep it relevant.

?For what it’s worth, the newly-launched SD15 has a higher resolution screen and does not offer Live View, and the Leica X1, at £1999 and occupying a similarly “high end compact” market position has exactly the same resolution screen as the DP, and equally relies upon it for composition. This leads me to suspect that the LCD screen would be acceptable to most people if they weren’t focusing on the numbers, and that the video resolution is very much a limit of the Foveon/TRUE II combination, leaving the movie mode on the DP models to be a happy side-effect rather than a curiously under-specified “feature”.

Sigma’s adoption of the Foveon sensor leads pundits and buyers alike to draw some interesting conclusions about the camera performance so it pays not to get too wrapped up in like-for-like comparisons. The DP2s, like the previous DP models, deserves to be judged in isolation – the buyers can make their decisions without the need for spoon-fed editorial.

It is, of course, possible to get a review of the DP2 model on this site already – there’s no sense repeating myself. So on the DP2s, we need to consider three changes – one of which is available to all users as a download in the form of Sigma Photo Pro 4 which I’ll cover in depth elsewhere.

The first significant change are the body markings. These do improve the usability of the camera, combined with the rapid-access to MF zoom first seen in DP2 firmware 1.03. It’s still necessary to pay attention to the display to ensure you’ve changed exactly what you wanted but the DP2 and DP2s allow up/down adjustment of shutter speed and left-right adjustment of aperture without an additional mode change. Due to the focus mode button being part of the joystick, it’s still not wholly intuitive – aperture is on the very comfortable and underused “zoom” buttons (marked for playback functions – the “digital zoom” function has been discontinued) and can be used in Program mode to override the automatic settings. Sigma have done a lot to make the camera configurable and the function of the buttons can be changed, with all settings being saved to SD for later recall if wanted.

The second change is in the colour behaviour and sensitivity of the Foveon sensor. Camera colour balance is a matter of taste and preferences in the user, but in the DP2s the appearance of reds has been adjusted to give a more natural appearance. This is quite distinct, and very clearly different to the DP1, DP1s and DP2 models.

DP2s and DP1s

DP2s on left, DP1s on right