Warning issued by Nikon on D800 numbers

Eye-level

Banned
Oldest marketing ploy in the book better buy it now because someone else is gonna buy it out from under you...hahaha

If you was a big camera company and you could sell every camera you made wouldn't it make a whole lot of sense to make sure there was no shortage of cameras available??? Who do these guys think they are Apple??? LOL :)
 

DW_

Senior Member
Well, there is a history of Nikon products actually increasing in price on the secondary market so it would appear as thou their shortages are real. So it's not impossible that demand for the D800 has out-striped supply. I'm curious what crazy prices we'll see on Ebay if this does happen.

Update - I should have looked before I wrote that last statement. Seems the price gouging has already begun - see HERE and HERE and HERE (actually there's quite a few more, sad isn't it?)
 

Eye-level

Banned
I guess it is nothing new really a very fine/excellent F2 with DE-1 in 2012 goes for about twice as much as it did new in 72 (a mint F2AS nearly triple) ...
 

Dr Daniels

Senior Member
Well, there is a history of Nikon products actually increasing in price on the secondary market so it would appear as thou their shortages are real. So it's not impossible that demand for the D800 has out-striped supply. I'm curious what crazy prices we'll see on Ebay if this does happen.

Update - I should have looked before I wrote that last statement. Seems the price gouging has already begun - see HERE and HERE and HERE (actually there's quite a few more, sad isn't it?)

I believe these shortages are real. I contacted my local national Nikon offices, they said they're not sure if they will receive the first pre-order batches before Saturday. So forget about 22 March in South Africa. Then they also said that it is rather unlikely they'll receive the quantity of D800 they requested for South Africa.

Let's not forget that a lot of D700 owners have been waiting for this D800 for nearly 2 years now, and many DX owners wishing to go FX were waiting for the new light-weight FX body since the D700 lacked video. So the demand is expected to be high.
 

DW_

Senior Member
Yeah, Crutchfield said they sent out some boxes yesterday but sadly I was not on the list. I don't think they received very many since my order was placed on Feb 10 and they were still filling Feb 8th orders. Sadly I doubt I'll see mine until some time in April...if I'm lucky! :dejection:
 

Dr Daniels

Senior Member
I've placed a deposit for a month now at my local B&H. The promised date was 22 March, and on that day they were still waiting for the only 1 copy they had allocated to them by Nikon.
Having a shoot tomorrow, I decided 'sc###' that and phoned virtually all shops in town. I managed to find a smaller shop that had 1 in store. So as of today, I am shooting with a D800! :)

I must say that coming from the D700, it feels like you barely changed cameras. Everything is virtually the same apart from the Single or Continuous focus option which is quite different.
After setting my usual settings, I played a bit with it and especially the video function interviewing a friend. I must say that it is quite impressive so far.

The one crucial thing that we have to keep in mind before purchasing there D800, is the massive resolution and what it implies. Of course we're talking huge files size, but more importantly: computer performance when handling such massive files. I take many D800 owners are gonna buy a new computer with it.
 

DW_

Senior Member
Dr, I know you'll understand this when I say "I hate you"! :dispirited: LOL!!! I don't think I'll get my grubby hands on mine until mid April, maybe sooner but I'm mentally prepared for an even longer wait.

As for computers, as long as you have a decent quad processor (I've the core i7 chip) and sufficient memory you'll be okay. Disc space, on the other hand, will quickly evaporate. I imagine an NEF shot in 14 bit is going to be a LARGE file. So I think we will all be much quicker on the culls than we were with smaller sized images. Nevertheless, storage will the name of the game. For me, I like externals and cloud. The nice thing about cloud style storage is that it will always be there. Your house could burn down (God forbid) and with it your external drives but your cloud storage will still be there.

Btw - Amazon gives anyone who has a membership 2 gigs of storage space for free. Not a bad deal, IMO, and after the first 2 gigs it goes up fairly reasonably. Also, "dropbox"also has a deal where you can have 2 gigs storage for free and an additional 250 mb's for everyone you get to sign up. So if anyone is considering using dropbox send me a PM and I"ll forward you an invite. What is nice about dropbox is that you can share very large files with others. Kinda like "fetch" used to be back in the early 90's. I use it for transfering RAW files and large PDF's.
 

Dr Daniels

Senior Member
DW if you need the D800 urgently, you should phone a couple of photo stores like I did. But mid-April is around the corner.
I had to make a move quickly because of some shoots that I really wanted to do with the D800.
 

DW_

Senior Member
Even thou San Diego is the 7th largest city in the US, there are precious few camera stores here. 2 as a matter of fact and both have long waiting lists. But on the bright side, there's an official authorized Nikon repair shop just a couple miles from my house, which is really handy just driving it up and dropping it off.
 

zx7dave

Senior Member
I had D800 on order with BH Photo from early Feb though mid Mar. After discussed with their inability to tell me the truth I cancelled my order and ordered through Ritz camera on 22 Mar. I was notified my camera from Ritz shipped yesterday. Meanwhile my buddy that also ordered from BH Photo in early Feb is still waiting and hearing the same lies. Each time a different customer rep has a different story with a different timeline.
Thanks Ritz... You have my business going forward.
 

Photowyzard

Senior Member
Oldest marketing ploy in the book better buy it now because someone else is gonna buy it out from under you...hahaha

If you was a big camera company and you could sell every camera you made wouldn't it make a whole lot of sense to make sure there was no shortage of cameras available??? Who do these guys think they are Apple??? LOL :)


No wiser words spoken. Apple is the number one valued company on the planet. This is right out of their play book.

Release as small number. Hype the press, predict shortages and disappointment if you don't pre-order, claim people won't see any till Christmas... yada, yada, yada. Big companies love to copy other big companies that have their act together.

The forums go buzzing with anticipation. Pent up demand is fuelled by the fires of desire. The lucky and talented few post pictures measly mortals only dream of taking, further fuelling the fires. [ the lucky few, would be the Pros, who happen to be NPS members who get their cameras first. Probably 5,000 of them because that was the supposed initial run, which sold out. How convenient! These "Pros" take great pictures, making you think this camera will make even your photos sing!]

Very clever marketing. The resellers have all bought this hype, hook-line-and-sinker. They are all saying you won't see a D800 demo in a LCS till Christmas because there won't be enough to meet the demand. So, the question I ask is, "How does a big company pay the bills selling just hype? At some point, you have to ship. Hopefully, they ship before the big C brings out their next best thing! LOL Otherwise ....

When they do ship, the ship TONS. No more shortages, the panic is then on to sell the production run! LOL

The one thing Nikon really does have going for it is the D4 and D800 have specs that are currently unsurpassed by the competition, so the hype is deserved, to some degree. The prices are competitive as well. The proof will be in the pudding [my daughter keeps telling me not to say this!] I am one of those guys who likes to touch and smell the fresh ink before I plop down a cool $3K for something. Like everyone else, I can hardly wait to see it, but my money stays in my wallet until I see what it can do.
 
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