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Technology Stocks : WDC/Sandisk Corporation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Esa who wrote (2273)	1/1/1998 2:42:00 PM
From: Mike Winn	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 60323

Esa, thanks for posting the EE Times article. This article is very confusing to read. Happy New Year to all. ================================= But the format used by Canon Inc. is not compatible with the EXIF format used by its much larger rivals, Fuji Photo Film Co. Ltd. and the Eastman Kodak Co. Multimedia analyst Reiji Asakura, who covers digital cameras for a number of Japanese magazines, said the "digital-still-camera vendors using CompactFlash memory cards are pro-CIFF, while SmartMedia card users are pro-EXIF." "The leading digital-camera vendor in terms of volume, Casio, is a member of the CIFF Forum," her said, "but the company has only one model that uses the CompactFlash card. It is the high-end model and is not a volume-sale product. Overall, SmartMedia cameras have a larger share in the market, so the forum represents a minority group." ================================ It seems to me that there are the CompactFlash and SmartMedia formats which define the storage media, and then there are the CIFF and EXIF formats which define the image compression format. The article said that most digital camera vendors who uses the CompactFlash memory cards, Canon is one of them, favor the CIFF format. But Kodak and Fuji use the EXIF format. The article went on to say that the CIFF format is better than the EXIF format because it's backward compatible with JPEG, and it contains information such as camera type and shutter speed. The article also said that SmartMedia's users are pro-EXIF while CompactFlash's users are pro-CIFF, but SmartMedia has a larger share of the market. So this is the summary of how I interpret the article: 1) Canon is pushing for the CIFF format, which is favored by the CompactFlash's users. But Fuji and Kodak are pushing for the EXIF format. 2) CIFF is better than EXIF. CompactFlash users favored the CIFF format. SmartMedia users favored the EXIF format. 3) Casio, the number 1 digital camera maker, sells more cameras using SmartMedia flash than CompactFlash. So SmartMedia has a larger market share than CompactFlash. 4) Kodak and FlashPoint Technology are pushing for another level of standardization so that camera users can develop pictures at any Kodak kiosk without having to worry about the format (CIFF or EXIF). =============================== So my questions are: - Which storage format is the winner: CompactFlash or SmartMedia? - Which compression format is the winner: CIFF or EXIF? Michael, could you please ask these questions to Sandisk. Thanks. Anybody has a different interpretation of the article? Mike.