Ideally both, but the main thing is reliability/data redundancy.

On my desktop I run a Raid 10 (sometimes referred to as 0/1) configuration. This is two Raid 0 arrays (=speed) that mirror each other.

Some months ago I had a problem when the hard disk management software reported one of the discs was duff. It actually turned out to be the hard disc controller on the motherboard (replaced by Dell about 3 weeks before the warranty expired), but the feeling of relief when I merely popped a replacement hard disc in and watched the system rebuild itself is hard fully describe.

If your data is important my advice is to get RAID. So much more reliable and timely than external backup solutions.

I had one briefly earlier this year. I found it quite good, but for my usage a little expensive/over specified.

More seriously, there was a big bug in the then current Windows driver, that meant it had to be reinstalled after every restart - not exactly productivity enhancing!

I sent it back on that basis but they have probably fixed this by now.

Have you looked at the new HP Envy?

They can be configured with twin hard drives in RAID, and I would now personally never consider using anything without this for my main machine.

How is this relevant to a consumer electronics product?

Are you saying the market consists substantially of slack-jawed wannabes who will gladly sacrifice usable results for the feelgood factor from behaving like a pro?

Thank god Pentax appear to have moved away from the seemingly recently pervasive attitude that poor results were attributable to flawed technique. Cause it’s all about economies of scale driven by mass market appeal.

@Mowog. I’m afraid the hard working investment bankers engaged by Hoya to off load Pentax, will independently have come up with Mr Kodak’s number after no more than a couple of brainstorming luncheons. And since he hasn’t pulled his chequebook out by now, it is unlikely to happen.

Yah, and if Pentax could launch a new model where additionally an integral part of video mode operation were the use of a hand crank, no doubt they’d be on to a real winner

Perhaps Pentax are also licensing this technology:

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1037&message=33849867

If it were merely a question of firmware (read software), don’t you think Pentax would have got it working on the K7 by now, regardless of the sensor overheating issues?

What I was getting at, is that it seems to me if Sony are supplying a brand spanking new sensor to Pentax not yet on the market but due to be released in a K5 in October, then they are also highly likely to have substantially supplied the hardware side of the image processing engine and probably also large chunks of the software.

However, I may be getting ahead of myself, since the Sony chatter mentions a phase detection autofocus system, which probably necessitates an EVIL design.

The sensor obvisously needs the capability (fast data pipes) but you are right.

However, the word in Sony-land appears to be that they are preparing this for launch in imminent A series models. And if they have a nifty little third-party package they could offer it to Pentax.

Who knows?

Hmmmm.

Reading on perhaps either the K5 or KR has an electronic viewfinder?

Or both?

Interesting, thanks for posting.

A quick 5 minute trawl via Google suggests some speculation in the Sony community that a similar sounding sensor will have autofocus HD video capabilities.

If that turns out to be the case, I’m probably in.

Any word on an EVIL?