truncated JPG files: Is there a way of repairing them yet please?

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

I have some files created by a Sony DSC-W200 which are reported as being either truncated or incomplete. Sometimes Photoshop reports an invalid JPG marker. This camera has started creating a whole series of these photos on one card I am using. But there is one particularly annoying one which the camera created, then cropped and actually saved. It now shown as a proper valid thumbnail in Photoshop (and explorer) but wont either print or open.

The camera HAS copied from the Memory Stick to a Flash Memory Drive and obviously I have never tried to shut down the camera or take out the drive while it was writing. the card and flash memory drive does defrag properly.

Is there a way of repairing these files yet or is the position that if there were, Sony would know about it? I have Photoshop 7 for Windows and CS2 for my Mac

(Apparently Sony know about this problem because their support reps are told to get rid of pesky users by sending them on wild goose chases when they report this problem: They are trained to tell users that if they send them an email about it, they will be able to get a return address to send Sony the file for evaluation. I discovered that this was apparently a blatant lie to get rid of me because when I did it, the response was that Sony couldn’t actually care less about what their cameras were creating and contained in the computer-generated response was the suggestion that if I thought there was something wrong with the camera, I should send it in to them for repair. Where they would simply create some valid files and send it back to me telling me that it was working properly.)

Can’t speak for any of them
http://www.brothersoft.com/downloads/jpeg-repair.html
Having a valid thumbnail is no guarantee you have a usable file, as it only uses a very small part of the file allocation.
Is it the memory card that came with the camera, if so, have you tried using a new card?
How long have you had the camera? Still under warranty?

TWK

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

Can’t speak for any of them
http://www.brothersoft.com/downloads/jpeg-repair.html
Having a valid thumbnail is no guarantee you have a usable file, as it only uses a very small part of the file allocation.
Is it the memory card that came with the camera, if so, have you tried using a new card?

No and I am sure that if I tried getting it repaired, Sony would blame the card; but I did discover that my practice of retaining photos on the card to show in a slide show is highly inadvisable as you apparently have to format these cards once a month.

How long have you had the camera?

The camera is only a few months old and it IS still under warranty but I suspect the company which Sony uses to repair these things isnt the greatest at actually repairing anything as they tried repairing my last camera a few times and couldn’t manage it.. They do sound very nice and helpful and knowlegeable over the phone!

TWK

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

Can’t speak for any of them
http://www.brothersoft.com/downloads/jpeg-repair.html

Here is my report thus far: PixRecovery couldn’t recover a sample picture I wanted. Instead, it rendered the top third of the picture (as shown sometimes on thumbnails: Normally you can see the whole photo on the thumbnail) and inserted what looked like a DOS box with some text in it obliterating three quarters of the centre of the photo.

When I tried with another picture (which Photoshop reported as having an invalid JPG marker), it just gave an almost instantaneous error message that there was no data in this 3 megabyte file to recover.

JPEG Recovery wouldnt even try: INstead it scanned the folder, found the photo and showed it as the ‘top third only’ version in its thumbnail and insisted on your going to their site and buying the software before you find out that it doesnt work!

Interestingly, PIX Recovery wants you to fill out a form telling them why you arent buying it after uninstalling, which at least shows that they care and MAY write back with recommendations as to how you can get the software to work?

(there didnt appear to be any other jpg recovery softwares on the page to which you directed me)

Having a valid thumbnail is no guarantee you have a usable file, as it only uses a very small part of the file allocation.
Is it the memory card that came with the camera, if so, have you tried using a new card?
How long have you had the camera? Still under warranty?

TWK

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

Can’t speak for any of them
http://www.brothersoft.com/downloads/jpeg-repair.html

Here is my report thus far: PixRecovery couldn’t recover a sample picture I wanted. Instead, it rendered the top third of the picture (as shown sometimes on thumbnails: Normally you can see the whole photo on the thumbnail) and inserted what looked like a DOS box with some text in it obliterating three quarters of the centre of the photo.

When I tried with another picture (which Photoshop reported as having an invalid JPG marker), it just gave an almost instantaneous error message that there was no data in this 3 megabyte file to recover.
JPEG Recovery wouldnt even try: INstead it scanned the folder, found the photo and showed it as the ‘top third only’ version in its thumbnail and insisted on your going to their site and buying the software before you find out that it doesnt work!

Interestingly, PIX Recovery wants you to fill out a form telling them why you arent buying it after uninstalling, which at least shows that they care and MAY write back with recommendations as to how you can get the software to work?

(there didnt appear to be any other jpg recovery softwares on the page to which you directed me)

Having a valid thumbnail is no guarantee you have a usable file, as it only uses a very small part of the file allocation.
Is it the memory card that came with the camera, if so, have you tried using a new card?
How long have you had the camera? Still under warranty?

TWK

What you describe is that the information being written to the card is either being interrupted, or the information is being written to bad sectors on the card.
I have used the utility below (free) to recover deleted files from my cards, I don’t know if it would help in your situation.
http://www.pcinspector.de/Sites/file_recovery/info.htm?langu age=1 Where are you from? In the UK we have a law called the Sale of Goods act, which briefly states that goods must be fit for the purpose for which they are bought. BTW, the contract is with the good’s vendor, not the good’s manufacturer. In your case a camera which shoots unrecoverable images is clearly not "fit for purpose". Do you have anything similar where you are? Using the memory card as a receptacle for a slide show is not recommended either and I have never heard of the format every month rule as well. I have two 2 gig Sandisks which I have had two and one year respectively and have only ever formatted them once, via the card reader. Are you using a card reader to transfer your images or the camera’s USB connection? I have heard the latter can cause problems.
Can you shoot in RAW? You could have a problem with the JPG compression algorithm.
Regards

TWK

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

Can’t speak for any of them
http://www.brothersoft.com/downloads/jpeg-repair.html

Here is my report thus far: PixRecovery couldn’t recover a sample picture I wanted. Instead, it rendered the top third of the picture (as shown sometimes on thumbnails: Normally you can see the whole photo on the thumbnail) and inserted what looked like a DOS box with some text in it obliterating three quarters of the centre of the photo.

When I tried with another picture (which Photoshop reported as having an invalid JPG marker), it just gave an almost instantaneous error message that there was no data in this 3 megabyte file to recover.
JPEG Recovery wouldnt even try: INstead it scanned the folder, found the photo and showed it as the ‘top third only’ version in its thumbnail and insisted on your going to their site and buying the software before you find out that it doesnt work!

Interestingly, PIX Recovery wants you to fill out a form telling them why you arent buying it after uninstalling, which at least shows that they care and MAY write back with recommendations as to how you can get the software to work?

(there didnt appear to be any other jpg recovery softwares on the page to which you directed me)

Having a valid thumbnail is no guarantee you have a usable file, as it only uses a very small part of the file allocation.
Is it the memory card that came with the camera, if so, have you tried using a new card?
How long have you had the camera? Still under warranty?

TWK

What you describe is that the information being written to the card is either being interrupted, or the information is being written to bad sectors on the card.
I have used the utility below (free) to recover deleted files from my cards, I don’t know if it would help in your situation.
http://www.pcinspector.de/Sites/file_recovery/info.htm?langu age=1 Where are you from? In the UK we have a law called the Sale of Goods act, which briefly states that goods must be fit for the purpose for which they are bought. BTW, the contract is with the good’s vendor, not the good’s manufacturer. In your case a camera which shoots unrecoverable images is clearly not "fit for purpose". Do you have anything similar where you are? Using the memory card as a receptacle for a slide show is not recommended either and I have never heard of the format every month rule as well. I have two 2 gig Sandisks which I have had two and one year respectively and have only ever formatted them once, via the card reader. Are you using a card reader to transfer your images or the camera’s USB connection? I have heard the latter can cause problems.
Can you shoot in RAW? You could have a problem with the JPG compression algorithm.

There may well be problems with the JPG compression algorithm but I have enquired whether there is a firmware upgrade for this camera and Sony apparently says that there isnt: Perhaps given the way they dont like taking technical calls and answering questions, it is possible they either dont know about this or wont admit it? The camera also has a peculiarity which they also cant explain about whic hI wanted to send them a photo: It seems perfectly capable of taking a photo of two people who are both exactly the same distance from the lens with one coming out in focus and the other not. And it is supposed to have a clever face recognition technology which lets it put up to eight faces in the same photo in focus!

Regards

TWK

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

Can’t speak for any of them
http://www.brothersoft.com/downloads/jpeg-repair.html

Here is my report thus far: PixRecovery couldn’t recover a sample picture I wanted. Instead, it rendered the top third of the picture (as shown sometimes on thumbnails: Normally you can see the whole photo on the thumbnail) and inserted what looked like a DOS box with some text in it obliterating three quarters of the centre of the photo.
When I tried with another picture (which Photoshop reported as having an invalid JPG marker), it just gave an almost instantaneous error message that there was no data in this 3 megabyte file to recover.
JPEG Recovery wouldnt even try: INstead it scanned the folder, found the photo and showed it as the ‘top third only’ version in its thumbnail and insisted on your going to their site and buying the software before you find out that it doesnt work!

Interestingly, PIX Recovery wants you to fill out a form telling them why you arent buying it after uninstalling, which at least shows that they care and MAY write back with recommendations as to how you can get the software to work?

(there didnt appear to be any other jpg recovery softwares on the page to which you directed me)

Having a valid thumbnail is no guarantee you have a usable file, as it only uses a very small part of the file allocation.
Is it the memory card that came with the camera, if so, have you tried using a new card?
How long have you had the camera? Still under warranty?

TWK

What you describe is that the information being written to the card is either being interrupted, or the information is being written to bad sectors on the card.
I have used the utility below (free) to recover deleted files from my cards, I don’t know if it would help in your situation.
http://www.pcinspector.de/Sites/file_recovery/info.htm?langu age=1 Where are you from? In the UK we have a law called the Sale of Goods act, which briefly states that goods must be fit for the purpose for which they are bought. BTW, the contract is with the good’s vendor, not the good’s manufacturer. In your case a camera which shoots unrecoverable images is clearly not "fit for purpose". Do you have anything similar where you are?
Using the memory card as a receptacle for a slide show is not recommended either and I have never heard of the format every month rule as well. I have two 2 gig Sandisks which I have had two and one year respectively and have only ever formatted them once, via the card reader. Are you using a card reader to transfer your images or the camera’s USB connection? I have heard the latter can cause problems.
Can you shoot in RAW? You could have a problem with the JPG compression algorithm.

There may well be problems with the JPG compression algorithm but I have enquired whether there is a firmware upgrade for this camera and Sony apparently says that there isnt: Perhaps given the way they dont like taking technical calls and answering questions, it is possible they either dont know about this or wont admit it? The camera also has a peculiarity which they also cant explain about whic hI wanted to send them a photo: It seems perfectly capable of taking a photo of two people who are both exactly the same distance from the lens with one coming out in focus and the other not. And it is supposed to have a clever face recognition technology which lets it put up to eight faces in the same photo in focus!

"eight faces in the same photo in focus"
It’s called "Depth of Field" on mine 😉 this should be a function of what sees the image, i.e. the lens and aperture setting.
It sounds like its too clever for its own good, I wouldn’t waste my time with it, it would be straight back to the shop.

Regards

TWK

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

Can’t speak for any of them
http://www.brothersoft.com/downloads/jpeg-repair.html

Here is my report thus far: PixRecovery couldn’t recover a sample picture I wanted. Instead, it rendered the top third of the picture (as shown sometimes on thumbnails: Normally you can see the whole photo on the thumbnail) and inserted what looked like a DOS box with some text in it obliterating three quarters of the centre of the photo.
When I tried with another picture (which Photoshop reported as having an invalid JPG marker), it just gave an almost instantaneous error message that there was no data in this 3 megabyte file to recover.
JPEG Recovery wouldnt even try: INstead it scanned the folder, found the photo and showed it as the ‘top third only’ version in its thumbnail and insisted on your going to their site and buying the software before you find out that it doesnt work!

Interestingly, PIX Recovery wants you to fill out a form telling them why you arent buying it after uninstalling, which at least shows that they care and MAY write back with recommendations as to how you can get the software to work?

(there didnt appear to be any other jpg recovery softwares on the page to which you directed me)

Having a valid thumbnail is no guarantee you have a usable file, as it only uses a very small part of the file allocation.
Is it the memory card that came with the camera, if so, have you tried using a new card?
How long have you had the camera? Still under warranty?

TWK

What you describe is that the information being written to the card is either being interrupted, or the information is being written to bad sectors on the card.
I have used the utility below (free) to recover deleted files from my cards, I don’t know if it would help in your situation.
http://www.pcinspector.de/Sites/file_recovery/info.htm?langu age=1 Where are you from? In the UK we have a law called the Sale of Goods act, which briefly states that goods must be fit for the purpose for which they are bought. BTW, the contract is with the good’s vendor, not the good’s manufacturer. In your case a camera which shoots unrecoverable images is clearly not "fit for purpose". Do you have anything similar where you are?
Using the memory card as a receptacle for a slide show is not recommended either and I have never heard of the format every month rule as well. I have two 2 gig Sandisks which I have had two and one year respectively and have only ever formatted them once, via the card reader. Are you using a card reader to transfer your images or the camera’s USB connection? I have heard the latter can cause problems.
Can you shoot in RAW? You could have a problem with the JPG compression algorithm.

There may well be problems with the JPG compression algorithm but I have enquired whether there is a firmware upgrade for this camera and Sony apparently says that there isnt: Perhaps given the way they dont like taking technical calls and answering questions, it is possible they either dont know about this or wont admit it? The camera also has a peculiarity which they also cant explain about whic hI wanted to send them a photo: It seems perfectly capable of taking a photo of two people who are both exactly the same distance from the lens with one coming out in focus and the other not. And it is supposed to have a clever face recognition technology which lets it put up to eight faces in the same photo in focus!

From the link below

"As we’ve seen in other Sony models, the W200’s face detection works pretty well, recognizing multiple faces in a scene–as long as it can see both eyes. It tends to be inconsistent, however; in a three-headed test setup, it would usually choose one, sometimes three, occasionally two faces, and a couple of times none, all under identical conditions. As we’ve seen in other Sony models, the W200’s face detection works pretty well, recognizing multiple faces in a scene–as long as it can see both eyes. It tends to be inconsistent, however; in a three-headed test setup, it would usually choose one, sometimes three, occasionally two faces, and a couple of times none, all under identical conditions."

the rest makes interesting reading as well, see
http://review.zdnet.com/digital-cameras/sony-cyber-shot-dsc/ 4505-6501_16-32329617.html?ar=o

Regards

TWK

the rest makes interesting reading as well, see
http://review.zdnet.com/digital-cameras/sony-cyber-shot-dsc/ 4505-6501_16-32329617.html?ar=o

I wonder why the user opinions are so much better than the review one? They seem to have got a very early model: I also wonder what a later manufactured model would show? (mine is I think an early one: Lots of the user ones seem to be later ones) But there is only one average one, which is quite unusual and people were looking at it with a critical eye: " I feel the CNet rating for this camera is unfair. Either they got a bad sample or did not take the….."

But this camera does suffer from quite bad shutter lag and someone said that it was particularly good in this regard so even here users have managed to get it wrong!

Must try setting it to 200 ISO and see if anything improves? Or perhaps sending it away for ‘upgrading’ might in this case assist IF anyone would admit that it either needs upgrading or that upgrading is possible.

Regards

TWK

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

the rest makes interesting reading as well, see
http://review.zdnet.com/digital-cameras/sony-cyber-shot-dsc/ 4505-6501_16-32329617.html?ar=o

I wonder why the user opinions are so much better than the review one? They seem to have got a very early model: I also wonder what a later manufactured model would show? (mine is I think an early one: Lots of the user ones seem to be later ones) But there is only one average one, which is quite unusual and people were looking at it with a critical eye: " I feel the CNet rating for this camera is unfair. Either they got a bad sample or did not take the….."

But this camera does suffer from quite bad shutter lag and someone said that it was particularly good in this regard so even here users have managed to get it wrong!

Must try setting it to 200 ISO and see if anything improves? Or perhaps sending it away for ‘upgrading’ might in this case assist IF anyone would admit that it either needs upgrading or that upgrading is possible.

Depends on what the rating is now, 100? If so this will allow you to utilise half as much light to achieve the same exposure if all other settings remain equal or a smaller aperture for greater depth of field or faster shutter speed to capture movement. Depending on the size (physical) of your CCD and associated photosites you could see an increase in digital noise. What are the images like like using the internal flash memory as opposed to the card?
I’d still take it back!

TWK

What is interesting are two suggestions it makes, neither of which seem susceptible to checking; and I wonder where they get their information: Firstly that the smallest aperture is F5. I have never heard of a camera which has a smallest aperture that large and cant imagine any one designing one which has such limited ability to control depth of field?? Especially where they are touting high-flown Bioz processors derived from their DSLRs, face recognition down to the Nth degree etc etc

Secondly that whereas I thought that all digital cameras fell broadly into two classes, those with 2.9mm CCDs and those with 24×36 CCDs, this one has what they call a ‘larger’ than standard CCD? How do they know this and doesn’t it make the higher pixel count a bit more meaningful? And if the camera DOES have a complex Bionz processor etc, how come all those artifacts which none of the user-reviewers noticed?

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

the rest makes interesting reading as well, see
http://review.zdnet.com/digital-cameras/sony-cyber-shot-dsc/ 4505-6501_16-32329617.html?ar=o

I wonder why the user opinions are so much better than the review one? They seem to have got a very early model: I also wonder what a later manufactured model would show? (mine is I think an early one: Lots of the user ones seem to be later ones) But there is only one average one, which is quite unusual and people were looking at it with a critical eye: " I feel the CNet rating for this camera is unfair. Either they got a bad sample or did not take the….."

But this camera does suffer from quite bad shutter lag and someone said that it was particularly good in this regard so even here users have managed to get it wrong!

Must try setting it to 200 ISO and see if anything improves? Or perhaps sending it away for ‘upgrading’ might in this case assist IF anyone would admit that it either needs upgrading or that upgrading is possible.

Depends on what the rating is now, 100? If so this will allow you to utilise half as much light to achieve the same exposure if all other settings remain equal or a smaller aperture for greater depth of field or faster shutter speed to capture movement. Depending on the size (physical) of your CCD and associated photosites you could see an increase in digital noise.
What are the images like like using the internal flash memory as opposed to the card?

They seem OK although as the intenal memory is quite small, I have never had much reason to use it

I’d still take it back!

I cant do that as it was GIVEN to me by Sony as a replacement for a W100 which their repairers couldn’t get working properly despite quite a few tries and a gigantic number of nightmare calls to their supposed techincal support.. This is hardly a litigation-appropriate situation!

I just wish Sony cared a bit more about their products and didn’t make it so difficult to get any answer out of their fake technical support which is obviously staffed by people without even the most basic knowledge about any aspect of either the cameras, the usage, the web site or anything! Only the scripts they see in front of them. You get the uneasy impression while speaking to them that although well trained to read those scripts, their staff have never even owned a digital camera

TWK

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

What is interesting are two suggestions it makes, neither of which seem susceptible to checking; and I wonder where they get their information: Firstly that the smallest aperture is F5. I have never heard of a camera which has a smallest aperture that large and cant imagine any one designing one which has such limited ability to control depth of field?? Especially where they are touting high-flown Bioz processors derived from their DSLRs, face recognition down to the Nth degree etc etc

F5 minimum is very poor, I thought it was a typo when I read the review. I’d like to see a hyperfocal distance chart for it, if one exists.

Secondly that whereas I thought that all digital cameras fell broadly into two classes, those with 2.9mm CCDs and those with 24×36 CCDs, this one has what they call a ‘larger’ than standard CCD? How do they know this and doesn’t it make the higher pixel count a bit more meaningful? And if the camera DOES have a complex Bionz processor etc, how come all those artifacts which none of the user-reviewers noticed?

Canon do a high end DSLR that has a CCD the same size as 35mm film. Not familiar with Bionz, anything to do with the colour fitration? All my cameras (Nikons) use Bayer arrays (twice as many green photosites) and my D200 can go to 1600 on occasion before noise becomes an issue, yet my D70 would be struggling with 400 under the same conditions. They both have almost identical CCD as well.

TAKE IT BACK! 😉

TWK

"Toobi-Won Kenobi" <Toobi-won > wrote in message

"news.rcn.com" <news.rnc.com> wrote in message

What is interesting are two suggestions it makes, neither of which seem susceptible to checking; and I wonder where they get their information: Firstly that the smallest aperture is F5. I have never heard of a camera which has a smallest aperture that large and cant imagine any one designing one which has such limited ability to control depth of field?? Especially where they are touting high-flown Bioz processors derived from their DSLRs, face recognition down to the Nth degree etc etc

F5 minimum is very poor, I thought it was a typo when I read the review. I’d like to see a hyperfocal distance chart for it, if one exists.

Secondly that whereas I thought that all digital cameras fell broadly into two classes, those with 2.9mm CCDs and those with 24×36 CCDs, this one has what they call a ‘larger’ than standard CCD? How do they know this and doesn’t it make the higher pixel count a bit more meaningful? And if the camera DOES have a complex Bionz processor etc, how come all those artifacts which none of the user-reviewers noticed?

Canon do a high end DSLR that has a CCD the same size as 35mm film. Not familiar with Bionz, anything to do with the colour fitration? All my cameras (Nikons) use Bayer arrays (twice as many green photosites) and my D200 can go to 1600 on occasion before noise becomes an issue, yet my D70 would be struggling with 400 under the same conditions. They both have almost identical CCD as well.

TAKE IT BACK! 😉

No, because of the way I was sent it, I am stuck with this thing! I suspect that there was some reason why the reviewer said all those nasty things about this particular company, possibly something to do with his or her not being able to get any proper support when they called the company to get information about it. I have also tried to call the journalists hot line and been faced with a similar wall of silence. It further explains the users GOOD reports on the W200, none of which mentioned the artifacts or noise as a serious issue.

The Bionz processor permits the in-built computer to process the picture faster so that it can (for example) take burst mode frames in an exceptoinally short space of time, something like a half second before the next comes rolling in. Steve’s Digicams quotes "100-shot Burst at 2.0fps (12MP resolution)" on this. Again, I cant believe any company could be stupid enough to put such a complex mechanism into a camera which only had a minimum aperture of f5, though curiously Steve’s also quotes this f5.5 without comment FOR THE ZOOM, whatever that means! On a measurement which you cant measure and which the manufacturer doesnt quote (because since the dawn of time the figure has always been f16 or f22,), I am exceptoinally suspicious about this figure. Same with the point about the supposedly larger than normal CCD. Basically the same factories produce all these CCDs and as far as I was aware, they were all either 2.9mm or 24×36.

Interestingly Steve’s mentiions the noise at 1600 ISO but comments that "As we have mentioned on various models that feature such high sensitivity options, the usefulness of being able to capture handheld images without motion blur in situations where most cameras need the flash greatly outweighs the degenerative effects to the image quality". They also comment, not on the artifacts and noise and packing of too many pixels in some unknown-quantity CCD, but rather that "Bottom line – with a stylish and durable outer shell, great image quality, speedy performance, and loads of useful exposure modes, I feel the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W200 will be a tuff (sic).model to beat in the high resolution ultra-compact category"

(The only slightly suspicious caveat on all this is that the anti-blur technology on my camera doesn’t SEEM TO work either)

Actually a little bit of delving deeper into Steve’s forum does disclose that "I recently sent back my Sony DSC-F717 (originally purchased in late 2003) as a result of this CCD failure. While doing some research online, I found a link to the Sony Service Center’s site geared specifically towards the problems many that of their customers are experiencing with their digital cameras. I was surprised to see just how accommodating they were, allowing customers the opportunity to send in their faulty cameras free of charge, regardless of age. Of course this is the right thing to do, but I did not expect a major corporation such as Sony to do the right thing!" which is the experience I had with their not being able to get my DSC-W100 working properly despite mnumerous tries. I think they are just difficult to contact for journalists trying to get information?

TWK