Going through the leaked Nikon product roadmap (originally pointed out to us by NR, and we have a full translation in our forum), one thing keeps jumping out at me: This person either has the same sources as Thom Hogan, or is basing this on Thom’s predictions.

The D300s and D3000 are widely rumored/leaked already for Aug 4th, and Thom stated the day before this “leak” that the D700x may be here before November, and low and behold, this document has it at October 15th. Thom also indicated some lenses and a strong pro lineup, this has a bunch of lenses being released (too many, is Nikon really going to significantly increase their lens release schedule when they cut back manufacturing due to the economic climate?).

So at first glance, the start of this document looks credible, especially if you’ve read Thom’s site lately. That is until you see the D700x can shoot at 6.5 f.p.s. with a battery grip, when the D3x can only manage 5 f.p.s. So is the D700x going to have more processing power than the top-of-the-line D3x with the same sensor?

Then looking at the 2010 “roadmap”, things just get wacky. a D400/D4 in Q2? Not likely, that would put the D300s production run at just over 6 months, and the D3 at less than 3 years: why accelerate your release schedule in a dire economic environment (unless they have the Canon “roadmap”, and it scares them). Same with the D4x, that would make the D3x a 2 year product cycle, highly unlikely despite its delayed release. Personally I wouldn’t expect the D400/D4 until very late 2010 or more likely 2011, and the D4x in late 2011 if we are lucky.

And then there are the lenses. Just too many of them, and we suddenly get all the lenses people have been crying out for over the past few years (fast wide angle, AF-S 85mm, 70-200 update, a 120-450mm presumably to replace the 80-400mm, some slower and presumably cheaper telephoto primes) – would be nice, but this is a lot more than anyone is realistically expecting from Nikon in the next 18 months.

The net result is that this screams of a fanboy wish list, based largely (at least short term) on Thom Hogans recent predictions.

Update:
The same poster who posted the original message, also posted this further down the thread when someone asked him to produce the document – basically saying he found out it was a ‘little joke’ after spending 3 hours translating it (via Google Translate):

The answer came to me by mail:

• I idiot when I disclose
  
• It’s little joke allegedly staff with responsibilities for their beloved colleagues and supervisors with shipper from the center
  
• So it’s supposedly fancy, but had to give mad work was concerned about his colleagues were extremely happy and very creative. And from me therefore I did laugh and I to 3 hours to translate.
  

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 9th, 2009 at 11:05 am and is filed under Nikon. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.