According to the japanese website DC.watch.impress.jp Olympus will soon release a new version of the E-P1 firmware.

E-P1 Firmware Ver1.2 has incorporated the following changes in.

* MF Assist enlarge time to change, and improved operability.
* Even if you set off the backlight of the LCD monitor, enabling the shutter.

UPDATE: Here the official Olympus news: http://www.olympus.co.jp/jp/support/cs/DI/fwdl/e1/ep1.html

Good morning dear readers!

Today we found two interesting links:

1) Lorenzo Cavalla made a ISo test comparison between the Panasonic GH1 and the Panasonic GF1: http://www.lorenzocevavalla.eu/lumix/test/

2) And our friend Marcram shows you the Robot 40mm f1.9 Lens on the Olympus E-P1: http://marcstephenramirez.blogspot.com/2010/01/robot-40mm-f19lens-on-olympus-e-p1.html

Alex Burack from from h2hreviews.com just sent me their latest Head-to-Head review between the E-P1 and the E-620. The test is very detailled (You have to read 14 pages!). I liked it a lot to read it! There are many graphs and image samples which makes it easy to understand what’t the difference between both cameras. Who wins? Click here to read the review and their conclusions!

Well done Alex and Emily!

Apparently the Samsung NX-10 with 18-55mm will cost 700 Euro or $800. That’s a lot cheaper than the Panasonic GH1 and I don’t know if we should expect a GH1 price drop soon (we already had a -$250 price drop in amazon US)
In the meanwhile dpreview posted some new NX-10 images. Try to compare it with the images taken with the Olympus E-P1. Let me know what your first impressions are!

UPDATE:
Where does the NX-10 lack against the Panasonic ?

It has no 50/60p and no 1080 recording.
Sound is mono only.
AF doesn’t work in video mode. UPDATE: This is wrong, AF works!
No swivel LCD.
And no video optimazied lenses.

P.S.: The Panasonic 14-140mm f/4.0-5.8 OIS Micro Four Thirds Lens is in Stock at amazon.

The japanese very popular website DC.watch.impress asked their readers to vote the best camera of the year. These are the results:

1. E-P1
2. 7D
3. K-7
4. GF1
5. K-x
6. D3s
7. GXR
8. E-P2
9. D300s
10. GH1

But real japanese sales rankings do show a different story. Take a look at the November 2009 sales rankings: http://bcnranking.jp/category/subcategory_0008_month.html.

Interesting or not? It seems that a lot of people like the “concept” of MicroFourThirds cameras but not so many of them are buying it…