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iq250/iq260 residual value

f8orbust

Active member
Lets, see. I had a back that listed for 39K, or actually 41 K as I remember, and the amount to to upgrade to a 250, with a new 5 year value add 21K. I believe the 250 was @35K or so at the time, may have been 34K.
Paul, have I read that correctly - the trade-in offered was your 260 plus $21k for the 250 with VAW. i.e. given the 250 listed at $35k, your 260 was effectively valued at … $14k ????

Wow, those numbers are absolutely brutal. Even today used IQ260s with VAW are advertised for ~32k, so $14k seems painfully low.

Jim
 

dougpeterson

Workshop Member
Paul, have I read that correctly - the trade-in offered was your 260 plus $21k for the 250 with VAW. i.e. given the 250 listed at $35k, your 260 was effectively valued at … $14k ????

Wow, those numbers are absolutely brutal. Even today used IQ260s with VAW are advertised for ~32k, so $14k seems painfully low.

Jim

It's no secret the aggressive/good upgrade offers are made to change 1-3 generations. Going from an IQ260 to an IQ250 isn't considered an "upgrade" in the parlance/tradition of trade ins - it's a cross grade. Cross grade pricing is not usually very advantageous.

Paul will find some great upgrade offers in the future - I'm quite sure.
 

jagsiva

Active member
If not for the "crop" I would have ordered a 250 on day one, and taken a loss on my 260, with the trade in price I received at the time from my dealer/Phase One. I was attempting to trade in a 8 month old 260. Result was a huge loss, but that's another discussion, or maybe not based on the original post title.

Lets, see. I had a back that listed for 39K, or actually 41 K as I remember, and the amount to to upgrade to a 250, with a new 5 year value add 21K. I believe the 250 was @35K or so at the time, may have been 34K.

Paul
Paul, ironically, i think it costs less to upgrade a P65+ than to upgrade your IQ260 to an IQ250. But it all seems to depend on which backs are being pushed. With LV now working on the CFV50, why not just spend 15K outright and get that if you need CMOS...still cheaper than losing your IQ260 + 21K
 

strok

Member
My point on the crop..
My mostly used lens was 55mm LS, now to get the same frame i will have to take a picture at 40mm (40-mm).
At 40mm i will have to deal with a small distribution which i didn't have at 55mm.
 

Paul2660

Well-known member
Paul, have I read that correctly - the trade-in offered was your 260 plus $21k for the 250 with VAW. i.e. given the 250 listed at $35k, your 260 was effectively valued at … $14k ????

Wow, those numbers are absolutely brutal. Even today used IQ260s with VAW are advertised for ~32k, so $14k seems painfully low.

Jim
Hi Jim.

Yes that was the deal. I still have all the emails from the dealer. I was to say, a bit shocked at the number. Many on this form do not seem concerned about book value and residuals. I do, they are real numbers and have an effect on a business tax return. Not to mention the investment loss I would have taken along with a huge book loss.

Paul
 

fmueller

Active member
Only 8 months with your 260? I think your original dealer should be a bit more accommodating. I understand they need to make a living, I really do, but surely there has to be an innovative way of handling a high value customer, e.g. at least a consignment type arrangement on your 260 where you could at least get a high percentage of its fair market value.

A problem could be that current P+ ---> IQ trade incentives are hurting you through the end of the year.



Hi Jim.

Yes that was the deal. I still have all the emails from the dealer. I was to say, a bit shocked at the number. Many on this form do not seem concerned about book value and residuals. I do, they are real numbers and have an effect on a business tax return. Not to mention the investment loss I would have taken along with a huge book loss.

Paul
 

f8orbust

Active member
Many on this form do not seem concerned about book value and residuals...
I'm not one of them - always believed I'd rather have money in the bank than tied up in a piece of gear that depreciates quicker than last year's laptop. Unfortunately in the MF digital era there seems to be the assumption that every working pro is shooting covers for Vogue, car campaigns for Audi or architecture for Foster & Partners - i.e. they're able to quickly recoup the initial outlay. If only that were so. Amongst all its wonderfulness, the cost of the DB has been its single worst aspect. At least there's a semblance of sanity with the CFV-50c pricing. Would be nice if HB brought their H version in line as well; P1 too with the IQ150 (BTW, what's that all about?)

BTW: Thanks for posting some real figures - when it comes to trade-ins it all seems so very cloak-and-dagger - have always thought it kind of odd why this is, and why people are so reticent to say what exactly they were offered / ended up paying. Human nature perhaps, but transparency in matters like this only benefits other in a similar situation. Now, if only there was a 'Kelley Blue Book' for digital backs ... that said, being offered $14k for your 260 is pretty fly - maybe the salesman (or saleswoman) you dealt with previously sold used cars...

 
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Ken_R

New member
Paul, the 60MP Dalsa sensor produces a stunning file and works amazingly well with tech wides and lots of shifting. Why did you want to change? Looking at your work you are getting good use of it. Very nice images.

I for one love working with my IQ160.

Regarding the crop I really like the angle of view with the 40mm HR and the IQ160 and with a smaller sensor I would loose quite a bit of it and with the 80mm on the Hasselblad I get also a nice angle of view for full length portraits and retain shallow dof at f2.8. With a smaller sensor I loose some of that since I would have to move further back to maintain equal composition.
 

fmueller

Active member
My general observation is that a dealer is expecting to pay half of what they think they can resell an item. Carrying costs, risk, and the need to make a living all factor into that number. I think a preowned IQ 260 is probably in the high 20's low 30's as fair market value through a dealer. A dealer will also generally add at least a 1 year warranty.

I'll bet an IQ 260 priced at $25k would be rapidly snapped up here on GetDpi (no, I'm not in the market.... :(. ) and he would be at least $11k ahead of a dealer trade in.






I'm not one of them - always believed I'd rather have money in the bank than tied up in a piece of gear that depreciates quicker than last year's laptop. Unfortunately in the MF digital era there seems to be the assumption that every working pro is shooting covers for Vogue, car campaigns for Audi or architecture for Foster & Partners - i.e. they're able to quickly recoup the initial outlay. If only that were so. Amongst all its wonderfulness, the cost of the DB has been its single worst aspect. At least there's a semblance of sanity with the CFV-50c pricing. Would be nice if HB brought their H version in line as well; P1 too with the IQ150 (BTW, what's that all about?)

BTW: Thanks for posting some real figures - when it comes to trade-ins it all seems so very cloak-and-dagger - have always thought it kind of odd why this is, and why people are so reticent to say what exactly they were offered / ended up paying. Human nature perhaps, but transparency in matters like this only benefits other in a similar situation. Now, if only there was a 'Kelley Blue Book' for digital backs ... that said, being offered $14k for your 260 is pretty fly - maybe the salesman (or saleswoman) you dealt with previously sold used cars...

 

f8orbust

Active member
My general observation is that a dealer is expecting to pay half of what they think they can resell an item...
Well, if you're selling things like books and bananas, the first rule of retail is double your money - not sure it applies to $40k cameras however. Whatever, I still think $14k is low.
 

f8orbust

Active member
In general, I would say the days of 'snapping up' high-ticket items like DBs are on the wane ... if indeed, they were ever here - these things are just too damn pricey to be 'snapped up' like a packet of cookies on 'special' in Safeway.

The scene has changed so much even in the last couple of years - e.g. right now, I can find a used IQ180 through a dealer, with a CW, for $20.5k ... but privately, people are still asking the same or more in most cases. And then they're surprised when the 'bargain' isn't 'snapped up'.
 

f8orbust

Active member
Going from an IQ260 to an IQ250 isn't considered an "upgrade" in the parlance/tradition of trade ins - it's a cross grade...
Yes, that whole 'cross-grade' thing wasn't exactly P1's finest hour was it? Lots of smoke-and-mirrors as to what they exactly meant by 'upgrade' - e.g. even though the IQ180 is claimed to have 12.5 f-stops of DR, and the IQ280 13 f-stops (source: P1 website), plus WiFi etc., it wasn't considered an upgrade moving from the former to the latter. Hmmm, it looked like an upgrade from where I was sitting:

Upgrade (verb): Raise (something) to a higher standard, in particular improve (equipment or machinery) by adding or replacing components.

However, P1 - in their wisdom - decided to define upgrade in terms of 'how many pixels there are'. Oh dear.

That said, the 'cross-grade' fiasco wasn't as bad as the 'investment protection policy' snafu - which only applied to purchasers of a DB from new (i.e. not P1's loyal upgraders). Oh dear, again.
 

Paul2660

Well-known member
Yes, that whole 'cross-grade' thing wasn't exactly P1's finest hour was it? Lots of smoke-and-mirrors as to what they exactly meant by 'upgrade' - e.g. even though the IQ180 is claimed to have 12.5 f-stops of DR, and the IQ280 13 f-stops (source: P1 website), plus WiFi etc., it wasn't considered an upgrade moving from the former to the latter. Hmmm, it looked like an upgrade from where I was sitting:

Upgrade (verb): Raise (something) to a higher standard, in particular improve (equipment or machinery) by adding or replacing components.

However, P1 - in their wisdom - decided to define upgrade in terms of 'how many pixels there are'. Oh dear.

That said, the 'cross-grade' fiasco wasn't as bad as the 'investment protection policy' snafu - which only applied to purchasers of a DB from new (i.e. not P1's loyal upgraders). Oh dear, again.
Part of my issue was the same thought. I am not a Phase One hater, indeed I always lead with Phase One in my work, the investment alone warrants that.

However I found both Phase One and my dealer lacking both in understanding, business acumen, and communication.

Net, I saw it this way. I was giving up 10MP pixels, and 30 % of a sensor view. If anything if was a "downgrade" not a cross grade.

I am old and tired of games, I just don't work well with them. I have a career in technical sales, that was 29 years long. I have been lucky to parallel that with a photographic career for the last 15 years and now full time.

In my career in sales, I have worked on enough deals to know that you can make pretty much anything happen, if you want to. However, if you are willing to walk away over a price, then so be it. But I sure feel I did a better job in communicating with both my customer and company I was working for, and I felt that I was a advocate for my customer. Add value was important even in a price war. I did not come away from my transaction on the 260/250 with any feelings like that.

I will tell you this, I don't drink the Kool Aid, never have, and I tend to call a spade a spade. Phase One for whatever reason did not want to work with me on a trade in. It's like they never thought anyone might want to move to the first CMOS back in history from a CCD back that was much more limiting in it's overall photographic ability. I contacted my dealer as soon as the 250 was announced and worked to try and make a deal for over 45 days.

After the price I received from my dealer and realized it was financially impossible to justify, I went back and asked for a reason and was told "you need to contact Phase One directly". I did not see any need for that, and let the whole thing drop.

Did it leave me with a warm fuzzy for Phase One, NO, Did it make me feel a warm and fuzzy for my Dealer, NO. Plain and simple. Phase One could have made it happen if they wanted to and for a much more reasonable and realistic price point. There are plenty of other testimonials on this forum where folks are quite happy with Phase One and their dealer so I am most likely just an acceptation, or I just had a different set of expectations based on my sales background.

When I saw about 6 months ago, that Phase One was still offering over 20K on a used P45+ to IQ250 (it was mentioned in a post on this forum) I was again shocked!. It might have been as much as 24K, which was the trade in received for my P45+ in late 2011 when I upgraded to the 160. This was still being offered almost 2 years later.

Just one opinion of a one Phase One user since March of 2008.

Paul
 

Paul2660

Well-known member
Paul, the 60MP Dalsa sensor produces a stunning file and works amazingly well with tech wides and lots of shifting. Why did you want to change? Looking at your work you are getting good use of it. Very nice images.

I for one love working with my IQ160.

Regarding the crop I really like the angle of view with the 40mm HR and the IQ160 and with a smaller sensor I would loose quite a bit of it and with the 80mm on the Hasselblad I get also a nice angle of view for full length portraits and retain shallow dof at f2.8. With a smaller sensor I loose some of that since I would have to move further back to maintain equal composition.
Ken:

First and foremost, thanks for the compliments.

I wanted to give a good answer so I have added a series of images in an attempt to show the issue for me.

In my work I often find myself in mixed lighting, especially in the winter/fall time. In the first image, you can see the a shot I was working as a full 15mm L, C, and 15mm Right shift with the IQ260 and 40mm Rod. I know it's possible to just do the 15mm R and L, but many times I find I like to shoot the center as it's the best part of the lens and also has less color cast issue/LCC recovery issue.

In Image 1, you can see a classic shot, where 1/2 of the image is in bright light, with a pure blue sky, (which in this shot is polarized), and the right half of the shot is in total shade. This is problematic for any CCD back, albeit that the 160/260 can handle it a bit better since they have better highlight recovery IMO. Still I have to make a series of exposures, in this case I shot at 1/8th of a second and 1/2 of a second. I realize that these seem very close in speed, only 1 stop missing, but in reality it's huge. In the other images I have posted it's very clear that the difference just 2 stops the amount of light I was able to recover on the far right is significant. However the 1/2 speed shot did blow out the left side of the image so to get where I need to be, I will have to work up both and then blend. Looking closely on the files I attached you can see the increase in noise in the 1/8th of a second exposure. The color and saturation are close enough not to really matter, but the noise is considerable.

With modern Sony CMOS, I have shot this type of shot 1000's of times, and I know I could have easily pulled up the right side 2.75 stops and still had both great color and details. Just can't be done with CCD. CCD loves light, and on a bright day, it can't be beaten.

The other reason I invested in the 260, was I felt that the chip design was significantly different than the 160, (YES I DID DRINK THE KOOL AID ON ON THIS ONE), and that Phase One would continue to work on image quality, releasing firmware that would enable better results in situations like this one, but they haven't and are not going to. I also bet on the come (stupid) that the LE (Long exposure) mode would give me better recovery at the base setting of iso 140, and that is far from the truth, in fact most time it's much worse. On the first series of shots I took from this spot, I worked the images at iso 140 as there was a bit of a breeze and I wanted to get to 1/30 with the CL-PL on. The results were terrible, looking like iso 800, the worse quality I have gotten from the 260. It could have been a heat issue, but the day was cool and the back was not hot. I was shooting tethered, and had C1 setup to push the shadows on all images and I caught this noise and was able to drop back to iso 50 and came away with a series I could use. However if there had been significant wind that afternoon, I would have been done as I could not have gotten to a fast enough shutter speed unless I moved to sensor plus.

Seeing what I can get from the D800 and now D810 CMOS, I can only image what the 50Mp chip would do in a scene like this.

I hope the images are large enough to show the issues I am referring to.

Paul
 

Ken_R

New member
Hi Paul, thx for posting a great explanation.

I tested the D800E alongside the Pentax 645D (before I sold it) and before I purchased the IQ160. The Nikon does have amazing shadow recovery but the IQ160 is not far off (very close) and to my eyes the IQ160 rendered the highlights better. Smoother roll off and better color in the highlights. Probably a combination of the sensor/electronics and the software (CaptureOne).

Maybe the D810 and/or the IQ250 are a bit better in that regard I don't know.

From my experience with the different cameras I concluded that with the IQ160 I had to treat exposure a bit more like color neg film and with the Nikon I had to protect the highlights aggressively like with color slide film and rely on the great shadow recovery potential to get the image to where I want it. The 645D had less "headroom" at both ends and did not rendered the highlights smoothly. The shadows were good but not great (better than any Canon for sure though).

The sample you posted plays right into the hands of the IQ250 and the D810 but the result you got with the IQ260 looks very very good.

Regarding the upgrade or "crossgrade" from one back to another it comes down to business policy. I mean. You got the IQ260 new from a dealer right? So PhaseOne made good money and the dealer made good money on that sale. Now, It would be cool if the dealer buys it back at a slightly (say 15%) lower price than what they can sell it used. The dealer then makes a profit, again, from the same back when they sell it to another customer (used). I don't think PhaseOne makes money from that transaction. Now, PhaseOne has the IQ250's new. Im sure they want to sell as many as they can at full price new, so both the dealer and phase can make money from that sale. However, in good faith, they should be able to give a good discount on the IQ250 to you, an existing customer.

So a good deal example for you would be: (Price of New IQ250 - 15% discount) - (Used Market price of IQ260 - 15%). Given today's prices that equals about $8k-9k + your IQ260 for a new IQ250. For the IQ150 should be about $5k less. However it is a matter of PhaseOne willing to give a discount on a new back. The dealer can only do so much.

Given that I have no clue about specific profit margins and business arrangements with the Dealers and PhaseOne the numbers above could or could not be possible.
 

Uaiomex

Member
Same thing here.
About every other format up from 1" sort of doubles in size. FF more than doubles in size APS-C and it costs only twice as much.
44X33 is barely 1.6X the size of FF and it costs from 4X to 10X as much. Too little gain for too much money. That's why I am not buying the 645Z and now we have 36mp (soon more mp's) FF bodies and amazingly new super sharp glass.

Because of this, I've said many times two things:
1) "Digital medium format starts at 48X36"
2) "Full-frame is the holy grail of digital photography"*
*so far

Regards
Eduardo

70% of my shots are PANO shots, but sometimes you have no choice and you need an UWA lens. Probably the IQ250 is the best option for me but what upsets me the most, that by getting an IQ250 I don't feel like buying a real MF sensor. 44mm not much bigger then 35mm, I'm buying a bottom of the line (first available in line-up) sensor for a price of 20 of 35mm, and one of the competitions sells the same sensor under 8k (including complete camera)
Lets say if the price of IQ250 would be around 15k it would be an easy decision.
 
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