The politics of Sony firmware updates...

[Lynne Whelden]

...or any other company, I suppose.
Does anyone know how Sony goes about doing firmware updates. Do they announce it after the fact? Or is it done behind the scenes and suddenly someone discovers "something's different?"
I'm curious because various discussions regarding the Action Cam referenced issues with a "blue cast" on the pictures, or the sky being too blue, or excessive pixellation. The users "wished for" a firmware response from Sony. But would we know if it's ever done (assuming Sony even notices or cares)?

[Chris Joy]

Generally speaking, its pretty well known in advance if a firmware update is coming from Sony, the rumor sites are pretty good about the date, just not everything being addressed. We had advance warning about the recent FS100, A77 and Nex7 updates. Some fixes were known, some were surprises and some weren't addressed much to the dismay of the owners. Can't please everyone I guess.

[Lynne Whelden]

Is there a Sony site that posts these fixes or is it strictly via rumor mills?

My guess is that the Action Cam, inexpensive as it is, is very low on their list of priorities.

[Woody Sanford]

My experience also owning a VG-10 and a FS-100 is Sony is actually pretty good about that. I really wouldn't expect a firmware update for the action cam though till next spring or summer if they do one. The strength of the blue channel is easy to manage in post but the white balance I believe should warrant a change in firmware.

After keeping up with the GoPro3 threads it seems they have left the door wide open for Sony to take what ever market share they want, so their is incentive to do something.

[Dave Blackhurst]

Go to Sony.com, and drill down on technical support for whatever your model #, if there's an update, it'll be there with instructions under available software. The rumour sites seem to pick up the updates as they show up on Sony sites worldwide at slightly different times...

Not a lot of politics with Sony, they just issue updates when they get to it, no fanfare, and unless you're "clued in", you might never even know there's one available!

[Jack Zhang]

I beg to differ about the EX1/EX1R 1.30 update. No one was informed other than some Sony service locations and it was quietly released into the wild. Only source at the moment is Sony UK, since the Sony US site is still stuck on 1.20 for the EX1R and 1.26 for the EX1.

I self-updated from 1.20 to 1.30 and am now running 1.30 on my EX1R. However, I have never heard of any case where the supposed "XQD support" in 1.30 is actually put into practice.