Slashdot Mirror
Canon Digital Rebel Hacked Into A Pseudo-10D
Reverb9 writes "When Canon introduced the Digital Rebel, the world's first entry-level Digital SLR camera, many remarked on its similarities to the 10D , its $500 more expensive big brother. In fact, the two cameras share much of the same technology and so Canon implemented a number of software-based limitations to avoid destroying sales of the professional-oriented 10D. Now, a new hack that restores a previously hidden menu along with a few additional tricks has added nearly all of those 10D features to the Rebel, with an arguably superior user interface to boot. Canon has so far said little on the hack but certainly cannot be happy with its potential effect on sales. This is, however, a reality that more corporations are having to confront. In an era where programming labour is relatively cheap and computer connectivity more frequent can artificial, marketing-driven, barriers between technology products, last?"
picture that...
Yes, when they're enforced by the DMCA and jail sentences for those who reverse-engineer them. (Remember DeCSS? The outcry over DeCSS was just a preview; things are going to get a lot worse, not better.)
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
I've been meaning to buy the Digital Rebel/300D ever since it was released, but somehow was held back by the lack of the Mirror Lockup feature. Now that this hack enables that feature, I think I'll go pick one of these babies up very soon. I already have a nice collection of Canon EF and EF L lenses that the 300D can take.
Canon has so far said little on the hack but certainly cannot be happy with its potential effect on sales.
That arguement is rediculous. What part of Canon's market that will shell out for that camera will apply this hack? Probably almost none of it, if they can find it or understand it. So that leaves the likes of the slashdot crowd, and that really isn't a big enough group to put a dent into Canon's sales.
Some of the Sony Minidisc players had features disabled through software. I, for one, was able to get many new features on mine after enering the service menu.
This will be happening a lot in the future... it's a good thing though, if they can make a product more powerful for that amount of money than they should do so. Marking up the same hardware and because you don't have artifical barriers on it should be a crime...
Unfortunately, it's breaking these artifical barriers to make full use of hardware you paid for that a crime in our society.
I touch computers in naughty places
Your car, for one.
But, the article, submitter, sure has a thing, for commas.
The Canon 10D is aimed at pros, and what pro would actually rely on a "hack" to turn their Rebel into a 10D? These guys have to be able to trust their cameras completely and having hacked firmware will degrade that trust, no matter what the 1337 h4x0r community says.
Besides, what will happen to these pros when the next Canon firmware obliterates this hack? If the firmware provides needed fixes that they can't get without losing their "Rebel/10D", they're going to be mighty unhappy.
So I doubt Canon will be too worried about this: their target audience for the 10D isn't the hack-using geekerati, it's professionals. People who rely on their cameras aren't about to compromise reliability just to save a (relatively) few $$.
Just to mention that the 10D does have different hardware, so this hack won't give all features,
notably the faster frames per second and frames that are buffered.
The EOS-300D will shoot 4 frames at 2.5 frames per second and the EOS-10D will shoot 9 frames at 3 frames per second.
Also, the EOS-300D has a cheap-feeling plastic body while the EOS-10D has a black magnesium body.
My Comcast cablebox (motoral model unknown, somewhere from c.1992) is a POS. I called Comcast for tech support because my volume was too low
Fast forward some months
This one feature was useful enough for me to keep two different codes for my one cable box on one remote.
I'm still searching for the CC button, like aztec gold.
Firmware update instructions from Canon
10D Instruction Manual (PDF file)
Latest Firmware from Wasia
(Wasia is apparently the pseudonym of the Russian hacker who has developed all these goodies.)
Wasia's site is here:
http://satinfo.narod.ru/
Some more info from the linked page:
There are a bunch of other neat tips on that site, but they aren't directly related to this story, and so I haven't re-posted them here.
p
In Korea, long hair is for old people!
In this particular case the hack involved restoring some capabilities, which while present in the hardware, had been locked or hidden by software. Certainly this individual deserves his due for circumventing the software barriers. However, in software products it is much easier to simply leave sections of code out of the finished build in the lesser versions. If the functionality is not there in the first place then no amount of unlocking will enable it. This incident raises important issues about the sale and marketing of technology products, especially in the digital camera market. It is my opinion that the industry has vastly underestimated the demand among consumers for more powerful "professional" grade digital cameras. It would probably make more sense from both a business and technology standpoint to offer the full camera at a price which is higher than the basic entry level model, but less than the full "professional" model since most of the work was probably in the design of the hardware and software and not as much in the manufacturing. People are generally willing to pay for a well built product as long as they know that the quality is there.
1. Build a product out of [price] reach for most consumers;
2. Charge a more realistic price for a 'feature reduced' version;
3. Watch as it gets hacked;
4. Then watch sales climb high as people begin to believe (under false pretences) that they have got 'one over' on the company - people love a free ride or a good 'bargain'.
I like it!
It can only be a good thing for Cannon too?
--
"we live in a post-ideological world..." - Billy Bragg.
Scott,
Here's a mindboggling stupid idea from our Marketing Department that you might be able to use. We make [type of machine]. A new version of our product is both cheaper and faster. A great breakthough, right?
Well marketing wants Engineering to slow the unit down so they have a low cost unit to sell. Then sell them upgrades to full speed at an enormous price. These would be physically identical, just one would have the code messed up on purpose to run slow.
So does this mean [type of machine] = Digital Cameras ?
yea, but these "features" cost money. The hack doesn't.
That big ass spoiler, adds 20 hp.
That unpainted body kit on your riced out civic. 10 hp, but it looks like crap, IMHO.
And who the heak thought a coffee can made a good exahust sound?
-Grump
Is it true that more people vote for the winner of American Idol, than vote for the president? -Ali G.
I doubt this particular hack will have too big an impact... Most features does not mean all features, and there are hardware differences.
It doesn't necessarily mean that any significant number of people are going to do it, either. Look at CPU overclocking for example... Both Intel and AMD allow it, so it obviously isn't hurting the sales of their high-end parts too much. Even considering retail seperate from OEM. If they felt like they could make significantly more money by locking the multipliers and FSB, they certainly would have done so many generations ago.
The other thing to consider with Canon is the costs involved... To modify the cheaper model enough to make this impossible would probably cost them more than they will lose with this hack out in the open.
No...
Many vehicles out there have the same exact engine and drivetrain, but have timing and whatnot adjusted via computer, one to give better fuel consumption, the other to givemore power.. and the manufactuere advertises one as 120HP engine, and one as 150HP. Same, exact, engine.
Also, the timing on many vehicles is adjusted for a certain low grade of fuel (Even if that low grade isn't the lowest grade available).... making the decision to ALWAYS run on a higher octane fuel, and tuning the timing to take that into account can give you a nice increase in power.
Add to that cars with servo controlled turbo wastegates (if I recall correctly).. boost pressure can also be increased (or decreased, for better fuel efficiency) on the fly.
There are numerous ways to tweak a modern computerized engine management system.
> This one feature was useful enough for me to keep two different codes
> for my one cable box on one remote.
Many of the universals are made by one company. Get online and dig around for the advanced programming codes and you can probably merge the volume codes from one set to the set that works everything else and have a seamless experience with only one cable button. And if you are lucky enough to have one with the JP1 header (or solder pads for a plug) you are set for some serious modding.
Democrat delenda est
The best easter egg in a car I think is this one. Have not found the hidden launch control on my 10 year old rustbucket, though. I am taking apart the digital clock this weekend to find it.
This tale is all hearsay, and I've never confirmed it (please don't nitpick on my model numbers, but I believe it was the 8L/4L):
When HP orignally launched their Laserjet 8L, they were having trouble generating enough sales for the product. I'm not sure why, but perhaps it was because a lot of the desktop publishing market at the time belonged to Apple, who had the Laserwriter out on the market. That's neither here nor there, though.
The 8L could do, IIRC something like 10 or 11 ppm. So HP took the 8L, and through the use of a slightly different gearing, produced the 4L, which was nearly identical except for a slower print-rate, somewhere in the 5 ot 6 ppm range, which was still quite nice for the time. They sold the 4L for about half of what the 8L went for. All of a sudden, they were selling a huge amount of 4Ls, but there were also a ton of companies that realized that a 4L wouldn't be enough for their branch office, or whatever, so they purchased the "upgraded" 8L, instead. Enterprising users could, presumably, order the gear set (and whatever associated parts went with the actual 8L) and "hard mod" their 4L into an 8L.
That's funny ... I remember DeCSS. My friend had the T-shirt. I read and loved the haiku.
I also remember how thousands of hackers won out in the end, and have libdvdcss and libdvdread installed on their systems. And remember how DVD-Jon was aquitted? Twice? That was sweet.
It's too bad that the DMCA brought us all down in the end. Every day i lament the fact that I can't download pirated movies off the internet before they're released in the theatre, and that I also can't watch dvd's on my computer.
It really sucks.
Way back when, the local phone company shipped out these cheap caller ID boxes when you ordered new service. They sent the lowest end model, which only shows the name and had ~50 number memory.
:P
One day bored, I opened the box up and found that there was *1* soider point that would upgrade it to "name" caller ID, and 200+ more number memory.
The difference in price bewteen the 2 models was like $40.
Honestly, I don't think many people will do this change to upgrade there camera. Personally, I wouldn't becuase those damn things are expensive compaired to my $100 digital camera
until (succeed) try { again(); }
It is an artifact of the need to standardize board layouts, processors, hardware and designs for mass production. Its also a direct tribute to the greed of companies who wouldn't offer their customers the best possible product possible.
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
Name one example of this. Everything I've seen that you state is in addition to several other modifications. For example, the engine in the Gen 1 and 2 DSM's (Eclipse, Talon, and Laser) may have lower boost as compared to the Euro model of that engine, but it also has smaller intake and exhaust manifolds, a smaller turbo, different fueling, etc.
The Audi S4 and RS4 have the same engine, but the turbos differ, as do the heads, exhaust and intake manifolds, the entire intake tract, intercoolers, etc. Everything appears to be the same, but it's not apparent until you start taking things apart.
We get screwed here in the US. Most foreign car manufacturers detune the cars for the US market due to emissions regulations, insurance reasons, or whatever. But that detuning rarely involves simply changing software or boost levels for turbos/superchargers. Usually, major components of the engine are "downgraded" also because they don't need to spend the extra money to support the same amount of air or fuel flow as they do on the european counterpart.
Need Free Juniper/NetScreen Support? JuniperForum
Saving $500 is quite a lot, I'll bet a number of normal people figure out how to apply this hack with detail instructions from message boards and the like.
I really thought it was odd of Canon to differentiate the software at all - they should haver just kept the price differential to a resnable cost for a sturdier body.
Both are really prosumer cameras, I think people shopping for one would be thinking about the other - like you say, the real difference is when you are going for a 1D or a 1Ds.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
just how many other devices have similar "hidden" features, just waiting to be hacked. I suspect it's a lot.
The Nissan Sentra has the same engine and frame as the more expensive 200SX, but for the life of me I can't find the software hack to change the body panels of my sentra.
Many other photocopier models offering different speeds were identical except for the controller boards, and swapping those over wasn't uncommon either; in fact, at one stage the distributor used to officially sanction it because the manufacturer was screwing them over.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
If I knew how to effectively fight those bastards, I would!
The Communist countries are that-a-way --->
Seriously.
There is no such thing as a "fair price"; consult the relevant economics theory to learn why, which won't fit in a Slashdot post. If people are buying it, with a fair choice on a open market (and if anybody replies to this message as if I didn't include that clause I will mercilessly mock you), then the price is fair. No other definition makes sense.
The idea of the market value of an item being the cost of labor to produce it went out with the 17th century, and unless you want to return to a 17th century economy, I suggest that we leave that idea safely in the dust bin of history, where it belongs.
From everything I've seen about the Rebel, it is a much more cheaply made piece of equipment. "As a professional" I would consider the more robust design of the 10D (which is due for a replacement/update by the way) to make it a superior camera, for reasons unrelated to the chip set and its functions. Furthermore, as a professional, I am considering the Rebel as a backup digital body, without any hacking. It just doesn't look like a good bet for a high use high reliability camera, although it has its potential uses. But even with functions hacked, it is unlikely to equal a 10d.
As for the "propriety" of crippling functionality, get a clue. The fact that a company can give something away at no cost doesn't mean that it is evil if it doesn't.
Look at it this way: The price for the low function and high function products is probably lower (over time, ceteris parabus, etc. etc.) because the development cost is amortized over a larger market which includes the low and high function products instead of just the high function products.
Of course the company could distribute the benefits of the larger manufacturing run to different market segments depending on compeitition... but somewhere, if the market is competitive, the consumer is a winner, if the company can sell more of those chips by crippling some of them.
Think about it.
I have one of those Motorola digital cable boxes. One afternoon my one-year-old nephew was crawling around and put his hand down on the remote. He apparently pushed just the right combination of buttons to access some sort of set-up menu. There was all sorts of settings that were obviously above my head, thus I was too chicken to make any changes for fear of really screwing up something, or worse. So I cancelled out of it and have yet to find out how to access it again. Makes me wonder what sort of stuff I could have tapped into had I known more about what I was doing.
He apparently pushed just the right combination of buttons to access some sort of set-up menu.
Yes, but that was intentional. I think your nephew has been hacking around in Emacs behind your back...
"Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
Some of the stuff in this thread is just insane. And far and beyond normal idiocy.
1.Since this camera was announced we knew it would be hacked it was just a matter of time.
2.Canon knew it would be hacked.
3.If you only knew how many times products are crippled/disabled and priced lower so that high end stuff still sells? anyone remember 3.5 single sided floppies? Companies do what is in there own best interest.. err in the stockholders best interest. Do some of you really think Canon is doing this to pull one over on you? No they are doing what will make the most money for their shareholders.
4.I think the anaology to overclocking is not valid. Chips are clocked at set speeds becuase they are stable at that speed, If AMD/Intel sold the 2.4 rated chip as a 3.0 which it is in some cases IDENTICAL, people would complain since the 2.4 rated chips can't really handle those speeds and crash. AMD and Intel love overclockers cuz they buy more chips then anyone else, since they fry things all the time.
5.All in all this will not really affect 10d sales, for all the reasons listed above, stability, ability to interface with higher end equipment, better case, higher quality parts, and certain features that the 300d can't so at all.
6.300d sales will go up since this just became the geek camera of the year.
Also on a side note no one has mentioned that people have been hacking the Canon lenses to get more f-stops and zoom out of them for awhile. Canon restricts some lenses since the quality becomes adversly affected at min and max. So some people have removed the stops and taken the quality hit for more versitility.
---In a time of Chimpanzees I was a Monkey.
No, in fact, ALL of the MD recorders have features disabled through software. SCMS copy protection anyone?
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
Er. No.
Canon said, 'we'll give you this camera here, with magnesium body and huge feature set, for X dollars.'
Then Canon said, 'alternately we'll give you this other camera here, with plastic body, and extensive but smaller feature set, for X minus five hundred dollars.'
Canon was quite open about advertising that there were significant similarities. The sensor and a lot of the electronics are essentially the same. The more expensive camera has a more durable body, can shoot multiple frames faster, has a higher maximum shutter speed, and a few other goodies. Canon never said anything about there being entirely different firmware on the two models.
When you buy the camera, what are you paying for? The advertised set of features. What did Canon give you for your money? The advertised set of features. Why are they lying, again?
~Idarubicin
Is there a modern car where something similar cannot be done? My Jeep could have 50+ more hp if I wanted it too, but it would take the whole tank of gas to get to the end of my driveway. All manufacturers tune their engine to find a good balance between fuel economy, handling, and power. Just because that balance can be adjusted does not mean that the manufacturer has been ripping us off.
Software hacks and the price differential of a few hundred bucks are fairly irrelevant when the camera's power can really only be unleashed with pro lenses costing $1500 or $2000 (and up) rather than the cheap crap lens that comes with a stock Rebel unit. It's not uncommon for a serious photog to have tens of thousands of bucks invested in lenses. Do you really think that this sort of pro would balk at the 10D's price and get a hacked Rebel instead?
Volkswagen Audi Group (VAG) is a very good example of this, though not with S4 and RS4 as you state. Theri previous platform for middlesized cars had on engine in particular that was used in many, many cars. The 1.8 liter turbo. There was tuning from 150 hp to 190 hp, with no changes what so ever to the hardware side.
Some examples:
Audi A3 150 hp to 180 hp, depending on country of sales
Audi A4 163 hp and 190(?) hp
VW Golf GTI 150 hp
Skoda Octavia 150 hp, RS has 180 but with different hardware.
Seat Leon 150hp to 180 hp.
Seat Toledo 180 hp
And more....
Often times it's cheaper for a manufacturer to do this.
I mean, they've already got production on the higher end model. It's a professional unit and is in line with competition prices.
So, they swap out some metal with plastic, remove some features in software, and sell the camera for a lower priced segment.
It's likely that they wouldn't have been able to do that at all if they had to design a whole new unit from the ground up for the lower market segment. It would have been too expensive for all the R&D and the new production line. In the end, the new lower cost model would have cost too much.
So what would you rather have? An inexpensive camera mostly based from a high end model or a low end camera built from the ground up and costs more with less quality parts?
I think it's an acceptable practice and it works out for the consumer in the end. Better product and less money.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
I also bought my 10D for reasons more than software/firmware capabilities. I knew the 300D (Digital Rebel) was crippled in some ways, including focus modes, but I still prefer the 10D for its overall build quality, the 10D has a magnesium-alloy body as opposed to the 300D's plastic body.
Other issues include the 300D's increased "mirror slap" which can cause some camera shake, not good for those long exposures. Also a slower shutter time and longer viewfinder blackout time.
This isn't to say the 300D isn't a good body, it's going to do wonders for those aspiring pros who can't quite afford higher end gear yet, but it still isn't a 10D.
------------ Ben Chroneos
They DO lock multipliers. It's a pain in the ass actually. I have a P4 2.4ghz chip that runs on the 400mhz bus (100mhz quad pumped) so 24x multiplier. Well my motherboard and RAM can handle 800mhz (200mhz quad pumped), which would give me better performance. No can do though, I'd need to step down to a 12x multiplier and the chip won't allow that.
The reason they don't bus lock is there isn't really a feasable way of doing it. It would require some kind of trickiness with the chip generating it's own internal clock, and doing a comparison, which would never work since external bus speed can vary from one board to teh next natrually.
The most important link is this one:
http://ravn.net/md/
But maybe you'll find these interesting too:
http://www.minidisct.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&t hreadid=13149
http://home.kabelfoon.nl/~bertrik/netmd/mdhack.htm l
http://forums.minidisc.org/viewtopic.php?t=5&start =195
-
Roses are #FF0000, Violets are #0000FF, find / -name '*base*' |xargs chown -R us && mv zig greatjustice
It is not the same camera. The 300D has a plastic body shell, isn't designed to be as robust as its more expensive rival the 10D.
For serious photography the heavier weight of the 10D helps avoiding camera shake (or atleast it does for most the people I know).
Also the 10D has built in PC socket (no not a PC as in computer - its a flash connector for studio flashes), I doubt the software hack magically opens up a new socket on the side of the body
The 10D has a higher frame rate which implies a larger buffer between the CCD and the flash memory.
Okay, the differences don't add up to $500 but the targeted markets arent the same and so the price does vary.
My film based 30 doesn't have many features above the 300v if you ignore eye control but still costs 200 more - for the features I do get and the better quality build etc I think its worth it.
So in short as the cameras are different beasts for different markets why should Canon be accused of fraud....
The original post to which this is the reply is a typical
--- Users are like bacteria -> Each one causing a thousand tiny crises until the host finally gives up and dies.
Of course, BMW has programmed the gearbox for maximum clutch and tire life - that is, it lets out the clutch slowly at low RPMs to reduce wear and tear on the clutch and not cause any wheelspin. However, when racing, clutch and tire life are secondary to getting a quick start - thus, you can use this easter egg to do the equivalent of popping the clutch on a straight manual tranny. Of course, I'm sure that the fact you've done this is recorded all over the ECU, and if you bring in the car for a warranty clutch replacement at 10,000 miles, the dealer will have some pointed questions to ask. Technology, as always, marches on ;).
That's it. I'm no longer part of Team Sanity.
Here's a film SLR with 90%. That said, the biggest difference between the 10D and 300D's viewfinder isn't coverage but magnification. With same 50mm lenses, the 10D has a .88x magnification, while the 300D has a .8x. Between the 10% magnification difference and inherently dimmer pentamirror construction, the 10D will be much easier to use.
When I'm shooting for a client, I need two things. I need a camera that won't fail, and I need a second camera. In that respect, if I had Canon lenses and my photography doesn't need the 1D/1D2's speeds or the 1Ds' resolution, the 10D/300D combination might be reasonable, if I can get over the severe difference in usability. No, it's not an "attitude" issue.
Your suggestion to get the 1Ds or the 1D Mark II are asinine, though, if they're looking at $800 and $1,000 bodies. Last I checked, the 1D Mark II costs $6,000, and the 1Ds costs $10,000, not to mention the weight increase from even 10D.
No, the skill will remain constant for a given photographer. However, with better ergonomics and specs of the 10D, you're less likely to miss shots with it than with the 300D. That's the whole point of buying say pro-grade over consumer-grade -- you're more likely to get usable results. Is that worth the price difference? I don't know. Ask your wallet.
I'm all for artificially imposed limitations, owning both a Minidisc player and a Radeon 9800SE. Let's all keep this nice and quiet and pretend we know nothing about the disabled functionality. If we're lucky, they'll keep putting more of said functionality in without charging us for it.
The 10D and the 300D/Rebel have the same sensor. And the sensor is a CMOS not CCD chip.
See the review here.
Steve
Oh, one little complaint---The zoom ring on the 55-200 doesn't move as smoothly as I'd like, which can make it a pain to fine-tune the focal length.
Of course, take my remarks about the quality of these lenses with a grain of salt. I'm new to SLRs (film or digital) and I've only used these Sigma lenses on my camera so far, which doesn't give me a real point of comparison for their quality.
Find this lens on froogle
Hate stupid software on freshmeat? Laugh at
Yeah. I'm still puzzled why some people prefer to be called disabled instead of handicapped.