Price glee for gadget-lovers

By RICHARD WOOD

Significant price falls thanks to a strong exchange rate, pressure from parallel importers and increasing manufacturing volumes are providing bargains for gadgets.

Most affected are digital cameras, colour printing, all-in-one photocopiers, scanners plus printer devices, flat PC screens, and DVD player/recorders.

It also means consumers are catching up with the choice and prices overseas.

Last year two megapixel digital cameras sold here at around $700. Today you can pick up a home brand two-megapixel "Dolphin" camera with 4x digital zoom and 16 MB compact flash memory from Dick Smith for $249.

Harvey Norman general manager, computers, Luke Naish said you could now get 3 megapixel for what you did paid for 2 megapixel. The Sony DSCP32, costing $599, was the starting point for 3 megapixel and cost $999 a year ago.

Harvey Norman camera sales rose 140 per cent from January to June.

Naish said the other standout seller was flat panel LCD screens, which accounted for 75 per cent of Harvey Norman's computer display sales.

Prices for the popular 15-inch size had dropped from $999 a year ago to $599.

But despite regular monitors being around $300 for a 17 inch, Naish did not expect flat panel prices to drop much further because manufacturers were having to compete with notebook manufacturers for 15- inch screens.

Otherwise, he said, the 17-inch flat panel LCD was becoming more popular and the 19 inch had just dipped below $2000.

In the printer market, colour lasers were still above $1500, said Dick Smith merchandise manager Tony Paulsen.

Colour inkjet printers, starting around $200, have been available for a couple of years so there's not much room to drop further, although a feature being added is the ability to print directly from a camera or by plugging in the memory card.

Paulsen said Dick Smith was selling 300 per cent more multifunction devices that combined printer, scanner, copier, and sometimes fax and digital answering machine a month than last year.

The key selling points were the extra functionality in less work space, some integrated operation between the functions and sometimes card readers for direct printing from camera removable memory.

Paulsen identified the $249 Hewlett-Packard Officejet PFC 1210 as a popular choice combining inkjet printer, scanner and copier. The nearest equivalent would have been around $450 a year ago, he said.



And consumers are using specialised printers to print their own photo collections. The Hewlett-Packard Photosmart 130 can print 6 inch by 4 inch borderless photos and sells for $355 at Dick Smith. It can print directly from Compact Flash, SmartMedia, Secure Digital (SD), Multimedia Card (MMC) or Sony Memory Stick.

This removable memory for storing photos and short video has also fallen in price dramatically to between $70 and $80 for 64MB, from around $100 at the start of the year and $130 a year ago.

Naish said 64Mb would do for most cameras, although the higher the megapixel resolution, the more memory required per photo. If your camera has a video capability you may need 128MB or 256MB.

With DVD devices there are two trends. The price of a regular DVD player has bottomed out at $150 and DVD player/recorders have now dipped below $1000 compared to $2000 a year ago.

Paulsen said the key with DVD player/recorders was the ability to play DVDs from multiple regions and record in different formats - although if you are recording only for your own viewing the formats may not be an issue.

The devices are tipped to rapidly replace VCRs if the price drops further.

Digitrex agent PB Technologies is bringing in the GKX-9000 DVD player/recorder for $999 in about a month and also has two portable DVD models - only slightly larger than a couple of sandwiches and incorporating flip-up LCD screens.

The chunkier PD100 has 5.8-inch display and is $599 while the PD650 is $699 with a 6.5-inch display.

Dick Smith has the Cyberhome 7-inch screen portable DVD player for $799.

If you are still not satisfied gadget-wise, Dick Smith has a combination 15-inch flat panel screen and TV from Cyberhome for $798. Or wait for an upcoming product tipped by Harvey Norman's Naish and expected to sell for $2999.

It will incorporate TV, AM/FM Radio, DVD player, Pentium 4 PC, remote control, mouse, keyboard, subwoofer speakers, and flat screen.