D800E gone!... :D

[arthurking83]

Firstly:
Stupid Nikon. No! actually make that STUPID <insert every known expletive here> Nikon!!!

Earlier this year, the 10 pin port on my D800E collapsed in on itself.
Whilst I had a little bit of time, I emailed Nikon (lack of)support type folks via their website.
A few email exchanges later, and to my complete surprise they deny fault, in that the product was faulty.

Now, firstly(for the second time ) I do use the 10 pin port a lot. In fact 99% of the time.
But I don't abuse it, just regular usage, where I slot in my easy to slot in bluetooth module(and I used to use the intervalometer doodad remote for a while too).
There is no pressure on the port in doing so, goes in easy, out easy.
Background history: I've used this bluetooth dongle on the D300 since about '09 .. and with much more regular usage(again, never abusive). D300's 10 pin port is still fine!

So after a few emails to Nikon's absent service support political advisor(ie. the spokesperson that effects all denial routines!) .. it was easier just to bypass them and go it alone.

Even tho in one of my replies to the Nikon folks with about three(at least, maybe more!) well known internet based transcripts of the exact same failure on other D800's of the same vintage, they still claim a denial of any impropriety on their manufacturing plants part.

FWIW: here's a link to probably the most widely read article re this issue.

D800 10 pin connector issue

Nikon won!
They wore me down till I couldn't accept their ineptitude any longer.

I finally had the time(synchronised perfectly with a vague memory of having something important to do! ) to take it to a repairer to look at it.
Very importantly for me .. a non Nikon authorised repairer.

I've almost totally given up on Nikon. They've had so much bad press over the past 4+ years, with the D800's, D600's, D750's .. and countless whatever other models/products and so on .. you'd kind'a think they may actually attempt to fix what is obvciously a well known issue globally! ... thus minimising(hopefully eliminating) any further impact on more potential long term customers.

They've basically forced me to eliminate future Nikon products from my things I need list.
Funny thing is, I'm not angry or mad in any way, just disheartened that a company with so much teetering on the about to lose big time tightrope, simply refuses to believe that they are about too.

I'm just one small fry customer that may spend about $5000K every 3-5 years to so, on new Nikon gear. So in the scheme of things, I'm small fry.
But, add up all the other small frys around the globe, plus new major products that appear to be another backward step(see D3400!) .. and Nikon's reputation is seriously going to be on the brink in no time at all.

I really really wanted to update the D300 to what appears to be a great camera in the D500. I was this >< close to getting one about a month ago .. then I remembered the D800 problem.
So far the D500 seems to be mostly problem free, apart from the major battery stuff up(where it's a lottery on whether your other so called compatible type batteries may or may not work in it).

Pass! ..
Nikon's loss of just that one more $3k customer .. again!
I'm sure my small fry problems mean nothing to Nikon at the moment. No problem.
I'm thinking that there's a real chance that one day in the future, they'll come to regret the choices they made in the way they treated their (current) customers. But I also believe that unless their corporate honchos actively change this current path now, this is going to be inevitable.
How many small fry customers does it take to close down a once corporate giant(it's not a joke, it's a hypothetical!! ). I suppose we'll find out one day.

Anyhow, D800E is currently at a (as yet to be named) repairer.
If all goes well and the repair price is reasonable, I'll give them a plug on here too.

ps. I was going to give it a go myself, but this is my main camera and I don't want to stuff it any more than it already is.
D300 is expendable now(will get converted to UV/IR one day) and D70s is on the waiting table for 'a major transplant' one day soon as well.

[jim]

[QUOTE]Nikon won![/QUOTE]

I know you're being a bit sardonic with that comment, but if Nikon imagine that this sort of bullshit is any kind of win for them, then they're sadly mistaken.

[ameerat42]

AK. Silly Q: Have you considered writ(h)ing to the "Digital SLR Ombudsman" about it?
- Ie, the equivalent of fair trading in Vic?

Ie, since I know you'll say "yes", what happened?

[Cage]

I'm hearing you Artie.

I've moved my D800 on, just wasn't happy with it's performance at anything over ISO800. My D600 had an oil spot and had the sensor replaced.

So what are the alternatives? I've done the Pentax thing with a K20D, liked it, although it was my first DSLR, and moved on to a K5, not so happy with it.

Canon don't seem to be much better than Nikon and anyway they lost me when they changed their mount interface.

Sony? Seem to have a dedicated, though small following, but lack the range of lens of the big two.

I have about $5K tied up in Nikon lens so changing brands is not something to contemplate lightly, plus I've bought a D7200 and will fit a LP filter for my Astro stuff. I'll be replacing the D800 in the near future and I'm leaning toward the overpriced D810A although I'll want some serious discounting and/or Cash Back to do a deal.

The D8xx series must be getting close to a major upgrade. Maybe Photokina will shed some light on that.

You really do paint yourself into a corner when you get a collection of add-ons for your particular brand of camera, don't you?

[arthurking83]

Jim: That was my main point for the article.
The issue itself, of a broken connector isn't the issue. The part would cost them all of about $2, and the labour maybe $100-ish(their cost) .. so about $100 to fix a common and known problem, that Nikon once again refuse to publicly acknowledge!
They went through the same crap with the early batch of D800's and D600's oily sensor, and then finally admitted what was glaringly obvious.
Going by the many reports from other owners of D800's of the same vintage as mine, there are some out there affected by this port issue.

The question is: irrespective of the fact that Nikon's current attitude is that they believe themselves to be all mighty and an attitude that they are God's gift to photography community, and with the recent countless product issues still fresh in everyone's memory .. AND!! .. the fact that they're sales are dropping faster than the price of iron ore!!!! .. wouldn't you at least try to ensure that at least one mid-high(ish) end customer is going to remain loyal?
Forgetting the fact that it's me(and I'm as stingy as the other stingiest guy! ) I didn't contact them about an old D40 or D50 (ie. from the lowest end of their range and a zillion years ago!)
It's a D800, I explained that I have the receipt, from a local real store!
The alarm bell should have rung for them, that this person is willing to spend close to $4k for a camera body!
If I were a company dealing out such products, I know how I'd be treating a customer like that.

What's disheartening about the issue is that the person emailing me back via their support site wouldn't even offer just the small token to have a look at it.
Of course we all know what the outcome of that process would have been any way .. they'd have assessed the problem as damage caused by operator error

My reference to Nikon's win anything was more about the point that .. if they deem that I'm not the type of customer that they need in the future, then they won! .. I'll be looking at other manufacturers in the future for new stuff.
It's obvious that their attitude is that the products are of a higher magnitude and they're trying to be more selective of the customers they want to maintain in the future .. (or something like that).

Note that all this doesn't mean that I'll never buy Nikon again! It's just that I'll never buy new Nikon Aus products ever again. I'll look at secondhand gear(eg. say a D810, but unlikely) and or well priced used lenses or whatever.
BUT! .. the inevitable situation will be that, in the future some camera with some must have feature or ability will eventually persuade me to have to acquire it(eg. D500 is really close to that ability!) .. and I'd have stopped eating for a few months just to be able to afford one!

Am: Canon and Nikon own the DSLR market. For sure the DSLR Omudsman will have to be paid for by those two, so we know what the outcome would be in trying to get assistance from the DSLRO

Kev: I recently looked at alternative house insurance(home and contents), and they wanted an estimate of my contents value. I'd estimated that my non household contents may have totalled about 10K. I really have nothing of value, 90% of all my items are hand-me-downs! Just a $2K fridge and $500 TV. After that, I spent about $2K on my current PC monitor. Then the girl asked me to estimate my camera gear collection .. in the end we both had a laugh at the discrepancy!
I wanted good cover on the camera gear. $20K is not far off the mark, give or take a couple.

What feels weird tho, is not having the D800E sitting there in the bag about 1m to my left!

[MissionMan]

Jim: That was my main point for the article.
The issue itself, of a broken connector isn't the issue. The part would cost them all of about $2, and the labour maybe $100-ish(their cost) .. so about $100 to fix a common and known problem, that Nikon once again refuse to publicly acknowledge!
They went through the same crap with the early batch of D800's and D600's oily sensor, and then finally admitted what was glaringly obvious.
Going by the many reports from other owners of D800's of the same vintage as mine, there are some out there affected by this port issue.

The question is: irrespective of the fact that Nikon's current attitude is that they believe themselves to be all mighty and an attitude that they are God's gift to photography community, and with the recent countless product issues still fresh in everyone's memory .. AND!! .. the fact that they're sales are dropping faster than the price of iron ore!!!! .. wouldn't you at least try to ensure that at least one mid-high(ish) end customer is going to remain loyal?
Forgetting the fact that it's me(and I'm as stingy as the other stingiest guy! ) I didn't contact them about an old D40 or D50 (ie. from the lowest end of their range and a zillion years ago!)
It's a D800, I explained that I have the receipt, from a local real store!
The alarm bell should have rung for them, that this person is willing to spend close to $4k for a camera body!
If I were a company dealing out such products, I know how I'd be treating a customer like that.

What's disheartening about the issue is that the person emailing me back via their support site wouldn't even offer just the small token to have a look at it.
Of course we all know what the outcome of that process would have been any way .. they'd have assessed the problem as damage caused by operator error

My reference to Nikon's win anything was more about the point that .. if they deem that I'm not the type of customer that they need in the future, then they won! .. I'll be looking at other manufacturers in the future for new stuff.
It's obvious that their attitude is that the products are of a higher magnitude and they're trying to be more selective of the customers they want to maintain in the future .. (or something like that).

Note that all this doesn't mean that I'll never buy Nikon again! It's just that I'll never buy new Nikon Aus products ever again. I'll look at secondhand gear(eg. say a D810, but unlikely) and or well priced used lenses or whatever.
BUT! .. the inevitable situation will be that, in the future some camera with some must have feature or ability will eventually persuade me to have to acquire it(eg. D500 is really close to that ability!) .. and I'd have stopped eating for a few months just to be able to afford one!

Am: Canon and Nikon own the DSLR market. For sure the DSLR Omudsman will have to be paid for by those two, so we know what the outcome would be in trying to get assistance from the DSLRO

Kev: I recently looked at alternative house insurance(home and contents), and they wanted an estimate of my contents value. I'd estimated that my non household contents may have totalled about 10K. I really have nothing of value, 90% of all my items are hand-me-downs! Just a $2K fridge and $500 TV. After that, I spent about $2K on my current PC monitor. Then the girl asked me to estimate my camera gear collection .. in the end we both had a laugh at the discrepancy!
I wanted good cover on the camera gear. $20K is not far off the mark, give or take a couple.

What feels weird tho, is not having the D800E sitting there in the bag about 1m to my left!

I think you're kidding yourself if you think Nikon or any company will admit there is a fault with the product. You can switch to Canon, Pentax, Fuji or any other brand and you will simply find that companies will not admit fault with a product. They may do out of warranty replacements for parts that are faulty, but they still won't admit it. The reason for this is things like product recalls which are costly, so unless it's a big issue on a big part (like a shutter recall), they won't bother, because 90% of customers don't use the port so they don't have to replace a whole heap of stuff that is never used.

Some companies are better or worse than others. For example, I can take a product into an Apple store and they replace it on the spot, where Microsoft won't even reply to my complaint, but Apple still won't admit there is a fault, even if its a common problem and most staff at companies are simply instructed to pretend the problem doesn't exist and you're the first to have it.

Incidentally, you aren't just punishing Nikon Australia if you don't buy, you're punishing local retailers when it's not their fault.

[arthurking83]

.....

Incidentally, you aren't just punishing Nikon Australia if you don't buy, you're punishing local retailers when it's not their fault.

Technically you're right, in that comment, but only in terms of Nikon specific retailers!
But, when you look at the whole picture, they're punishing themselves by not 'supporting' their customers at least partly so!

I understand that it's hard for them to admit there is a known fault due to the possible costs involved, but I doubt that they've never heard of any other D800 10 pin ports collapsing in like mine(and others have).
The notion of this is impossible to me.

So with that in mind, at least they could have offered to look at the camera for no fee.
They wanted me to take it in to their authorised repair centre(Camera Clinic) to have it assessed, which would have cost me a small fee(I think about $50 or something from memory).

Ummm .. yeah! .. No freaking way am I paying for someone to explain to me some 'typical company line' that bears no resemblance to reality!
If I was doing something wrong with the way I use that 10 pin port, the D300 would have collapsed on me back in 2010 at the latest(it got far more use, just because the camera got far more use).

Like I said, I'm just small fry in Nikon's Australian operations. I mean nothing to them. What I do now won't affect their financial position in any meaningful way.
They miss out on about $4K in sales over the next 6 months. Barely a thousandths of a percent in their overall sales figures I reckon
But it's the entrenched attitude they display, coupled with the current (and forecasted) market conditions(ie. obviously dropping sales).
In such market conditions, you don't want to be alienating any customer anywhere, if the future of your business means anything to you.

With my current mindset(of avoiding all new Nikon products), I'll only be affecting those Nikon specific retailers that depend only on Nikon sales. I don't think any exist at all.
But I would (most likely) be assisting Sony or Pentax retailers and all their behind the scenes people in some way instead. (I've thought about a K1 or A7)
So the only real effect is that Nikon's Australian operations will be affected.

The other sale they missed out on is a D5500 + a 35/1.8 Dx lens. While it's not a high value combo, it's still a sale they miss out on, I want to update my daughter's Galaxy Camera that's she's outgrown.
She didn't mind the D70s with a small lens, "but a bit smaller would have been nice" .. so a D5500 + small lens could have suited her in some way.
That would have been a mid Sept purchase.

But what's important to remember here isn't my issue. It's the overall feeling of any enthusiasm to maintain market share is what I'm feeling.
We know that new sales(in terms of both moving products and finding new customers) are harder to come by. Manufacturer's sales forecasts are laughable in terms of accuracy(according to CIPA figures).
For the past few years they've been short by a minimum 10% and more like 15 or 20 percent or so.
Their profits are higher per unit item, which points to a situation where you rely more on a smaller pool of customers to maintain higher profits.
Alienate one customer here and there, and they all add up top .. not a strong outlook for the future of their company (unless their attitude changes).

Funny side comment:
I purchased the damned thing locally and paid a premium for it
1/ to support the local retailing industry and
2/ hopefully for better support!
Should have just saved myself the $1K and not have to deal with Nikon support. Now I know better

[mudman]

simple solution A.K go Pentax
my k7 has done over 40k frames with no problems
and i'm sure the K1 is equally robust with excellent performance characteristics

[MissionMan]

Technically you're right, in that comment, but only in terms of Nikon specific retailers!
But, when you look at the whole picture, they're punishing themselves by not 'supporting' their customers at least partly so!

I understand that it's hard for them to admit there is a known fault due to the possible costs involved, but I doubt that they've never heard of any other D800 10 pin ports collapsing in like mine(and others have).
The notion of this is impossible to me.

So with that in mind, at least they could have offered to look at the camera for no fee.
They wanted me to take it in to their authorised repair centre(Camera Clinic) to have it assessed, which would have cost me a small fee(I think about $50 or something from memory).

Ummm .. yeah! .. No freaking way am I paying for someone to explain to me some 'typical company line' that bears no resemblance to reality!
If I was doing something wrong with the way I use that 10 pin port, the D300 would have collapsed on me back in 2010 at the latest(it got far more use, just because the camera got far more use).

Like I said, I'm just small fry in Nikon's Australian operations. I mean nothing to them. What I do now won't affect their financial position in any meaningful way.
They miss out on about $4K in sales over the next 6 months. Barely a thousandths of a percent in their overall sales figures I reckon
But it's the entrenched attitude they display, coupled with the current (and forecasted) market conditions(ie. obviously dropping sales).
In such market conditions, you don't want to be alienating any customer anywhere, if the future of your business means anything to you.

With my current mindset(of avoiding all new Nikon products), I'll only be affecting those Nikon specific retailers that depend only on Nikon sales. I don't think any exist at all.
But I would (most likely) be assisting Sony or Pentax retailers and all their behind the scenes people in some way instead. (I've thought about a K1 or A7)
So the only real effect is that Nikon's Australian operations will be affected.

The other sale they missed out on is a D5500 + a 35/1.8 Dx lens. While it's not a high value combo, it's still a sale they miss out on, I want to update my daughter's Galaxy Camera that's she's outgrown.
She didn't mind the D70s with a small lens, "but a bit smaller would have been nice" .. so a D5500 + small lens could have suited her in some way.
That would have been a mid Sept purchase.

But what's important to remember here isn't my issue. It's the overall feeling of any enthusiasm to maintain market share is what I'm feeling.
We know that new sales(in terms of both moving products and finding new customers) are harder to come by. Manufacturer's sales forecasts are laughable in terms of accuracy(according to CIPA figures).
For the past few years they've been short by a minimum 10% and more like 15 or 20 percent or so.
Their profits are higher per unit item, which points to a situation where you rely more on a smaller pool of customers to maintain higher profits.
Alienate one customer here and there, and they all add up top .. not a strong outlook for the future of their company (unless their attitude changes).

Funny side comment:
I purchased the damned thing locally and paid a premium for it
1/ to support the local retailing industry and
2/ hopefully for better support!
Should have just saved myself the $1K and not have to deal with Nikon support. Now I know better

I think companies failure to acknowledge problems is more to do with the litigious nature of the US market than anything else. If they admitted fault, they would suddenly have 10000 D800 owners on a lawsuit with them demanding compensation for some obscure reason when less than 1% of them has every experienced or been inconvenienced by the problem. The antennagate issue which turned out to be a non-issue and the same characteristics occurred on other phones including the blackberry? Yeah, that didn't stop 10,000 jumping on the bandwagon for a class action against Apple, despite Apple offering a full refund for any unhappy customers.

I think the sad nature of what has occurred is that companies now have to protect themselves because any small mistake can be blown out into legal action.