jzucker Offline Upload & Sell: Off
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p.3 #3 · p.3 #3 · really hating the alien bee accessory spring grip | |
Finale chapter in the saga. Got my new einsteins today.
(2) Einsteins
(2) CSR+ receivers for my AB1600s
(2) CSXCV receivers for the einsteins
(1) Cyber commander
Total cost, approximately $1500
unpacked one einstein, the cyber commander, one csxcv, one csr+. Hooked everything up, went through the setup and config, set up freq, channels, etc. Confirmed that the freq and channel setup worked by varying the modeling light and firing the flash from the einstein but I could not fire the flash on the AB1600. The ab1600 was on the right freq and channel which was verified by the fact that I could adjust the modeling light and flash power but I could not fire the flash. Finally, I hooked up my other ab1600 and moved the csr+, the RJ11 phone cord and optical slave disabling cable over to it. Turned on the power, plugged in the RJ11 and voila, i could adjust the modeling light, the flash power and I could fire the flash. But why not on the other AB1600?
Dunno, but that was the final straw for me. Forget about how hoakey it is that you need to power the flash ab1600 on, then plug the in the CSR+ RJ11 cable in or it doesn't work. Forget about the fact that even though I'm plugging in an $89 CSR+ receiver interface into it and I still have to disable the optical slave manually by plugging in a mini-cable. Forget about the fact that I can't use rechargable batteries in the cyber commander or that it's $100 more than the Elinchrome Skyport or that it's user interface is ridiculously stupid. It just doesn't work with all my ab1600 lights. The light that doesn't work works just fine with my stratto receiver.
So, like the mounting mechanism, it seems that the ABs are unreliable non-deterministic. I basically am of the mind that the AB stuff is good, cheap stuff but not pro-caliber gear.
And I'm tired of broken flash tubes, modifiers falling off the flashes, flashes not firing, etc.
I just want it to work. So like someone else said, I used alien bees for a while and got a lot of good use out of them but it's time for me to make the investment in Elinchrome and not look back.
I'll be selling one AB1600, possibly an AB400, some softbox adapter rings, and a kacey 22" beauty dish....
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