thedruid wrote:
Lets get it straight here unless you own a D600 with this issue then you do not know...I have it and use it daily, before this I had MANY Dslr's from 1D series to D3x. The issue does not just go away, a wet clean is a temporary solution so far, I am beyond the so called magic 3000 click mark! These are not dust bunnies we are talking about but a real issue Nikon has shoved under the rug. So please spare me the swab stories.
+1, agree. Nikon just wont admit its design flaws on D600.
Rodolfo Paiz wrote:
As to your "I absolutely refuse to wet clean on a regular basis when I am spending $2000 for a camera", I will say bluntly that you're being ridiculous. Any modern DSLR camera -- I repeat, ANY modern DSLR camera -- will need wet cleaning on a regular basis. That is in addition to any built-in sensor-cleaning routine it may have. Some cameras may need it more often during its first few months of life, that's all. My D3s was like that.
We have two D700s, and have never wet cleaned them. We don't even run the built-in sensor cleaning. There's no way we'd have spent as much as we did on full frame cameras if we expected to have to tinker with their insides on a regular basis. To be honest, I don't think the majority of FF camera users perform any wet cleaning at all.
Interesting discussion. I purchased my digital cameras after self cleaning came about, It activates at least twice and probably more times during each shoot, when ever I use the on/off switch. After reading Rodolfo's comments I went back over my propeller aircraft shots, all up at very small f no.s, f20,22, to look for spots and marks. After 3 years of use, a lot of lense changes and an African Safari my skies are still free of marks. I have not cleaned a sensor yet.
The problems with the D600 are obviously a manufacturing fault, maybe due to some change in lubricant or quantity used, I think I'd be pretty disappointed if the OP's problems showed up on a new camera I'd purchased.
Ferrophot wrote:
Interesting discussion. I purchased my digital cameras after self cleaning came about, It activates at least twice and probably more times during each shoot, when ever I use the on/off switch. After reading Rodolfo's comments I went back over my propeller aircraft shots, all up at very small f no.s, f20,22, to look for spots and marks. After 3 years of use, a lot of lense changes and an African Safari my skies are still free of marks. I have not cleaned a sensor yet.
The problems with the D600 are obviously a manufacturing fault, maybe due to some change in lubricant or quantity used, I think I'd be pretty disappointed if the OP's problems showed up on a new camera I'd purchased....Show more →
I think the real issue is that this is happening more frequently than what would be considered "normal". If Nikon came out with a solution to reduce it's occurrence people would be happier.
I think your situation is on the opposite side of the spectrum if you've never had to wet clean. If everyone was in the same boat they wouldn't bother selling products to do the cleanings and local camera shops wouldn't offer it as a service.
The need to clean dust is dependent on usage, how often are lenses changed, how careful the user is when changing the lens, under what conditions, etc. Under normal shooting conditions if you are careful about changing lenses, the need to clean dust is minimal.
However the spots on the D600 are not dust(well I did see one dust spot and the built-in cleaning removed it), they are from oil or lubrication and this necessitates frequent cleaning as we see from the D600 owners' feedback here and on other forums.
I did call Nikon service and they told me that there are no issues with the D600 and if I need the sensor cleaned to send it to them. I would have to pay the shipping to them and they would pay the return shipping.
seaum wrote:
I did call Nikon service and they told me that there are no issues with the D600 and if I need the sensor cleaned to send it to them. I would have to pay the shipping to them and they would pay the return shipping.
If nikon admits the issue, the company will pay a lot of money for recall.
Rodolfo Paiz wrote:
And data is not the plural of anecdote, we all know that.
But the problem here is not whether the D600 will need more, or less, wet cleaning than other cameras throughout part or all of its lifetime. The problem is that the OP seems to believe that "real cameras" don't need wet cleaning at all and thus refuses to buy any camera that will need wet cleaning... which, I'll say again, is absurd.
In 25,000 shots, I might have cleaned my 5d2 3 times. Cleaning a sensor every 200 shots is not acceptable IMHO.
chez wrote:
In 25,000 shots, I might have cleaned my 5d2 3 times. Cleaning a sensor every 200 shots is not acceptable IMHO.
Very similar experience here. My 5D2 required only a blower now and again. I'm on my second D600 now, and it has exactly the same spot-splat problem as my first one. (SN's 603xxxx & 606xxxx).
My second one also decides to freeze up for a few seconds now & then while viewing images. I'll be taking it back, and going for third-time-lucky. If the third D600 has the spot-issue, then I will be sure that every single D600 on the market has it. However many don't want to admit it. I even had a thread locked and got a warning from the admin of dslr-forum.de because I dared to criticise the camera. It seems for some Nikon has a cultish hold, similar to how you can't discuss shortcomings of Apple devices to a huge fan.
My faith in Nikon would take a fatal tumble if my third D600 has issues, so instead of risking the D800 I'd go for Canon's 5DIII after all (whose 5DII was incredibly reliable).
At the end of the day, we're photographers who require our tools to work properly. Most of us really don't care about brands, history or systems. We just need our tools to provide more output and less stress.
I'm a couple months away from buying almost an entire new kit of gear. For the last five years I've had kits provided to me at work, with a small collection of personal equipment. I've always used Nikon, and I love it, never considered switching.
Sitting outside the other day though, pondering the thousands of dollars I'm about to drop and the current problems with the D600, I realized that now, if ever, I could make the switch to Canon without too much loss or extra cost.
Will I do it? Probably not. But holy eff I hope these 600 issues are resolved soon.
I shot with the d600 at a birthday party. Wide open with people walking around. Didn't see any dust. I think the dust spots bokeh nicely. Or they added to the 'grain' look.
M Lucca wrote:
I shot with the d600 at a birthday party. Wide open with people walking around. Didn't see any dust. I think the dust spots bokeh nicely. Or they added to the 'grain' look.
You're not gonna see the spots wide-open, that's the point. Macro shooters are most affected by this problem.
runamuck, lol. I like your analogy, but is the requirement to clean your tv always a non-issue. It depends...
So you have a few friends over to watch the super bowl on Sunday. After an hour your picture is littered with spots, you and your friends cannot see the game that well, so you shutoff the tv, open the back and vacuum off the tube. Now you're good to go.
But wait, another hour later your picture is covered with spots again, so time to shutdown, clean, etc. And then once again late in the 4th quarter. Damn it, just missed the game winning td. How enjoyable is watching the game at your house?
I purposely ran through 570 shots on my new D600 to observe if I had a dust issue. Since I primarily use my D800e these were just "test shots!" But, in the end, shooting all between f/11 up to and including f/40 (70-300mm vr), I had only a small amount of dust, however it was nothing significant. And although I thought it would be oily and require a wet cleaning, I simply puffed away with my rocket blower.
Count me relieved. And a 1%er compared to what I read here.
ckcarr wrote:
Count me relieved. And a 1%er compared to what I read here.
Maybe, maybe not. It could be that 99% of the D600 bodies are depositing oily spots on the sensor array, but it could also be that only 1% are doing it... that'd still be enough to generate some volume of complaints. It's probably not 1% if someone can get three cameras that do it, but it's still an unknown.
All we know is that some people are complaining about the issue and that the issue is real -- though we don't yet know if it's a break-in issue that goes away or whether it's a constant. But we don't know anything about how many D600 bodies may have this problem. Only Nikon knows or has any sort of a clue.
