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Archive 2013 · Leica M240 issues

  
 
douglasf13
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p.3 #1 · p.3 #1 · Leica M240 issues


zhangyue wrote:
Based on so many issues hear start from M8, M9, till this M240. Leica really should give out all the electronics design to Japaneses, focus on Rangefinder mechanics, body, and lens. Or stick with old fashion like fine tuned M9,(seems settle down now) make it as simple as digital back and as reliable as possible.

The tool is pretty simple. don't complicate as Japanese do. Most Leica user will pay 'more' for 'less'.

But they seems keep forget what make them unique.

I predict here that once FF MILC coming, Leica will get hit by include those half baked features than
...Show more

Agreed. They should make a new, simple MP with the m240's sensor and shutter, but none of the rest of the new gadgets.



Nov 12, 2013 at 07:32 PM
zhangyue
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p.3 #2 · p.3 #2 · Leica M240 issues


Arka wrote:
This may be true of longer-term Leica users. I am fairly new to the system though, and I don't think I would be nearly as happy with the camera without at least the Live-view feature. I mostly use RF, but the LV quite often gets me images that would've been difficult to obtain otherwise. I understand that desire within the Leica user base to keep the camera simple and prevent feature creep, but it seems to me that the M240 has about as many problems (or perhaps fewer) than the M9 did when it was introduced, but brings many features
...Show more

I can understand! especially LV part But, now you see, I can shoot FF MILC with smaller size, better video, more pix, better LV, less bug, with $5000 in pocket wait for MKII, MKIII....

I think Leica may lose some customer like you (might not) and many others without those 'fancy' feature like LV, EVF, peaking, video, but they will gain more at build brand image and increasing confidence of using their camera. At least, there will be less or no (hopefully) report about all these creep with simplified camera.

I can't imagine professional can rely on this during important photo session that your card suddenly corrupt, and camera suddenly frozen.

Leica's selling point is (or should be) RF and simple, efficient, reliable tool(because it is mechanic) for image capture. The effort trying to make it Swiss army knife like Canikony doing gonna be a disaster to me or them. They simply don't have the expertise and experience to handle and follow fast moving technology like this. Half baked video, worse than $500 p&S, half baked LV with so many M lens having FC, and all those reported Card issue....

I am not shoot professionally, but in no way I can bring this camera with me as sole one in field, even for personal traveling. Why, I don't trust them even though they are lovely, beautiful and joyful to use

BTW, I still love my Leica.







Nov 12, 2013 at 09:56 PM
charles.K
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p.3 #3 · p.3 #3 · Leica M240 issues


adamdewilde wrote:
I'd pay $7k for the sony A7 camera right now, if it looked as good as the Leica.

I like the styling of Leica, and I can put up with a few bugs, I just hate the customer service, and the slower then reasonable repair times.

RF mechanism is great when working, but something that pops out of alignment so easily should be serviced with a one week turn around guarantee.. And that's just not gonna happen from Leica.

EVF is fine, and my only real option right now so I can't complain about the added features.


Adam, agreed about the RF mechanism. It is great and very accurate, and the re calibration time should be a max of 1 week. With the M240, the time it is taking is 5 to 6 weeks, and totally unacceptable!! With the M9's in Australia, the turn around is 3 days and this is great of course. The LV function IMO is a necessity, and not a luxury and should perform flawlessly. The LV is a great backup should the RF goes off calibration, and is the only means to focus properly.



Nov 12, 2013 at 10:09 PM
charles.K
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p.3 #4 · p.3 #4 · Leica M240 issues


zhangyue wrote:
I can understand! especially LV part But, now you see, I can shoot FF MILC with smaller size, better video, more pix, better LV, less bug, with $5000 in pocket wait for MKII, MKIII....

I think Leica may lose some customer like you (might not) and many others without those 'fancy' feature like LV, EVF, peaking, video, but they will gain more at build brand image and increasing confidence of using their camera. At least, there will be less or no (hopefully) report about all these creep with simplified camera.

I can't imagine professional can rely on this during important photo
...Show more

Michael, agreed here! If you are a professional, then Leica service times may let you down. I do know that Leica will provide back up cameras for those that do need it

I really love the M240, and is really worth the upgrade from the M9. There are niggling features, and really does not take away from the camera. The service times are an issue that Leica does need to address very quickly. About 90% of the repairs to the M9's could be done locally, and this allowed a quick servicing time. With the new M240's, all the repairs must be done at Solms, and this is not acceptable IMO.



Nov 12, 2013 at 10:17 PM
Mitch Alland
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p.3 #5 · p.3 #5 · Leica M240 issues


douglasf13 wrote:
..They should make a new, simple MP with the m240's sensor and shutter, but none of the rest of the new gadgets.


My wish is that they should go back to the CCD sensor. While I realize that most M240 owners feel the image quality is better or that it can be processed to be very similar to that of the M9, I remain unconvinced on the basis of the overwhelming bulk of the color rendition that I see coming from the M240, which, to my taste, is not as good as that coming out of the M9. A friend who works in post-processing of cinema (film and digital) had the same reaction, independently, looking at the last few pages of the "Leica M8/M9/X1 Picture Thread" here. Please note this is not to criticize the M240 shooters there — but is simply to state that I prefer the color rendition of the M9 on the basis of what I see and also having processed some M240 files. It's a question of taste rather than what is better or worse.

—Mitch/Bangkok
Tristes Tropiques [WIP]



Nov 13, 2013 at 12:04 AM
Gary Clennan
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p.3 #6 · p.3 #6 · Leica M240 issues


Leica is indeed a quirky camera. Having said that, I have never used any other camera which feels so good in the hands or I enjoy using as much.


Nov 13, 2013 at 12:15 AM
CVickery
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p.3 #7 · p.3 #7 · Leica M240 issues


Gary Clennan wrote:
Leica is indeed a quirky camera. Having said that, I have never used any other camera which feels so good in the hands or I enjoy using as much.


+1



Nov 13, 2013 at 12:22 AM
Arka
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p.3 #8 · p.3 #8 · Leica M240 issues


Gary Clennan wrote:
Leica is indeed a quirky camera. Having said that, I have never used any other camera which feels so good in the hands or I enjoy using as much.


Yeah, this is exactly it. For all of its quirks, there's no other camera I've ever enjoyed using more.

Re: feature creep vs. reliability, I simply don't believe that the addition of any feature, no matter how useful, must come at the cost of reliability. The Leica LV is extremely helpful as a photographic aid, and unlike the M-video implementation, is not a gimmick. LV obviates costly external finders for wides, allows one to use lenses with minimum focus distances shorter than 0.7m, makes it a lot easier to focus telephoto lenses without Leica's expensive 1.25x or 1.4x magnifiers, and allows for more discrete and accurate management of unusual compositions. It's also easier to shoot through fences. While I use the excellent M240 RF 90% of the time, I would really dislike this camera if it didn't have LV. Some of my favorite images were shot using the excellent Voightlander Ultron 21 f/1.8 at 0.5m, which benefits greatly from the LV.

The LV was the reason I bought the M, and love the system as much as I do. When I was originally shopping for a Leica, I was convinced that the M-E or a used M9 was good enough for me (and cheaper!). It took one rental to completely change my mind. I don't think Leica would be able to claim me as a system adherent if the extremely useful LV was absent, and I seriously doubt Leica is losing existing customers because the LV was added. It's a win-win for them. For those that want that simplicity and/or the old CCD option, Leica has kept the M-E available in the lineup. That seems like a very reasonable compromise between pleasing the established user base and bringing new users to the M-fold.

As for reliability, it seems every M has its issues, even those that don't have excessive feature lists. The M9 and M8 had their share of serious bugs that were at least as bad, if not worse, than anything afflicting the M240. If Leica is serious about these issues, they can be resolved by working with the right partners or developing the appropriate expertise in-house.



Nov 15, 2013 at 03:02 AM
rscheffler
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p.3 #9 · p.3 #9 · Leica M240 issues


Gary Clennan wrote:
Leica is indeed a quirky camera. Having said that, I have never used any other camera which feels so good in the hands or I enjoy using as much.


Until something goes wrong. There must be some sort of sadistic German doctrine involved in Leica's product development... as if the joy one derives from the use of their products must be penalized, and is greatly enhanced because one knows that at any moment it could come to a crashing end, therefore savor it while it lasts.

Interesting to read all these experiences, some of which sound familiar from the M8/M9 thread.

I have to wonder... isn't Asia Leica's largest market? Shouldn't they have at least a regional service center there, like we have in the US? Isn't that what happens at the Leica Store in Ginza, Tokyo? I thought they do some servicing there.

I'll add to my Leica service experience from the first page... So far, everyone I've dealt with at Leica, be it Carm in NJ, Andrea Frankl in Solms, or the guys at the Leica Store in Munich, they've all been great in a one on one basis. (From my understanding, this isn't necessarily the case worldwide...) OK, service turnaround at NJ took too long (waiting for a part), but they did it under warranty despite the fact I was not the first owner. And I did pay the express service charge for 2-day turn around while I was in Germany (ends up being 4 days with shipping both ways). And when they muffed the 50 Lux ASPH infinity setting, they redid it, and my entire kit, while covering the shipping costs.

I've been a Canon user for decades, and the complaints I read about Leica here, sound very similar to the complaints about Canon Canada's CPS service in the early-mid 2000s. No loaners, too long turn around. multiple trips back to finally fix a problem. At least I was lucky to live only 45 minutes away. Imagine the cost of shipping in a $10K super tele from one of the coasts... During that time, I actually did spend 2x the cost of a 1D series camera because I couldn't count on their service to always be there, thus justifying a second identical body. Canon benefitted from the additional sale, but their service reputation was taking a serious dive among photographers. Then with their 1DIII camera, of which I also bought two, I had the most problems I ever had with any photographic equipment. But at the same time, it was a camera I loved when it worked right. Luckily by this point they were getting serious about reorganizing their service department to better serve CPS members and loaners were easy to get... now I dodn't care how long they take with my camera(s) because I always get one of theirs. Turnaround is usually less than a week, and very frequently they fix it the first time.

As Adam pointed out, the question is, for me: How serious is Leica really about catering to hardcore users, the very ones who greatly rely on their cameras?

For the time being, I agree about not sending anything to them unless absolutely necessary (a rule of thumb I also adhered to with Canon back during their 'dark age'). For me that means coping with what seems to be some RF drift...



Nov 15, 2013 at 04:18 AM
adamdewilde
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p.3 #10 · p.3 #10 · Leica M240 issues


zhangyue wrote:
I can understand! especially LV part But, now you see, I can shoot FF MILC with smaller size, better video, more pix, better LV, less bug, with $5000 in pocket wait for MKII, MKIII....

I think Leica may lose some customer like you (might not) and many others without those 'fancy' feature like LV, EVF, peaking, video, but they will gain more at build brand image and increasing confidence of using their camera. At least, there will be less or no (hopefully) report about all these creep with simplified camera.

I can't imagine professional can rely on this during important photo
...Show more


+1 on everything you said.



Nov 15, 2013 at 12:08 PM
adamdewilde
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p.3 #11 · p.3 #11 · Leica M240 issues


rscheffler wrote:
Until something goes wrong. There must be some sort of sadistic German doctrine involved in Leica's product development... as if the joy one derives from the use of their products must be penalized, and is greatly enhanced because one knows that at any moment it could come to a crashing end, therefore savor it while it lasts.

Interesting to read all these experiences, some of which sound familiar from the M8/M9 thread.

I have to wonder... isn't Asia Leica's largest market? Shouldn't they have at least a regional service center there, like we have in the US? Isn't that what happens
...Show more


+1 with all of what you typed. And I'm about to find out, as I'll be bringing my M240 to Tokyo with me, so we'll see if the service center there can realign my RF.

I also had the same issues with CPS Canada
However, though a series of failed CPS fix attempts I ended up with a new camera from my insurance policy's lemon law... And got to keep the old camera that finally got fixed after 6 trips to Canon Canada (a loaner was provided though, since I made a lot of noise).



Nov 15, 2013 at 12:16 PM
adamdewilde
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p.3 #12 · p.3 #12 · Leica M240 issues


charles.K wrote:
Adam, agreed about the RF mechanism. It is great and very accurate, and the re calibration time should be a max of 1 week. With the M240, the time it is taking is 5 to 6 weeks, and totally unacceptable!! With the M9's in Australia, the turn around is 3 days and this is great of course. The LV function IMO is a necessity, and not a luxury and should perform flawlessly. The LV is a great backup should the RF goes off calibration, and is the only means to focus properly.



AGREE!



Nov 15, 2013 at 12:16 PM
adamdewilde
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p.3 #13 · p.3 #13 · Leica M240 issues


Mitch Alland wrote:
My wish is that they should go back to the CCD sensor. While I realize that most M240 owners feel the image quality is better or that it can be processed to be very similar to that of the M9, I remain unconvinced on the basis of the overwhelming bulk of the color rendition that I see coming from the M240, which, to my taste, is not as good as that coming out of the M9. A friend who works in post-processing of cinema (film and digital) had the same reaction, independently, looking at the last few pages of
...Show more

Do you think that maybe the increase dynamic range has anything to do with it?
As I find that a lot of my lenses perform differently now that I've got the M240, the 28cron definitely lost some of its magic. Honestly I always felt as if the skin tones were a bit to red on the M9, and now a bit to... something else I can't quite put my finger on, on the M240.



Nov 15, 2013 at 12:18 PM
adamdewilde
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p.3 #14 · p.3 #14 · Leica M240 issues


Gary Clennan wrote:
Leica is indeed a quirky camera. Having said that, I have never used any other camera which feels so good in the hands or I enjoy using as much.



AGREE, but also agree with Ron about the German conspiracy.




Nov 15, 2013 at 12:22 PM
zhangyue
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p.3 #15 · p.3 #15 · Leica M240 issues


Arka, I wish leica can success, wish they are as reliable as possible at the same time add as much useful feature as possible. Sounds contradict myself, but not
The only reason for Leica to exist left is range finder, well plus status symbol and maybe feel and look, before there is a very big reason: small FF with high quality lens, now or in the near future, this reason is not valid with Sony and others coming soon.

If leica can't differentiate itself by introduce 'less' and improve those 'less' that no one else can do but compete with Canikon's on feature set is a dead end. I bet a survey with leica user: most will be happy with improved speed, reliability, focus on user experience like shutter sound, speed, rf accuracy will put this M a lot more resistant to others offers eating their market.

Without sony, I must have put my money to get this M240, but now, for the new feature it add on, I can gain everything more with paying less...

As for reliability vs feature set, as a IC design engineer, I understand every little feature will increase the chance go wrong exponentially, not mention debug, test time, robust of design over corner condition require a lot of experience and expertise over the years that most Japanese company have. And that is the reason of death of German company 20 years ago. I just don't want see that happen.

As end user, I certainly wish leica can give us more, but the reason I pay $7000 instead of $2000 sony is not that 'more' potion.

From iPhone. Sorry for typo.



Nov 15, 2013 at 01:08 PM
edwardkaraa
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p.3 #16 · p.3 #16 · Leica M240 issues


I agree with zhangyue in principal. Leica M is about spartan minimalism. Very small menu, very few buttons, basic analog controls. The jump from M9 to M240 adds more buttons, larger menu, though still much simpler than any other camera on the market. I think Leica should keep this in mind when they design their next M.


Nov 15, 2013 at 01:29 PM
Gary Clennan
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p.3 #17 · p.3 #17 · Leica M240 issues


Michael - sounds like you may end up making the switch from M9 to A7? Will you keep both systems?


Nov 15, 2013 at 01:30 PM
zhangyue
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p.3 #18 · p.3 #18 · Leica M240 issues




Gary Clennan wrote:
Michael - sounds like you may end up making the switch from M9 to A7? Will you keep both systems?

I will keep M9 and maybe M240. I mostly offer my opinion about cold fact, but I won't deny my love for high quality stuff like Leica. None of the manufacture offer perfect thing I want, otherwise, most likely they are out of business already

With saying that, I will pick M240 with simpler, smaller, stronger, faster, more reliably any day over all the feature they give me include this LV, which cover 1-2% of my need. I do have all others can do LV, that is not the reason for this multi-10000 system.



Nov 15, 2013 at 01:47 PM
rscheffler
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p.3 #19 · p.3 #19 · Leica M240 issues


Well, 'at heart' the M240 and S system use a Fujitsu processor. So it's already Japanese IC technology in that respect. There must be something lost in translation... The camera is German designed and partly Portuguese and German assembled. The sensor was designed by guys in Belgium and manufactured in France... How many of the electronic components are Chinese sourced? It's quite the mashup!

Along the lines of the M9, it seems the software is having trouble managing all this and perhaps some components can't keep up with others... just a hunch.

Adam, if you're ever back to Canada and revert to shooting Canon, you'll be very pleasantly surprised with the improvements to CPS. Good luck with Leica in Japan, and keep us posted!



Nov 15, 2013 at 01:52 PM
sirimiri
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p.3 #20 · p.3 #20 · Leica M240 issues


douglasf13 wrote:
Agreed. They should make a new, simple MP with the m240's sensor and shutter, but none of the rest of the new gadgets.


When the M240 starts getting long in the tooth, I think we can indeed expect some variants. It was announced over a year ago, by now.



Nov 15, 2013 at 03:22 PM
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