Thom Hogan's Nikon Camera, DSLR, Lens, Flash, and Book site
D800 Not recommended by Thom...... any views
July 23 (commentary)--People aren't exactly looking forward in time far enough. That's what I was trained to do and why I was successful in my Silicon Valley career. I do most of my thinking in the future then try to get there.
Here's the thing people haven't yet figured out yet: 18 months from now you see a D800 on eBay for a good price. Do you buy it?
Think about that some more. I'll give you a moment.
No, you probably don't. Not without more information. Unfortunately, Nikon's silence means that you don't know which serial numbers were affected. The fact that it's 18 months out you don't know if Nikon will still fix it for free if it does have the problem. The fact that Nikon doesn't exactly list a specific "left AF sensor fix" on their repair statements means that a seller can't show verification of a fix by Nikon.
Let's say that it's you selling your D800 (probably because a D800Exs has come along ;~). How do you convince a buyer like me that your camera has no problem?
In this case the unintended consequence is on the consumer, not Nikon.
Unintended Consequences
July 23 (commentary)--With Nikon basically still in traditional Japanese denial mode on the left autofocus sensor programming problem, the fallout has begun.
First up, me. After thinking about this (again, there's not much to do sitting on the tarmac for two-and-a-half hours and in a terminal for another six), I've realized that I've made a mistake. My D800 Review currently says Recommended. It should not. I've got enough data now to know the left sensor issue is not a problem with just a couple of cameras, but is reasonably widespread. I also have enough feedback from Nikon users that getting Nikon's attention is a giant game of Gatekeeper: some people are getting past the gatekeeper more easily than others. It seems that it isn't quite as simple as calling them and reporting that your camera has a focus problem. According to some emails I've been receiving, Nikon seems to want to make at least some of you leap over some unknown hurdle first. Plus, here in the US Nikon is not picking up shipping to them, not even retroactively when they discover that your camera did indeed have the manufacturing error they know about and are fixing.
Thus, because of the apparent widespread nature of the problem and Nikon's response to it, I'm going to have to change my review to Not Recommended, and it will stay that way until such time as it becomes clear to me that all new cameras coming into the US are free of the left AF sensor programming problem. That might be a day, a week, a month, or more. One problem will be that Nikon almost certainly won't send me a message saying "all new cameras are fine," which is a relative of the "we won't acknowledge any problems with our cameras" position they've been taking. So I'll have to figure out for myself when it appears that the pipeline is free of this demon, and that might take me longer than it should. Not a consequence Nikon wants, I believe, but one they now deserve given their stance.
Meanwhile, the whole nature of this problem has brought out the Super Testers. And these testers are finding that the autofocus system isn't quite what they expected. Modest differences between sensors and consistency are the norm and always have been. In practical shooting, small differences don't generally have any significant consequence. Still, a -10 is not a -5. So we see the Internet Amplification Effect (IAE) all over again. People are finally testing closely enough to see the differences that have always been there. Indeed, we now are getting automated test systems (e.g. Reikan FoCal, but there are others in development, too) that will report just what the autofocus system is doing. Almost no one is going to see their camera get a "perfect report."
While we're talking about very small differences here (a -5 on AF Fine Tune represents an extraordinarily small tolerance, one we used to be blissfully unaware of and ignore), people are bothered by seeing any difference. The more of these automated testing suites we see and the more they get used, the more people are going to put pressure on Nikon about its autofocus system (Canon, too, probably, but they're not the focus of this story, pardon the pun). So here we have another consequence Nikon doesn't want, and one with an unknown outcome. Imagine what happens if someone compiles a database of these automated test results and it shows that Canon is plus or minus 5 on average and Nikon is plus or minus 10. Oh yeah, such a database will happen, believe me. Nikon had better hope that they win that battle, but it's their fault that such a database gets generated in the first place.
Another unintended consequence is spillover. That's compounded by the fact that the D7000 launch was also accompanied by a lot of "doesn't focus right" complaints. As I was writing this I got two emails with image samples, one from a D800 and one from another Nikon DSLR. Both showed some left/center difference, but not the level of difference I would expect to see from the misprogrammed sensor table. One looks like it could be a lens problem (miscentered or misaligned lenses can produce left/center/right differences, too). Again, this is the IAE at work. My guess is that Nikon has now opened all their equipment up to far closer scrutiny overall, and so two numbers will go up: their requests for returns for repair, and their customer dissatisfaction levels on surveys like those by JD Power.
Also consider this: until this problem became clear, the D800 was "the camera to buy." Now it's "the camera to test at the dealer before taking it home." Or maybe just "the camera to avoid for awhile." Ouch. Oh, and Nikon has some new cameras coming soon. Any bets on what the number one sales question will be on those? No, not "how many pixels does it have?" More like "Have they fixed the focus problem yet?"
Nikon's approach on dealing with the D800 focus issue is all wrong. That approach will create real and lasting consequences for the brand and other Nikon DSLRs they launch in the near term.
Personally, I understand how complex these products are and how many moving pieces all have to be executed perfectly. Every now and then you make a mistake. The real brand distinction is made in how you acknowledge and fix those mistakes. Leave any doubt in the customer's mind and you start knocking over the unintended consequence dominoes.
D800 Not recommended by Thom...... any views
July 23 (commentary)--People aren't exactly looking forward in time far enough. That's what I was trained to do and why I was successful in my Silicon Valley career. I do most of my thinking in the future then try to get there.
Here's the thing people haven't yet figured out yet: 18 months from now you see a D800 on eBay for a good price. Do you buy it?
Think about that some more. I'll give you a moment.
No, you probably don't. Not without more information. Unfortunately, Nikon's silence means that you don't know which serial numbers were affected. The fact that it's 18 months out you don't know if Nikon will still fix it for free if it does have the problem. The fact that Nikon doesn't exactly list a specific "left AF sensor fix" on their repair statements means that a seller can't show verification of a fix by Nikon.
Let's say that it's you selling your D800 (probably because a D800Exs has come along ;~). How do you convince a buyer like me that your camera has no problem?
In this case the unintended consequence is on the consumer, not Nikon.
Unintended Consequences
July 23 (commentary)--With Nikon basically still in traditional Japanese denial mode on the left autofocus sensor programming problem, the fallout has begun.
First up, me. After thinking about this (again, there's not much to do sitting on the tarmac for two-and-a-half hours and in a terminal for another six), I've realized that I've made a mistake. My D800 Review currently says Recommended. It should not. I've got enough data now to know the left sensor issue is not a problem with just a couple of cameras, but is reasonably widespread. I also have enough feedback from Nikon users that getting Nikon's attention is a giant game of Gatekeeper: some people are getting past the gatekeeper more easily than others. It seems that it isn't quite as simple as calling them and reporting that your camera has a focus problem. According to some emails I've been receiving, Nikon seems to want to make at least some of you leap over some unknown hurdle first. Plus, here in the US Nikon is not picking up shipping to them, not even retroactively when they discover that your camera did indeed have the manufacturing error they know about and are fixing.
Thus, because of the apparent widespread nature of the problem and Nikon's response to it, I'm going to have to change my review to Not Recommended, and it will stay that way until such time as it becomes clear to me that all new cameras coming into the US are free of the left AF sensor programming problem. That might be a day, a week, a month, or more. One problem will be that Nikon almost certainly won't send me a message saying "all new cameras are fine," which is a relative of the "we won't acknowledge any problems with our cameras" position they've been taking. So I'll have to figure out for myself when it appears that the pipeline is free of this demon, and that might take me longer than it should. Not a consequence Nikon wants, I believe, but one they now deserve given their stance.
Meanwhile, the whole nature of this problem has brought out the Super Testers. And these testers are finding that the autofocus system isn't quite what they expected. Modest differences between sensors and consistency are the norm and always have been. In practical shooting, small differences don't generally have any significant consequence. Still, a -10 is not a -5. So we see the Internet Amplification Effect (IAE) all over again. People are finally testing closely enough to see the differences that have always been there. Indeed, we now are getting automated test systems (e.g. Reikan FoCal, but there are others in development, too) that will report just what the autofocus system is doing. Almost no one is going to see their camera get a "perfect report."
While we're talking about very small differences here (a -5 on AF Fine Tune represents an extraordinarily small tolerance, one we used to be blissfully unaware of and ignore), people are bothered by seeing any difference. The more of these automated testing suites we see and the more they get used, the more people are going to put pressure on Nikon about its autofocus system (Canon, too, probably, but they're not the focus of this story, pardon the pun). So here we have another consequence Nikon doesn't want, and one with an unknown outcome. Imagine what happens if someone compiles a database of these automated test results and it shows that Canon is plus or minus 5 on average and Nikon is plus or minus 10. Oh yeah, such a database will happen, believe me. Nikon had better hope that they win that battle, but it's their fault that such a database gets generated in the first place.
Another unintended consequence is spillover. That's compounded by the fact that the D7000 launch was also accompanied by a lot of "doesn't focus right" complaints. As I was writing this I got two emails with image samples, one from a D800 and one from another Nikon DSLR. Both showed some left/center difference, but not the level of difference I would expect to see from the misprogrammed sensor table. One looks like it could be a lens problem (miscentered or misaligned lenses can produce left/center/right differences, too). Again, this is the IAE at work. My guess is that Nikon has now opened all their equipment up to far closer scrutiny overall, and so two numbers will go up: their requests for returns for repair, and their customer dissatisfaction levels on surveys like those by JD Power.
Also consider this: until this problem became clear, the D800 was "the camera to buy." Now it's "the camera to test at the dealer before taking it home." Or maybe just "the camera to avoid for awhile." Ouch. Oh, and Nikon has some new cameras coming soon. Any bets on what the number one sales question will be on those? No, not "how many pixels does it have?" More like "Have they fixed the focus problem yet?"
Nikon's approach on dealing with the D800 focus issue is all wrong. That approach will create real and lasting consequences for the brand and other Nikon DSLRs they launch in the near term.
Personally, I understand how complex these products are and how many moving pieces all have to be executed perfectly. Every now and then you make a mistake. The real brand distinction is made in how you acknowledge and fix those mistakes. Leave any doubt in the customer's mind and you start knocking over the unintended consequence dominoes.
