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|| SportsShooter.com: Member Message Board
Panasonics featureless firmware 'update'
Jeff Mills, Photographer, Photo Editor
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Columbus | OH | USA | Posted: 3:48 PM on 06.17.09 |
->> While I know using chipped ink carts has become pretty common place for the past few years, I'm really disapointed to see that Panasonic today came out with a firmware "update" thats only "fix" is to render 3rd party batteries unusable, in the intrest of consumer safety.
Now I'm a big fan of Panasonic compacts, having had a LX3 and now a ZS3, but the battery life on them is quite poor, in part due to the amazing 3" LCD's, best I've seen on any compacts. With such short battery life a spare (or two) is useful but Panasonics OEM prices are rather high, so 3rd party batteries for 1/3rd the cost were a welcome change.
Well now with the update, the cameras have the ability to better detect if its an OEM battery or not.
Now its at least nice they made clear what this firmware "update" does. I could only imagine how upset people would be if in addition to the normal fixs for metering modes, AF, additional language menus etc, they added this little feature.
Its a disturbing trend though and one I really hope the likes of Canon and Nikon don't follow with. I've been using 3rd party batteries since the original 1D and always with great success. They are 1/3rd the price and many of times offer even better performance.
Its certainly fair to deny a warranty claim if a non OEM part is used, but to start issuing firmwares that dont give the end user the choice I feel is wrong. |
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Chuck Steenburgh, Photographer
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Lexington | VA | USA | Posted: 11:16 PM on 06.17.09 |
| ->> Are you kidding? Nikon has done this for a while now. Not firmware updates, but successive models using the same batteries are made to be incompatible with 3rd party batteries. |
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