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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Bricked NEW EPICs (Quality Issue ?)

Of course, Chris. Send in (if you have not already), we confirm it is this issue, you get the warranty extension.
 
To be CLEAR,
after the failure of my EPIC-X # 6183, RED EUROPE was fast and accurate.
After repair they have checked the camera again, and the technician decided to replace it with a new EPIC (fully tested). The entire process in a single week..
(ITALY to UK -> UK to ITALY) GREAT SERVICE!
Now my EPIC-X #6272 works perfectly.
 
In April Epic #1650 "bricked" this year after 1 year of very moderate shooting (300 hours). After a month with some hassles I got it back from RED Europe. Since then it works as expected. The same happened to my RedOne 3 years ago. I had once "bricked" an Arri 435, before that an Arri 35III. A rented Sony F900r died in my arms, I had issues with F750, and my very trusty Arri SrII needed a surgery on the open heart to keep shooting (issues with the fuse). The only camera that never in its 10 years of life had the slightest hiccup is a Sony Z1 which still serves as a casting device well.

If your shoot goes down the drains because of a camera issues you will learn the hard way that camera bodies are hardware and all hardware fails some time. The question is: when? Hence, it makes sense in shoots that involve people with limited time to have a second body available. Ok. It is annoying to deal with the paperwork that is involved when a camera needs to go back home for repair. Its annoying and costly to rent while waiting to have the "bricked" camera resurrected. But you must expect to have it happen and a plan to deal with it.


I'm not sure wether there is a particular issue with a particular batch of Epics or wether Epics in general are prone to some hardware failure. I know for sure that technology on the edge is more prone to fail than proven mass-technology. We are in times where beta is the release build and Red has been spearheading this trend. I comfort myself with the statement of my favourite rental-house that their numerous Alexas have seen their place of birth not only once.

Lastly, I'm confident that Red is doing all to improve QC.

Hans
 
Had to send my EPIC off to RED about 6 weeks ago after it failed on a music video...turns out the camera malfunctioned due to some rough handling on set and an internal board got damaged.
3 Weeks ago my EPIC failed again, this time with a "Data integrity Error"....sent it off to RED again, explained that the camera was just with them 3 weeks ago....RED repaired it free of charge without me even having to ask.
As Hans said, these machines are hardware workhorses but also exceptionally complex, eventually something will fail and if the error is on RED's side, those boys will stand by their products and help you out !
I never dealt with any other company where the turnaround was as quick as with RED....I stopped using Sony products completely because Sony Germany stuffed me around years ago and I had to wait 7 weeks to get an item repaired. Maxtor made me wait 4 weeks for harddrive replacements....the list could go on.
 
Brent,

Thanks for joining the coverstation.

Brent@RED said:
Robin, we have put in new test procedures so boards are being pre-screened for this issue.

Others who just took delivery, I can understand your trepidation. I don't want the impression that the sky is falling, that is not the case. As I mentioned earlier, this issue has only happened in a relative handful of cameras. So, the risk is still very small of something happening even factoring that in.
Click to expand...
 
Brent@RED said:
Of course, Chris. Send in (if you have not already), we confirm it is this issue, you get the warranty extension.
Click to expand...

Mine died in June about a month after getting it (and just before a big shoot). How do we know if our case is one of the affected cases?
Red fixed it in 2 days. Awesome service as usual... just wish I didn't need to send it in.
 
Brent@RED said:
Antonio, you are 100% correct, I was waiting for more data to be able to address this in a more head on manner. The quality numbers did not show a statistically significant spike, but there was a small increase none the less. Taking a big deep dive with our engineering team utilizing information provided by customers who have experienced issues soon after receiving their cameras, we have isolated the cause to a small batch of bad boards from one of our suppliers.

The issue is very difficult to detect over the course of outbound testing as its rate of occurrence is very infrequent. Hence, would pass on our end and then have the issue in the field at some point soon after delivery. So, we have updated our test plans to account for this and are currently combing through existing inventory.

At RED, we know we are only as good as our weakest link. And this board fab issue is no exception. So, effective immediately, if this issue does hit you, please submit an RMA Request. If we get in your camera within 90 days of you taking delivery and confirm it is this issue, we will grant you one additional year of warranty coverage. When there is an issue, we want to make it right.
Click to expand...

This is good to hear Brent - reliability on set is the number one priority for me and confidence of clients. Not every production will pay for a spare body on set - then even though it may be possible to optain a spare body, it's easy to lose an hour or two of production while the new body is delivered and rigged.

I hope that every camera that has a board from that suspect batch is flagged in your database so that if one of those cameras starts dying and a tech support ticket is raised, your engineers will be aware of it and be on the look out for the symptoms.

By the way - is there a definitive list of symptoms of this fault? Just saying they are "bricked" doesn't give much detail of what to look for.

Thanks.
 
ericyoung said:
By the way - is there a definitive list of symptoms of this fault? Just saying they are "bricked" doesn't give much detail of what to look for.

Thanks.
Click to expand...

I'm also interested in this. Can you give us a list of known symptoms other than the camera being unusable?
 
Sometimes, at startup the touch display remain black but after the restart all was OK.
After 1 day on set… an error during recording (stop record ,message on screen, and strange glitch on monitor).
When I re-start the EPIC, the display show: "START UP ERROR.
 A serious error detected during startup. 
Please save log and send to RED SUPPORT".

Milano Questa said:
I'm also interested in this. Can you give us a list of known symptoms other than the camera being unusable?
Click to expand...
 
Chris Luker said:
Mine died in June about a month after getting it (and just before a big shoot). How do we know if our case is one of the affected cases?
Red fixed it in 2 days. Awesome service as usual... just wish I didn't need to send it in.
Click to expand...

Chris, contact the RMA team in indicated in my link. They can check repair log to confirm or deny for you.
 
as much as i like the idea of the extra warranty, i don't think this is the correct way to go about this....
we now know that there was a bad batch of boards, so there should be a way to find out which serial numbers were affected....and there should be a way to have these cameras looked at by red....a recall....if there is a problem, red fixes it, if not, problem solved, peace of mind....
i know some people hate car analogies but here it goes anyway: manufacturer X would not say: we know there is some bad parts out there, if you happen to crash into a tree because of it, we will fix the car for you and give you some extra warranty....
i am not sure why red should not be able to narrow down the serial numbers and call these cameras in for an extra check up or part replacement if there s doubt...so owners might be without their camera for a week or so but at least they should be able to trust it after that check up is completed....
 
I too had a bricked epic after scarlet swap and had to RMA. Repair took a week or so.
 
Hi guys,

I still remember when Brent had not charged me a penny for an out of warranty Red One in 2010 because
Camera was sent twice to Red for repairs for same problem....Rocket IO error....
That's Brent for you...and I became a permanent customer of RED....see my signature for more details..

Harcharan
 
I just had one of my Epics come up with: Data integrity Error - on a shoot today, on a 64GB card.

Lost the clip.

Shot some more on the mag, and it was fine. Then switched to the other body...

Never seen it before. Is this a problem?

Do I need to send the camera back to Red?
 
Ben, please contact RED support via RED.com. They can assist you. In the meantime, pull a log file, as I would expect them to ask to see it.
 
Brent, one day you have to teach me your mantra! Your calmness is admiring ;)
 
Or you probably got the little book of calm:


Imagine the ocean.... hehehe!
 
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