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DSMC1 end of Repair

fernando Cordero

fernando Cordero

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Dear All,

I hope all is well!

I may have been out of the loop, but recently discovered that RED won't repair DSMC1 Cameras anymore.

Does this mean that we should stay away from buying Scarlet-x and Epic Dragons at all costs?

For all the owners that do own DSMC1 Epic Dragons; and are in need of repair- are they out of luck?

I just want to be brought up to speed on this topic. Please let me know-

Thank you!

Fernando-
 
fernando Cordero said:
Dear All,

I hope all is well!

I may have been out of the loop, but recently discovered that RED won't repair DSMC1 Cameras anymore.

Does this mean that we should stay away from buying Scarlet-x and Epic Dragons at all costs?

For all the owners that do own DSMC1 Epic Dragons; and are in need of repair- are they out of luck?

I just want to be brought up to speed on this topic. Please let me know-

Thank you!

Fernando-
Click to expand...

There is a guy who repairs DSMC1's in the USA. He will most likely comment here. It is possible to make repairs but only by trying bits from other faulty units. Basically it is a swap in / swap out situation and maybe some clever circuit-board-fixing techniques.

You are in luck, as long as it is only minor. Otherwise, you might have to buy a whole 2nd hand unit.

I have 2 DSMC1 bodies and, so far so good, they are in good operation.

You can find really good deals on DSMC1 cameras with full kits that are totally worth it. That is, however, my opinion here. Others will further the debate.

Cheers.
 
Having a spare of everything seems to be a good plan. I have an old Scarlet-X that I bought new almost 10yrs ago. Picked up a spare Scarlet-X kit last year for a 1/4 of the new cost. Both are working fine currently except for the side-handle buttons that don't work on either now. I even have a 3rd side-handle, but it doesn't work either. I alternate shooting with them on projects. Also super helpful for 2-camera shoots, but then you need more glass and a 2nd OP most times.
 
I just sunk several thousand dollars into a Scarlet MX kit that had under 96hrs on the body at the point of sale. I'd say its def worth the price they are at now, great and cheap(er) way to get into the world of RED without fully breaking the bank. They are great cameras
 
I agree with everything commented above.

I've bought my Scarlet MX here in 2017 I guess, it had something like 500 hours on it, and have made another 1500 hours till today. Everything functioning flawlessly, not a single redmag died on me. It's just the V-Mount batteries that being re-packed, and accessories that change over time.

Had to open my Scarlet MX at the local camera service at the moment to troubleshoot another Epic M that I've purchased a couple month ago. Tech said that my Scarlet is like a baby, fresh and mint.

Otherwise, I was not as lucky with Epic. It had some short circuits on the boards, general cooling issues due to the previous owner hands out from the ass (he has changed thermopaste for some unobvious reason). Also the camera was hit by a splash of salt water. Thus, I have some chips to be changed (lucky enough some generic ones, not Red specific), and hope for a working camera in some days.

Probably I'll make a post for things to look at when you're buying a used DSMC1 body nowadays.
 
This is why I abandoned any ideas about getting a DSMC1. Stuff is just getting too far towards 8K and with cameras like the Blackmagic Pocket 6K out there for the meantime, it just makes more sense to move on. Now, I would have considered a used Epic-W Helium 8K but I’ve only ever heard problems about sensor issues and that’s discontinued as well too so for the money there’s the Blackmagic Ursa 12K and now a Sony Alpha 1 for stable 8K and word is that more 8K cameras are on the way, including more video/digital cinema cameras.

If I had the money, of course I would consider another RED camera as our RED One MX was (and still is) fantastic but we have to stay realistic with our next camera choice as it’s going to have to be 8K at minimum and with more mirrorless cameras getting RAW/Prores RAW/BRAW support that’s actually really good and increasing the viability of those cameras, it’s coming to a point where the industry will have to start accepting more cameras on their lists of approved cameras.

If there were a change for RED to implement on DSMC3, it should be to use more common parts in their design and extend support farther than they ever have so we don’t have so much viability overlap between RED camera generations.
 
It's disappointing that RED EOL'ed these cameras prematurely, in my opinion. I just had one of my genius friends pull mine apart and clean it for me and give it a fan adjustment. Just tested it tonight, and it's working great, but it was pretty nerve-wracking when I thought I had a very expensive doorstop on my hands. The upgrade path was not a very appealing deal, and forcing owners who paid a lot of money for these EPIC-M cameras onto the upgrade path, or else....wasn't very a very customer-service oriented move, considering the price of the camera and its delayed delivery.
b
I'm grateful to my friend for resurrecting it but not terribly happy with RED that their response was to invite me to upgrade. I didn't want to pay thousands and thousands of dollars on an upgrade, I wanted my EPIC-M to work. And now it does, but no thanks to RED.
 
Anyone who's had experience getting a DSMC1 model repaired through a third party - can you link me to who to talk to? Im based in Australia but can ship to the US if someone is confident they can repair my cam for a decent price.
 
There is a risk in having multiple copies of an ageing camera type for purpose of eventually making one out of several when something breaks. It may be an achilles-heel component which dies in all of them.
 
I have a 2011 Scarlet MX and the fact that it is not repairable by RED is not a knock for me. I mix it in with Komodo, Helium and Monstro just fine. When it finally quits I will buy another newer camera, but not before. Camera companies buy components. They build cameras from those components. Those components are only available as long at the manufacturer makes them. That's it. Try finding an RCA 6L6 vacuum tube if you need one. RCA does not make them anymore. Sony introduced the F3 in 2010 and discontinued it in 2012. You might be able to get one repaired, but I doubt it. A Scarlet MX shoots compressed raw. Still. .r3d! Newer color science means it is better now than when it was new. I don't see how there is anything to complain about, but that's just me..... YMMV.
 
That's a pretty weak comparison, considering you can run out and buy a brand new 6L6 vacuum tube at a reasonable price. It's a lot easier to buy a vacuum tube released in 1936 than it is to repair a DSMC1...maybe choose your analogies more carefully.

https://www.thetubestore.com/power-tubes/6l6-5881-tube-types

I disagree that a perfectly relevant camera deliver in 2017 should wind up in a landfill in 2021 because basic maintenance and simple repairs are unavailable. My EPIC M is up and running again thanks to my friend, and I could not be happier, but I'm kind of stunned that RED is ready to punt all of these cameras to the landfill. What a waste.
 
Meryem's right. It's just a shame that these still wonderful cameras aren't serviced anymore. They're still delivering beautiful pictures. Do you remember Red's Obsolescence Obsolet, folks ?

By the way, we have a smashed 4,7" Red LCD with a broken glass, is there a place where this could be fixed for less than the cost of a new one ? Several people on this forum seem to be in the same case and didn't find anything except Red.
 
Literally, EOL of DSMC1 with a response of "we don't have parts", while there's a trade-in upgrade program still going and there's lots of camera brains are being bought-out by Red themself is silly.

Also, after the experience with a drowned Epic-M repair at local shop, I kinda have to tell you - every single chip on most of the boards inside DSMC1 can be easily found online, except for the genuine boards (chips on boards to be exact) made for RED exclusively (there's only 3 of them in the Epic M - the sensor board, the RGB board, the IO board). And even on those boards there's plenty of parts that could be found online.

The local shop has managed to repair - the Side SSD board (analog to digital sound converter was in a short circuit after someone put a sync device into the earphones jack with a phantom power turned on both inside a camera and on the device). Chip was replaced with a new one - working flawlessly after.

The SDI/HDMI board also was repaired, and the side-ssd module board was also repaired (the top fan connector was damaged on the board).

Also the water damage to the contacts on the PCBs was minimised.

So, is it non-repairable? I highly doubt it after seeing how non-complicated the repair was. It's a totally marketing decision to push everyone into DSMC2, which is maybe ok for a company, but has vastly turned me out of RED camp (I bought my first Red Scarlet MX and a week later RED announced DSMC1 EOL).
 
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Meryem Ersoz said:
That's a pretty weak comparison, considering you can run out and buy a brand new 6L6 vacuum tube at a reasonable price. It's a lot easier to buy a vacuum tube released in 1936 than it is to repair a DSMC1...maybe choose your analogies more carefully.

https://www.thetubestore.com/power-tubes/6l6-5881-tube-types

I disagree that a perfectly relevant camera deliver in 2017 should wind up in a landfill in 2021 because basic maintenance and simple repairs are unavailable. My EPIC M is up and running again thanks to my friend, and I could not be happier, but I'm kind of stunned that RED is ready to punt all of these cameras to the landfill. What a waste.
Click to expand...

My analogy is just fine. I said RCA. You cannot run out and buy an RCA vacuum tube. The reason? They don't make them anymore. They do make clones in China and Russia but they are knock offs, not RCA. This is no different than Zeiss no longer being able to make T1.3 Super Speeds. Turns out radioactivity isn't healthy. You could argue that RED should have bought more parts to future proof their ability to repair their older cameras. But they apparently didn't. Or, as Alex points out, if the parts are available, they could continue to repair in some way, but they don't. So here we are. RED is a very small company, started by a billionaire who didn't need to make money at the time, but maybe they do need to make money now? Buy a Sony I guess?...which EOL'd the F3 only two years after it was introduced. What I know is that I bought a used Scarlet-MX in 2013. And you know what? It bricked about two weeks after I got it. I sent it back to RED (no warranty at all) and they fixed a bad board, upgraded two others, fixed a broken audio jack that I didn't know about, set the clock back to zero and overnighted it back to me, for free. Your mileage may vary.
 
I've owned 8 iterations of RED cameras since 2007 and owned a reservation in the very first round. The level of customer service you received in 2013, when RED would go to bat for their cameras and their customers is simply not the level of customer service you will receive today. Of course companies change and evolve, and so do customers. It's just too bad that my brand commitment is no longer matched by a similar customer commitment anymore. It makes RED just another camera company. If your Monstro is bricked in 2025 because you can't get basic maintenance on it, then no complaining, right? Because that's the analogy we should really be comparing - one top of the line camera to another, and its eventual trip to the landfill if it is abandoned. Shoot fast, life is short.
 
Can we confirm that DSMC1 is truly EOL now?

Last thing I heard was that they were winding down support and not stocking older parts. So if something went bust on your DSMC1 and the part wasn't in stock then the camera is out of luck.

Is it across the board now? Any damage or faults with a DSMC1 have no chance of repair from RED?
 
Josef Gatti said:
Can we confirm that DSMC1 is truly EOL now?

Last thing I heard was that they were winding down support and not stocking older parts. So if something went bust on your DSMC1 and the part wasn't in stock then the camera is out of luck.

Is it across the board now? Any damage or faults with a DSMC1 have no chance of repair from RED?
Click to expand...

I've contacted RED a month after the announcement - I've had a small bite on my 5.0 Touch. Short answer was - we don't service DSMC1 anymore. I've heard and read lots of similar replies all over the forum. The only category they were worried about was dsmc1 Dragon, because it was way younger than MX on the date of the EOL announcement.

Also I think there's a differenciation if you're a direct RED customer or you have a second-hand brain, no matter registered or not.

But, it's not as hard to repair the cam at the local shop as you might think. I've managed to make a working one out of a piece of garbage, literally. The cams are really built like tanks, thus if the brain wasn't drowned or overheated - it'll live long. SDI/HDMI/SOUND boards are quite easy to repair, but the sensor, RGB board and the IOB boards have plenty of RED genuine parts and in most occasions are non-repairable, it's a direct board swap or sometimes it's cheaper to buy a new brain.
 
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What would be awesome if RED released a self repair manual of the camera; breaking down the layers of the camera and showing a schematic system of where, what, why, how and when to fix if need. I feel that could help soothe the DSMC1ers out there. If there is a straightforward way to decomplexify it all, it could be a fantastic solution of the so called "dead-end" or "EOL" for the users.
 
Thanks Alex that's super helpful. Unfortunately my insurer wouldn't accept a repair bill from an uncertified party. And my DSMC1 Dragon is still making great images, I much prefer it over Helium tbh. Pretty sneaky of RED to abandon DSMC1.

Kristin Stewart said:
Do you remember Red's Obsolescence Obsolet, folks ?
Click to expand...

Sure do. Was a great bit of marketing in hindsight
 
PatrickWebb said:
What would be awesome if RED released a self repair manual of the camera; breaking down the layers of the camera and showing a schematic system of where, what, why, how and when to fix if need. I feel that could help soothe the DSMC1ers out there. If there is a straightforward way to decomplexify it all, it could be a fantastic solution of the so called "dead-end" or "EOL" for the users.
Click to expand...

That's a good idea....

mine turned out to need a good cleaning and to have its fan reseated, and it's purring like a kitten. That's it. It still amazes me that I could not get something so simple done. I would have paid for an out-of-warranty repair. I guess it was cheaper to EOL it than to fix these....
 
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