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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 :)

NEW Firmware scare!!

Glen Powell said:
I'm sorry for what happened to Jay and his Epic - But - I tend to look at the situation from a slightly different perspective: Perhaps the beta firmware, and Jay's problem are unrelated? Maybe his cam would have cooked no matter what because of some other unknown problem? Before this becomes some blown out of all internet proportion 'issue' that we hear about ad-nauseum at the rental house / on set / from people who don't even own the cameras - we should take a breath and wait and see what RED tells Jay the problem is.

I'm using the Beta build, and I'm half way through the 4th shoot day on it - no trouble, nor am I worried.
Click to expand...


I can already see the phone game at work here from people that don't even own the cameras --

"hey did you hear what happened to jay's camera while performing a BETA firmware upgrade?"
"what? Jim's camera broke while upgrading? "
"I knew that Dragon was trouble"
"yea Jim Jannard said that it got so hot smoke came out it, like a fire breathing dragon !"
"the fire department had to be called out just to put out the flames"
"i heard the unions are going to ban REDs on sets because they are a fire hazard "
"yea 6K is way too dangerous for mere mortals to be able to handle"
 
I had the same thing happen to an epic in the early release days and RED support sorted me out immediately...hope all goes smooth for ya. This seems like an isolated incident.
 
One note on this, I wouldn't have a camera, any camera, plugged into an AC source with out hardcore surge protection. Particularly in the film world where there a big lights, genny's and all manner of other things to screw with clean power. The best way to avoid frying a camera is to never run it off of anything other than batteries. I know the younger generation sees no harm in it, but electricity is seldom as clean as you think.

Nick
 
I almost had the same thing just happen to me.

I installed the 5.x upgrade and was playing around with the new menus/setting etc and happened to read this thread. Then realized my camera was very quiet so I shut it down and tried to power up. No such luck, it just stayed on a black screen. It didn't feel very hot because it was only powered up for about 5min (probably with no fan running).

I took another RedMag and reloaded the 4.x firmware onto it and luckily the old firmware was able to reboot and get the camera back up and running. Fans kicked in and things were OK.

Then I reloaded the new 5.x firmware again with no problems and noticed again the fan was not running at all. I immediately went to the fan control and switched from adaptive to auto. Fans kicked back in and went on full blast. So I'm guessing the adaptive fan setting (which is the 5.x default) is not engaging the fan in time or correctly.

***** If you upgrade to this 5.x firmware be sure to check your fan settings and make sure your fans are engaging. If your camera is very quiet go to your fan settings and change from adaptive to auto. Or I can imagine other people will have this same problem and maybe overheat.

Hope this helps save some problems for other people
 
Last edited:
With your tips Jan, is it safe to go ahead with this beta?
 
same here,
almost fried my sensor,
installed 5.1.14 started the camera and it's quiet, it took me 60-90 seconds to realize that fan is not just quiet, but it's off , get to the fan menu and switch from adaptive to auto, then the fan went on, but by that time i could smell that very distinctive odor of dust on a hot surface;
no more betas.
 
Im good, I will wait to see what RED team comes up with.
 
Jan Schuster said:
I almost had the same thing just happen to me.

I installed the 5.x upgrade and was playing around with the new menus/setting etc and happened to read this thread. Then realized my camera was very quiet so I shut it down and tried to power up. No such luck, it just stayed on a black screen. It didn't feel very hot because it was only powered up for about 5min (probably with no fan running).

I took another RedMag and reloaded the 4.x firmware onto it and luckily the old firmware was able to reboot and get the camera back up and running. Fans kicked in and things were OK.

Then I reloaded the new 5.x firmware again with no problems and noticed again the fan was not running at all. I immediately went to the fan control and switched from adaptive to auto. Fans kicked back in and went on full blast. So I'm guessing the adaptive fan setting (which is the 5.x default) is not engaging the fan in time or correctly.

***** If you upgrade to this 5.x firmware be sure to check your fan settings and make sure your fans are engaging. If your camera is very quiet go to your fan settings and change from adaptive to auto. Or I can imagine other people will have this same problem and maybe overheat.

Hope this helps save some problems for other people
Click to expand...


The thing is :
in adaptive mode you set a goal temperature for the core and the camera will try to keep it at this exact setting and modulate the fan so temperature stays constant for better low noise images (if you did a blackshade at the same core temperature).

So, with that mode enabled by default at 65 degrees :
The camera should blow on boot then quickly put the fan off (ou super low ?) until the required temperature is reached.
I think it is just normal to have a silent camera for several minutes when you do a cold start (just watch the temp rising)

This is imo not directly related to Jay's issue (maybe it is the sleep mode or something completely different).

The new adaptive fan will make the camera much more silent and keep a very low image noise. Good for the eye ad the ears :-)
While many may rightfully dislike the non constant fan speed (for audio recording / denoting) it also does offer several real advantages.
 
I can understand why adaptive is a good thing. Just seemed that the Adaptive fan setting wasn't working and potentially causing the overheating issue. Jay had his overheat possibly because of sleep mode and after 5 minutes my fan didn't turn on at all and then wouldn't start up again. After turning the fan to auto things were all good. I'm sure this will be fixed but for now it seems like the default Adaptive setting isn't working as planned (or maybe it is I don't know).

The new rack focus feature is great. if your on a tripod you can set keys for up to 4 focus points (for autofocus lenses) and easily switch between each focus point with a simple custom button layout. I can see it working great for some situations. New menu layout and quick links to advanced settings is a real plus. Will be a sweet update when the little issues get resolved.

Mikael Lubtchansky said:
The thing is :
in adaptive mode you set a goal temperature for the core and the camera will try to keep it at this exact setting and modulate the fan so temperature stays constant for better low noise images (if you did a blackshade at the same core temperature).

So, with that mode enabled by default at 65 degrees :
The camera should blow on boot then quickly put the fan off (ou super low ?) until the required temperature is reached.
I think it is just normal to have a silent camera for several minutes when you do a cold start (just watch the temp rising)

This is imo not directly related to Jay's issue (maybe it is the sleep mode or something completely different).

The new adaptive fan will make the camera much more silent and keep a very low image noise. Good for the eye ad the ears :-)
While many may rightfully dislike the non constant fan speed (for audio recording / denoting) it also does offer several real advantages.
Click to expand...
 
Jan Schuster said:
After turning the fan to auto things were all good. I'm sure this will be fixed but for now it seems like the default Adaptive setting isn't working as planned (or maybe it is I don't know).
Click to expand...

Since default is 65, it would be interesting if you SAW higher temp right before switching to auto. Then you could say Adaptive isn't working as planned. But I imagine in the rush you didn't observed display, correct?
 
The current default fan mode in 5.1.14 beta is 'Adaptive' with a target core temperature of 65. Under normal operation, the fans will start slowly and begin to pick up speed as the core temperature approaches the target temperature. 'Auto' and "Quiet Preview and Record' are also available as fan control options.


We take all of these comments very seriously. So far, we have not been able to reproduce Jay's original issue, but are still actively investigating possible causes.


If you are having any issues, or think you may be having issues, please contact support send us a log file from your camera.
 
Ok guys I'm back with my Scarlet and tried it out.

Firing it up: no fan noise what so ever. Total silence.
Fans came up at around 64 degrees. Very silent, but on. Temperature didn't rise above 65 afterwards. Fans became louder the longer it was on.

What I haven't tried is "not monitoring it" as in: put the camera to sleep and see what happens. I might try that too just to make sure.
I didn't time the duration until fans kicked in but it must have been around 10-15 min. So I'd put it to sleep when it's cooled down and see what happens after that time.

I had similar symptoms happen to my Scarlet about 3-4 weeks ago. Totally unrelated to firmware updates. Camera just froze during a take and never recovered. A board had to be exchanged.

EDIT: removed the part about the title of the thread. Even though this could be blown out of proportion, it might remind people that a beta is still a beta. After all it's Jay's or RED's decision :)
 
I personally like the title as is. Held me back from upgrading, which is as it should be for me.
 
I dont know if it was the right thing to do, but after the firmware update, and hearing no fan noise at all, i decided to set the adaptative temp to 50 degrees.
Waited about 10 minutes, the camera warmed up, and i did a black shade calibration.
Works great, not too hot.
The fan kicks in slowly keeping everything at 50 degrees.

I felt the 65 degrees setting was too hot holding the camera.

Does it make sense ?

Antoine
 
Antoine Fabi said:
I dont know if it was the right thing to do, but after the firmware update, and hearing no fan noise at all, i decided to set the adaptative temp to 50 degrees.
Waited about 10 minutes, the camera warmed up, and i did a black shade calibration.
Works great, not too hot.
The fan kicks in slowly keeping everything at 50 degrees.

I felt the 65 degrees setting was too hot holding the camera.

Does it make sense ?

Antoine
Click to expand...

I set my temperature in the "Adaptive" mode to 60. Just sort of a precautionary thing. Seems to work just fine.
 
this seems more of a sleep power saving issue....

as in you put the camera into power save/ sleep mode and the fans were somehow disabled....this doesn't really surprise me


I no longer use the power saving options, because quite often...the camera would loose all touchscreen functions upon wakeup...requiring a reboot..
seemed a little glitchy

Not sure if anybody else had this yet,....
 
Antoine Fabi said:
I dont know if it was the right thing to do, but after the firmware update, and hearing no fan noise at all, i decided to set the adaptative temp to 50 degrees.
Waited about 10 minutes, the camera warmed up, and i did a black shade calibration.
Works great, not too hot.
The fan kicks in slowly keeping everything at 50 degrees.

I felt the 65 degrees setting was too hot holding the camera.

Does it make sense ?

Antoine
Click to expand...

Targeting adaptive at a lower temperature will lower the core temperature, raise the fan speed and shorten the warm up time. Targeting adaptive at a higher temperature will raise raise the core temperature, lower the fan speed and lengthen the warm up time.


With Dragon, the current sweet spot to produce it's best image quality, warm up-time and fan speed is around 65.


In all cases you will get the best image quality performance if you black shade at the camera's stable temperature.
 
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