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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 :)

The SDI issues

Omar Saad said:
This x1000. I want to be respectful here. I love this company and have been a Red owner since the very beginning, but... I cannot believe that they are not going to address this one main glaring issue. I just hope they do so soon! I used the camera last week for the first time on a professional gig and it performed great. Yet I'd love (and would pay a premium for) a Red made monitor that connected using the pogo pins. Using the SDI is honestly freaking me out. I'm 99% sure that one time I'm going to screw up the sequence, as my thoughts are on a million other things when shooting.
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Absolutely. This is a very common problem. I just saw another post by someone with a blown SDI on the Komodo Uers FB group, and noted that Red repaired it for free as a "one time concession". I guess this means that if it dies a second time, you have to pay for shipping and repair costs?

EDIT: another person on the group says they were charged $440 even though they have both a warranty and an extended warranty.
 
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Brendan McCafferty on the Red Komodo Users FB group (from a couple months ago): "Currently all 3 of my ST Komodos are in for repair which is remarkable as we follow their procedures to a T. It seems that Red must address this with a recall / replacement board as this seems to be an egregious design flaw."

If it is possible for a guy who knows and follows the procedure to blow all 3 of his cameras SDI boards, then this is not to be taken lightly.
 
Robert Hofmeyr said:
Red told me you can hot swap BPs without following the procedure.
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How is this possible? When you hot-swap the battery you are essentially doing exactly what you do when you blow the SDI board. So why would it be any different than while using a single battery?


Robert Hofmeyr said:
EDIT: another person on the group says they were charged $440 even though they have both a warranty and an extended warranty.
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They should contact Red and demand it free of charge. Warranty and extended warranty is expensive, Red should not demand customers to pay for Red's own design flaw.

Robert Hofmeyr said:
Brendan McCafferty on the Red Komodo Users FB group (from a couple months ago): "Currently all 3 of my ST Komodos are in for repair which is remarkable as we follow their procedures to a T. It seems that Red must address this with a recall / replacement board as this seems to be an egregious design flaw."

If it is possible for a guy who knows and follows the procedure to blow all 3 of his cameras SDI boards, then this is not to be taken lightly.
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Getting tired of this. Red is not communicating, they have redirected all communications to a template-paper response on their support channels. I'm not sure what is going on, but the transparency and "open community" communication that was once present on this forum, addressing serious issues like this has been just silenced. It's like Red is putting their head in the sand and just tries to ignore this problem instead of working WITH US to find a solution.

If people follow procedures and still blow their boards, it is essentially RED's FAULT for making a bad design choice. We all know the SDI problems are industry-wide for all types of cameras, but that is not an answer to the problem, that's just acknowledging a problem without offering a solution. We essentially have a camera that has a major flaw and a high risk of damage for normal usage without any proper backup systems in place, all while Red hides behind their support page non-answers ignoring the problems people have and even charging people for fixing issues related to this thing, even though they actually follow Red's procedures and guides.

Seriously Red?


Solutions:

- Make a dedicated monitor that uses BP batteries. More business for Red, better reliability for us... win-win for all, just do it.
- Make a dedicated riser board with its own SDI board separate from the camera. As above, more business for Red, safer operation for users. Make it use other ports as well, such as HDMI and display port and you have a winner as long as it's not overpriced.


Tired of this silence from Red. It's ironic that they pride themselves with having a camera that can withstand fire and explosions and keep on rolling while the SDI board can almost be blown by breathing on it.

Red should stop everything that they're doing and just make a solution to this first. You don't just release something and ignore it, it's not fair to loyal customers to have to deal with faulty and unsafe gear like this. We spend thousands of dollars to build a system around this camera and we are even asking to spend more to make it safer to use. How long do we need to keep discussing this before any action is taken?
 
FWIW, there were valid choices made along the way in developing the Komodo platform that represent the kind of compromises inherent in engineering a sophisticated device. Now mix in some marketing and demographics... and don't forget the quest to fill out a product line.

Perhaps most directly to the point, selling a $6,000 camera with a $3,000 monitor seemed absurd. I'd imagine RED was even less interested in putting their name on a low cost monitor that fell short in performance, durability, etc. Since 12G SDI was likely in the design spec anyway, and smartphone based solutions so promising, would you have invested the NRE costs required to productize a low margin monitor for Komodo?

The reality is that 12G SDI is the only single cable UHD/4K option (other than HDMI, which is NOT robust enough for the use case) widely supported in our industry. Sadly, in its own way, 12G SDI really isn't robust enough for the use case either. Copper coax, 75Ω with BNC connectors has had a long run (pun extended) but even 3G can be finicky - let alone 12G.

As I noted in another post, its past time for IEEE, SMPTE, MPAA and the leading hardware vendors to propogate an interconnect topology that can reliably move at least 40G out of the gate and 80G down the road. I would assume optical signaling with metal connectors - but as long as it can physically hold up on busy sets, move >40G of data reliably and a 50' cable run is under $200 within a year of release - sign me up. If that's a non-starter, get ready for the consumer HDMI 2.1 spec to cross over into the pro space...

For the record, I am aware that we are on a fast track to a fully wireless world. That said, IMHO, the need for a clean signal from camera to a reference monitor (and/or scope) at the beginning of the signal chain via hardwire will be relevant for many years to come.

Cheers - #19
 
Christoffer Glans said:
(snip) Red should stop everything that they're doing and just make a solution to this first. You don't just release something and ignore it, it's not fair to loyal customers to have to deal with faulty and unsafe gear like this. We spend thousands of dollars to build a system around this camera and we are even asking to spend more to make it safer to use. How long do we need to keep discussing this before any action is taken?
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IMHO, the crux of the biscuit is the fundamentally flawed 12G SDI spec. It's easy to call out RED for choosing it, but what was the better option when they were finalizing the design for Komodo? What's the better option now? Should RED develop a proprietary connection standard that lacks widespread industry support? Would you prefer a 4 cable BNC snake? How about friction fit HDMI rated for less than 20 mating cycles?

With 20/20 hindsight, there's a good argument that RED should have started developing a pogo pin based, on camera monitor, for Komodo in 2019. Ironically, if they had, there would probably be a thread about it being too expensive...

Cheers - #19
 
Blair S. Paulsen said:
IMHO, the crux of the biscuit is the fundamentally flawed 12G SDI spec. It's easy to call out RED for choosing it, but what was the better option when they were finalizing the design for Komodo? What's the better option now? Should RED develop a proprietary connection standard that lacks widespread industry support? Would you prefer a 4 cable BNC snake? How about friction fit HDMI rated for less than 20 mating cycles?

With 20/20 hindsight, there's a good argument that RED should have started developing a pogo pin based, on camera monitor, for Komodo in 2019. Ironically, if they had, there would probably be a thread about it being too expensive...

Cheers - #19
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I would think the simplest solution would be to offer to downgrade the board to 3G-SDI. Many people are using isolators to protect the SDI, and most of these only transmit 1080p anyhow.
 
Robert Hofmeyr said:
I would think the simplest solution would be to offer to downgrade the board to 3G-SDI. Many people are using isolators to protect the SDI, and most of these only transmit 1080p anyhow.
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Plus make the link adapter more reasonably priced. $395 to get wired USB as a backup option if the SDI dies is a bit steep.
 
Blair S. Paulsen said:
IMHO, the crux of the biscuit is the fundamentally flawed 12G SDI spec. It's easy to call out RED for choosing it, but what was the better option when they were finalizing the design for Komodo? What's the better option now? Should RED develop a proprietary connection standard that lacks widespread industry support? Would you prefer a 4 cable BNC snake? How about friction fit HDMI rated for less than 20 mating cycles?

With 20/20 hindsight, there's a good argument that RED should have started developing a pogo pin based, on camera monitor, for Komodo in 2019. Ironically, if they had, there would probably be a thread about it being too expensive...

Cheers - #19
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Doesn't matter, Red had no backup option. The single most important thing is reliability and safety for production. SDI isn't the problem, it's that it's the ONLY way to have proper monitoring. It makes it problematic to use professionally. The solution is simply to give us a better option, something to use so we aren't forced to rely on the SDI as our only way of properly monitoring what we shoot. The Komodo Link is a fine backup option, but it's not enough as a primary monitoring setup.

The facts on the dangers of 12G were out there during development. They redesigned the antenna for wifi on the camera so even if they were late in design, they had time to make a proper backup solution, but they didn't. And every time someone said that they wanted a dedicated monitor, they just said it couldn't be done because the camera can't give enough power to the monitor... duh... make the monitor use BP batteries, end of story. I'd just say, just do it and stop the corporate marketing BS because that doesn't help the actual users of these cameras.

At the end of the day, I just don't care what the excuses are. We have a potential and risky problem, we need a solution, and Red is just silent. It's getting tiresome.

Been a long-time Red user, but I'm starting to lose patience. Red gear is expensive and lesser brands seem to keep their ear to the ground far more and change and communicate better while pushing prices down. How in the world will Red survive the new wave of cameras coming out if they can't even give us a solution to something like this? Seriously, why is this forum so dead with their feedback? They used to actually talk to us, keep us in the loop, hint at solutions and upcoming changes and stuff. Right now, I'm barely able to plan how to build my system because Red never clarifies anything surrounding this problem. I think it's time to check out soon. Times are changing and I'm not sure Red is the rebel it once were.
 
Christoffer Glans said:
At the end of the day, I just don't care what the excuses are. We have a potential and risky problem, we need a solution, and Red is just silent. It's getting tiresome.
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I have not seen anyone with their name coloured red on this board in a while - I fear we may be shouting into the void.

Looking at the number of posts about Komodos with dead SDI ports, I reckon a significant percentage fail in the first year. Red seems willing to at least sometimes replace the board under warranty (with a disclaimer saying this is a "one time concession"), but that will not help me if I find myself in the field with no proper monitoring solution. Wifi monitoring was touted as near realtime, but, in my experience it has been unusable. I've purchased an SDI isolator, but it is a very clunky solution and other people sometimes use my camera, so I can't guarantee it will always be used. I've also purchased a second Komodo as a backup in case the first goes down, so my Komodo kit cost way more than what I originally planned to spend - that'll teach Red :)

And for all those saying that this is just an inherent problem with 12G-SDI, I'm pretty sure that the quality of the electronics influences how easy it is to fry the board (you can buy 12G isolators, so surely one could have been incorporated into the design). And since there is only a single SDI output, this problem is far more serious on Komodo than on other cameras. I do think the SDI issue should have been addressed in some way by Red - at the very least they could have made sure all the Komodo users are aware of the issue so they can take precautions. Putting a note in the manual then only begrudgingly repairing broken cameras as one time concessions seems like a rather poor way to deal with the problem.
 
Michael Sutton--If Mutiny made a solution to this SDI problem that mounted underneath the camera and offered additional ports (5-pin Lemo for TC please) as well, I bet you'd sell them like hotcakes! (Save one for me please)!
 
Lowly BM Ursa Broadcast evf uses sdi signal bnc with power from AB brick or V mount and it never burns out sdi.
 
Robert Hofmeyr said:
I would think the simplest solution would be to offer to downgrade the board to 3G-SDI. Many people are using isolators to protect the SDI, and most of these only transmit 1080p anyhow.
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I would JUMP at this to have reliability and not risk a client or shoot day.
 
I had to get mine serviced by red. The good news was that turnaround was quick <10 calendar days (Including July 4th holiday). Is there any chance we'll get video over USB-C or a dedicated monitor for the pogo? Seems like the bandwidth is there but maybe the processor is too weak?
 
I recently got a Komodo, and so have been reading this thread.

Doesn't it all boil down to - "Disconnect BNC before changing batteries"? I think it's dumb, but not the end of the world.

Nick
 
Nick Gardner said:
I recently got a Komodo, and so have been reading this thread.

Doesn't it all boil down to - "Disconnect BNC before changing batteries"? I think it's dumb, but not the end of the world.

Nick
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That's pretty much it. But the issue is that if you (or someone else) are in a rush and slap a new battery onto your monitor without disconnecting you risk making your camera pretty much unusable. If you shoot in remote areas, this becomes even more critical.
 
George Nathanson said:
I had to get mine serviced by red. The good news was that turnaround was quick <10 calendar days (Including July 4th holiday). Is there any chance we'll get video over USB-C or a dedicated monitor for the pogo? Seems like the bandwidth is there but maybe the processor is too weak?
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Was it repaired under warranty? Did it happen when changing batteries or powering accessories with the SDI connected?
 
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