GH3 Help! My GH3 won't turn on anymore...

S

Stab

Well-known member
Hi guys,

My GH3 won't turn on anymore. I have 3 batteries and I've used all of them. When I press the on/off switch nothing happens. No light comes on, just 'dead'. I've also tried removing the lens but makes no difference.

I bought i a little over 2 years ago so I guess waranty is out of the question.

Any thoughts, solutions that I could try myself?
And an important bonus question: Could this have been caused by inserting a cheaper off-brand (OTB) battery? This never happened before and it seems to have happened after I first inserted a replacement battery. It has the same 'name' (DMW-BLF19E) as the original batteries but uses 7.4v instead of 7.2v and 11.84Wh instead of 14Wh...

Could that have fried the insides of the camera? Otherwise it would have just happened out of nowhere...

Thanks!
 
Unless you are good with disassembling electronics and diagnosing them, it's time to send it in, and ask for a quote.
 
My GH3 stopped turning on when a screw holding the hotshoe in place fell out inside the body. It short-circuited the logic board, or whatever it's called in a camera. If I shook the camera around I could hear the screw rattling around inside. If your camera didn't bomb out as soon as you put in the other battery, then this could be your problem. I read that it wasn't too uncommon. I had to send it to the UK to get fixed and it ended up being quite expensive (if I remember correctly in the region of $400), so hopefully your problem is something else.

I recently opened up a GH4 and as long as you have nerves of steel, it's not too complex. If you have the inclination, then you could always open the cam up and see if there's anything loose inside.
 
Thanks Dotkomrade. Sorry to hear what happened to you.

Good news for me. I just called the shop where I bought the camera and even though my warranty expired (by just 6 weeks), they man said he will take care of it. They will send it in to Panasonic for repair and I won't be charged for the repair. So that's good news.

My hot-shoe is still in place though and I don't think a screw falling in is the problem.

I still wonder if it was the aftermarket battery. I have used the camera last week without any problem. This time when I turned it on for the first time, I had the OTB battery installed. It didn't turn on anymore after that.

Is that even possible? The OTB battery charged fine though and seems to be made specifically for the GH3, although the voltages / specs slightly differ...
 
That's great. We don't even have Panasonic cameras represented in South Africa, so nowhere to get things finxed or serviced. Hope your cam gets sorted :)
 
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