Man opens "$700" Nagra battery, finds $30 worth of batteries inside
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Darren Levine
Veteran
pretty typical actually, but even assuming upwards of $100 said and done for the various bits an pieces in there, that's a pretty serious markup. For that kind of cost and seeing that much empty space in there, i would actually expect them to have a redundant battery pack in there.
Recently, I had one of my smaller sized Bescor bricks go bad. This was a lead acid type battery and A replacement was worth about $100. I opened the wrapper and found a generic type battery and the exact same brand replacement priced out at below $20. The swap out was two blade connectors. Shipping was $27. Still less than half to replace.
FrameFarmMedia
Veteran
The moment something is deemed a 'professional' product the markup goes through the roof.
I feel like beyond just fixing things, it shouldn't be hard to even upgrade it. Another $30 and you've got twice that battery back, or have that acid type battery replaced by a lithium pack - saving weight and adding battery life.
Of course, recharging it will need to be fixed accordingly.
Of course, recharging it will need to be fixed accordingly.
Richard Crowley
Veteran
This whole discussion is ridiculous. You can go down to the Home Depot and buy a $20 cordless drill.
But if you need to buy a replacement battery pack, it is $50. And it probably has those same cells in it.
But if you need to buy a replacement battery pack, it is $50. And it probably has those same cells in it.
I have to support so many battery systems for my business, it is just stupid expensive over the course of a year. I believe most of the manufacturers who use a proprietary battery system view them as a huge profit center. Think ink and printer manufacturers. They make more long term profit on ink than they do selling the printer to begin with. That philosophy spawned the refillable cartridge business. There is an entirely recent retailer segment that sells specialty batteries on the net and in my experience, if carefully done, can be a good alternative to oem product at a fraction of the oem cost.
Grant
Grant
Noiz2
Sound Ninja
What I found curious was that the pack was obviously designed with replacing the batteries in mind, why on earth is Nagra not offering to "service" the packs? They could charge $100 with a warrantee and people would not blink an eye, or take the time to dissect the pack. Traditionally Nagras were very service friendly. Even the Nagra VI opens up so you have easy access to the guts. One would assume from that legacy that a lot of Nagra owners would open the packs up just too see before forking over $700 for a new pack. I know I would. Generally when I have what is inside is not nearly as friendly.
There is no doubt that repairs are a major profit center for any company. Repair centers better be making 60% or more margin or they are not doing their job. I worked for one company where the repair prices on items ranged from 30% to 110% of a new unit. Yes, one repair price was higher than a new unit.
There is nothing unique here to Nagra.
There is nothing unique here to Nagra.
Noiz2
Sound Ninja
The Nagra VI I hauled around did not have nice light battery packs. It's "brick" weight a number of pounds.
But this does beg the question of did the guy actually ask about repair or just what a new one would cost?
Carhartt is a big local company in my new home town. They make some amazingly durable coats and such. Anyway the pull on the zipper on my 4+ year old coat broke. I was going to do the usual of using a paperclip till someone said call them they support their goods. I did and they sent me the parts that slide up and down and told me how to replace them, no charge.
I have gotten so used to the disposable electronics mentality that I forgot that a lot of places actually will repair/ replace for quite awhile after you buy.
But this does beg the question of did the guy actually ask about repair or just what a new one would cost?
Carhartt is a big local company in my new home town. They make some amazingly durable coats and such. Anyway the pull on the zipper on my 4+ year old coat broke. I was going to do the usual of using a paperclip till someone said call them they support their goods. I did and they sent me the parts that slide up and down and told me how to replace them, no charge.
I have gotten so used to the disposable electronics mentality that I forgot that a lot of places actually will repair/ replace for quite awhile after you buy.
Mitch Gross
Veteran
Treading lightly into this conversation representing a manufacturer that does not sell its own proprietary battery pack...
Y'all have a lot of righteous indignation and believe that a faceless company is just sticking it to you, but that's not necessarily true. Nagra makes expensive pro gear, which means that it doesn't sell in large volumes. I have no idea how many of these recorders they have sold, but to put it in perspective Aaton was pretty proud that they shipped more than 500 of the original Cantar audio mixer/recorder. Yup, five hundred or so units.
That battery brick is a proprietary design, specific to that device. They can only ever sell so many of them. They need to design the housing, design the circuit board, source all of the parts, have a run of each of them made, have them CE & UL approved plus whatever other regulations are involved when dealing with making a Li-Ion device, and then sit on that inventory as they sell them slowly. That's a lot of sunken costs into what will be a very slow return. That housing costs the same to design whether you make 1 or 1,000,000. And it costs decidedly more to make each one the fewer you have made. I would venture to say that the battery cells are one of the lowest cost aspects of that particular brick.
I would absolutely bet that if asked, Nagra would have been more than happy to recall that battery brick. It is clearly manufactured in a way so that it can be serviced, which is not true of many battery designs. Many such devices are designed not to be opened or serviceable as it can be a distinct liability issue for the manufacturer, and in certain cases change the regulatory hurdles for the design & sale of the item (I don't know the specifics for this case). So Nagra clearly made this so that it could be easily serviced, at least by them.
Let's just say that Nagra made a few thousand of those battery bricks (figure every recorder would need at least two). The design and prototyping work would easily be more than $50K. Don't forget that they need to have test circuit board spun and stuffed, the metal is either bent, milled, stamped or molded, and there are usually at least a couple of prototypes built of anything to work out the kinks (and that's after CAD drawings and rapid proto printing). Then they have to have lots of these things made at the local machine shop and board stuffer, which means that they need to be scheduled into the job lots in runs of at least 50 units at a time because resetting the tooling is part of the cost and you need to gather all the parts & raw stock on a schedule and so forth. So they have to pay for a pile of these things at least 50, maybe 100 at a time. When you're making that few of anything you don't get much of a discount so the rates are close to retail.
And then they sit on the shelf until you can sell them, a big pile of equity that is not sitting in an interest-bearing account gaining value.
Given all of that, companies must calculate out a profitable price by which they can stay in business. There are mouths to feed at Nagra, taxes to be paid, retirement plans paid into, etc. The cost of that one little set of cells inside that device is infinitesimal compared to what it cost for Nagra to make the thing and have available to sell to its clients.
If Nagra knew it was going to sell 100,000 of these devices it would be a different story. First there would be dancing in the streets because they probably haven't sold that many recorders in their entire history, all models combined. But if they did then the costs of design could be applied over a far greater number of units sold. The manufacturing costs would be lower as the scale of product rose, and the sitting equity would not be sitting but instead flowing at a higher, more steady rate of return. If Nagra knew that in a three year period it would likely sell 100,000 of these battery bricks it would probably sell them for around $100 each.
But that's not going to happen. This business is tiny. So the price per item must be much higher. The parts have very little to do with it.
Y'all have a lot of righteous indignation and believe that a faceless company is just sticking it to you, but that's not necessarily true. Nagra makes expensive pro gear, which means that it doesn't sell in large volumes. I have no idea how many of these recorders they have sold, but to put it in perspective Aaton was pretty proud that they shipped more than 500 of the original Cantar audio mixer/recorder. Yup, five hundred or so units.
That battery brick is a proprietary design, specific to that device. They can only ever sell so many of them. They need to design the housing, design the circuit board, source all of the parts, have a run of each of them made, have them CE & UL approved plus whatever other regulations are involved when dealing with making a Li-Ion device, and then sit on that inventory as they sell them slowly. That's a lot of sunken costs into what will be a very slow return. That housing costs the same to design whether you make 1 or 1,000,000. And it costs decidedly more to make each one the fewer you have made. I would venture to say that the battery cells are one of the lowest cost aspects of that particular brick.
I would absolutely bet that if asked, Nagra would have been more than happy to recall that battery brick. It is clearly manufactured in a way so that it can be serviced, which is not true of many battery designs. Many such devices are designed not to be opened or serviceable as it can be a distinct liability issue for the manufacturer, and in certain cases change the regulatory hurdles for the design & sale of the item (I don't know the specifics for this case). So Nagra clearly made this so that it could be easily serviced, at least by them.
Let's just say that Nagra made a few thousand of those battery bricks (figure every recorder would need at least two). The design and prototyping work would easily be more than $50K. Don't forget that they need to have test circuit board spun and stuffed, the metal is either bent, milled, stamped or molded, and there are usually at least a couple of prototypes built of anything to work out the kinks (and that's after CAD drawings and rapid proto printing). Then they have to have lots of these things made at the local machine shop and board stuffer, which means that they need to be scheduled into the job lots in runs of at least 50 units at a time because resetting the tooling is part of the cost and you need to gather all the parts & raw stock on a schedule and so forth. So they have to pay for a pile of these things at least 50, maybe 100 at a time. When you're making that few of anything you don't get much of a discount so the rates are close to retail.
And then they sit on the shelf until you can sell them, a big pile of equity that is not sitting in an interest-bearing account gaining value.
Given all of that, companies must calculate out a profitable price by which they can stay in business. There are mouths to feed at Nagra, taxes to be paid, retirement plans paid into, etc. The cost of that one little set of cells inside that device is infinitesimal compared to what it cost for Nagra to make the thing and have available to sell to its clients.
If Nagra knew it was going to sell 100,000 of these devices it would be a different story. First there would be dancing in the streets because they probably haven't sold that many recorders in their entire history, all models combined. But if they did then the costs of design could be applied over a far greater number of units sold. The manufacturing costs would be lower as the scale of product rose, and the sitting equity would not be sitting but instead flowing at a higher, more steady rate of return. If Nagra knew that in a three year period it would likely sell 100,000 of these battery bricks it would probably sell them for around $100 each.
But that's not going to happen. This business is tiny. So the price per item must be much higher. The parts have very little to do with it.
Mitch, with all do respect, I think you are both right and wrong. And Convergent Designs Odyessy proves my point. Nagra chose to get into the battery business. And probably for all the reasons you mentioned, came up with a really expensive proprietary battery. And how does CD do it? They do their customers a favor and offer battery plates so a customer can use what they already have within reason. So which is better for the company, and which is better for the customer?
Grant
Grant
morgan_moore
Major Contributor
Im with Mitch on the complexity of production. Ive brought a couple of products to market and the cost is horrible.
BUT third party batteries are not so simple.. because you want super robust connections. Nagra is not in the business of losing takes because the power chord is janky it is in the business of delivering a good take every time.
I have a $1000 sony lavalier set up that I do not trust because the AA batts do not seat well. Would it be better for sony to charge $1200 and do it properly.. of course.
My Redbyte Decimator on my Steadicam has janky power.. again one consumer lead threatens takes on a multiple thousand $ rig.
In still photography I use 'pocket wizards' a great thing ruined by a 1/4 jack taking the signal.. and I have maybe $1500 of 'wizards'.. none of which I trust because of one little connector.
And when you are being paid to be there it completely ruins the vibe and your reputation to be fiddling with power supplies.. it makes you look amateur.
And I dont want to look amateur with $1000 lav set up or $1500 of light synch or $10000 of Steadicam
To some extent making robust housings is the place of the small manufacturer.. and these cost (mainly due to the small runs)
Look at the 'cage' market for cameras.. taking crappy built consumer cameras like canon DSLR and making them robust enough for use on set.. no-one complains about that.
BUT third party batteries are not so simple.. because you want super robust connections. Nagra is not in the business of losing takes because the power chord is janky it is in the business of delivering a good take every time.
I have a $1000 sony lavalier set up that I do not trust because the AA batts do not seat well. Would it be better for sony to charge $1200 and do it properly.. of course.
My Redbyte Decimator on my Steadicam has janky power.. again one consumer lead threatens takes on a multiple thousand $ rig.
In still photography I use 'pocket wizards' a great thing ruined by a 1/4 jack taking the signal.. and I have maybe $1500 of 'wizards'.. none of which I trust because of one little connector.
And when you are being paid to be there it completely ruins the vibe and your reputation to be fiddling with power supplies.. it makes you look amateur.
And I dont want to look amateur with $1000 lav set up or $1500 of light synch or $10000 of Steadicam
To some extent making robust housings is the place of the small manufacturer.. and these cost (mainly due to the small runs)
Look at the 'cage' market for cameras.. taking crappy built consumer cameras like canon DSLR and making them robust enough for use on set.. no-one complains about that.
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morgan_moore
Major Contributor
Totally Off Topic. One of the reasons I don't trust the 07q is because it is not robust enough..(a million dollars of amazing software reliant on a power input cable)
If it had a built in battery (like the BMC which is excellent with the onboard 'life saver') or an external one that mated with the robustness of the nagra I would be a lot closer to trusting it. CD need to slip a $30 battery inside!
S
If it had a built in battery (like the BMC which is excellent with the onboard 'life saver') or an external one that mated with the robustness of the nagra I would be a lot closer to trusting it. CD need to slip a $30 battery inside!
S
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IDX makes very reliable battery holders and sells very reliable batteries, maybe Nagra should have put an NP1 style holder on there and put the power supply inside the recorder to get the various voltages they need. That simple circuit board he says that is just a charger looks a lot more like a switching power supply used for multiple output voltages. If the recorder didn't need multiple voltages, I doubt they would have used the mating connector that they did, unless they did it for redundancy or high current.
Camera batteries are no different, we used to replace the cells in the Nimh AB batteries all the time vs. buying new batteries. But my bosses were cheap and made us just do individual cells so we were back in there within a month. Only ones that stayed good were the ones with complete pack replacements, complete pack was 1/4 the price of new and returned reliability to the battery.
Camera batteries are no different, we used to replace the cells in the Nimh AB batteries all the time vs. buying new batteries. But my bosses were cheap and made us just do individual cells so we were back in there within a month. Only ones that stayed good were the ones with complete pack replacements, complete pack was 1/4 the price of new and returned reliability to the battery.
Cedric Akins
Well-known member
ouch, that is a rip off.