C100: Small HD: Positive Customer Service Experience with my DP4 & DP6

nedcam

nedcam

Well-known member
I just wanted to jump off Erik Naso's thread of 2/27/14. I sent in my two monitors due to flickering and assumed it was the female HDMI ports and/or the female power port. They ran their diagnostics and from the 3 HDMI cables I sent to be tested one was bad. My cable from the Gold Mount to the DPs was bad. Their service was fast and efficient.

So in sum nothing was wrong with their monitors, just my cables. And they didn't charge me!
 
nedcam said:
I just wanted to jump off Erik Naso's thread of 2/27/14. I sent in my two monitors due to flickering and assumed it was the female HDMI ports and/or the female power port. They ran their diagnostics and from the 3 HDMI cables I sent to be tested one was bad. My cable from the Gold Mount to the DPs was bad. Their service was fast and efficient.

So in sum nothing was wrong with their monitors, just my cables. And they didn't charge me!
Click to expand...
Encouraging to hear. Thanks for sharing.
 
I had to send back my SmallHD AC7 because the HDMI stopped working. They were, however, great to deal with and I had my monitor back in no time. No charge for repair seeing it was under warranty. Their great.
 
Here's what I figure out about HDMI cables, I have used several brands:

I don't think the point where the cable goes into the connector is built tough enough on these cables. The twisting and torquing we do in production, just handling the camera, tilting the monitor, etc. seems to create the problem. I mainly use my thinnest HDMI which is the black one from the Apple Store, but that's not meant for the abuse of production. So, I plan to buy this from SmallHD, it seems to be the solution for our problems. It will stop us from assuming the problem is the female HDMI ports on our DP4s & DP6s:

http://store.smallhd.com/Store/DP4-Monitor-Accessories/DP4-HDMI-Port-Lock
 
I've said it many times, they are great to deal with and really care about their customers and what we need.

As far as HDMI goes, it was never intended for TV field production use, it's overly complicated, overly expensive, delicate and doesn't lock in place(at least usually not without some type of add-on that takes up space and time using it). I understand why they are there now, but I wish they would go away on professional gear. They are taking up space on the chassis of pro gear that could be used for more SDI connections. I would MUCH rather have, and be much better served, with another SDI on my C300 than an HDMI. I don't even really like it on my home gear. I've had cables fail that are never touched, but I can't think of more than one or(MAYBE) two BNC cables of mine that have failed in 17 years or so.
 
Run&Gun said:
I've said it many times, they are great to deal with and really care about their customers and what we need.

As far as HDMI goes, it was never intended for TV field production use, it's overly complicated, overly expensive, delicate and doesn't lock in place(at least usually not without some type of add-on that takes up space and time using it). I understand why they are there now, but I wish they would go away on professional gear. They are taking up space on the chassis of pro gear that could be used for more SDI connections. I would MUCH rather have, and be much better served, with another SDI on my C300 than an HDMI. I don't even really like it on my home gear. I've had cables fail that are never touched, but I can't think of more than one or(MAYBE) two BNC cables of mine that have failed in 17 years or so.
Click to expand...
Can I get a AMEN!

+1
 
But wait... the manufacturers put HDMi on the professional camera gear so it must be right. Right? ;)
 
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