Nikon D610 discussion

spraynpray

... People want the newer bodies for higher clean ISO and more dynamic range. My suggestion is the D600 has sufficient megapixels, sufficient clean high ISO and sufficient dynamic range to be fully usable for the next decade. So if you are not getting the spots you can keep shooting your D600 for a decade and not worry about its price drop this year because a D610 is released or next year or the year after, etc. By the time a D600 is no longer worth shooting neither will be a D610. They will become obsolete at the same time because they are essentially the same camera. The price drop of a tool is not really relevant as long as you are still using that tool and not selling it.

I own one of the 'offending' D600's (presumably repaired) but completely agree with the sentiment above. Thanks Donald for posting. With that in mind I intend to return my attention to enjoying the art and craft of photography.

Hah! A novel idea, but it will never catch on... :P

donaldejose

BigDog: me too!

Photobug

Are we going to have to wait until the end of the year for the official announcement from Nikon? Believe I saw a rumor that it won't be available until some trade show in January.

Msmoto, do you have any further insight on when the D610 will be released?

MikeGunter

Hi all,

The most damning evidence that the D600 is junk is, if the D610 has generally the same specifications, it isn't an update or refresh, but a 'fix' of a defected model.

How else can one read that? The black body is a different shade of black?

My best,

Mike

Ironheart

LOL! @MikeGunter you nailed it. The main difference is the D610 will come in red and that turd brown that the D5200 comes in. Market research has shown these additional colors will boost sales by exactly the same amount that the dust/oil tanked them, so no need to actually fix the shutter. The same market research has indicated that the first full frame camera available in pink will be a sales leader as well, but they are holding off for the holiday season before releasing. Keep tuned for more rumors ;-)

Msmoto

@Photobug

Trust me, in regards the D610 I am clueless..... I think Mike G got it right. If the D610 is essentially the same as the D600, this is Nikon's way of admitting the D600 is to be avoided.

One of the issues for the vast majority of folks who will purchase a D610 is they will most likely have no idea of the problems with the D600. It is only a few of us who are the 'photo geeks' who are fully aware of the problems.

My guess, and purely a guess, is Nikon would want to get the D610 out before the Holiday Season so as to avoid more D600 problems and offer a 'new' body for gifts....to others or oneself...LOL

My suspicions are we will be seeing refurbished D600's next year, guessing again about June 2014, at near the $1,000 mark once the D610 is released. And, at that price, this could be an excellent buy provided one is able to clean their own sensor. If I purchased one I would most likely shoot about 5,000 frames of the floor, examine the image, wet clean the sensor and then shoot another 100 or so so as to see if garbage was still accumulating. If the it were accumulating after 5,000 clicks, I would return it under the 30 day warranty. If the spots were not accumulating I would have a nice body at a good price. But, I recognize the testing is not for everyone and those who are reluctant to clean their own sensor may not want to do this.

sevencrossing

One of the issues for the vast majority of folks who will purchase a D610 is they will most likely have no idea of the problems with the D600..

I suspect this is also true of a lot of D600 owners as well
Have I missed something? Do we the full spec of the D610 yet ?

spraynpray

I heard for sure there is a huge upgrade coming - to the model number badge. It will now say D610! WOW! )

Elvishefer

I heard for sure there is a huge upgrade coming - to the model number badge. It will now say D610! WOW! )

Don't be ridiculous.

That's TEN upgrades!

Elvishefer

Seeking a community to learn from and grow with, virtual or otherwise, is never a waste of time.

Posting instead of shooting? Definitely.

Photobug

Msmoto said: My suspicions are we will be seeing refurbished D600's next year, guessing again about June 2014, at near the $1,000 mark once the D610 is released. And, at that price, this could be an excellent buy provided one is able to clean their own sensor. If I purchased one I would most likely shoot about 5,000 frames of the floor, examine the image, wet clean the sensor and then shoot another 100 or so so as to see if garbage was still accumulating. If the it were accumulating after 5,000 clicks, I would return it under the 30 day warranty. If the spots were not accumulating I would have a nice body at a good price. But, I recognize the testing is not for everyone and those who are reluctant to clean their own sensor may not want to do this.

That would be a terrific deal, a refurbished D600 under the $1,000 mark. Especially if the dust and oil issue was resolved. Like your approach for testing if the D600 to see if the dust issue had been resolved. If the camera was fine after this testing that would be a really good deal.

catfish

I wonder if Nikon will extend the warranty for the D600 users, as long as the problem with it is dust and oil? We are quickly coming up on the 1 year anniversary of the D600 I know it was announced in September so it probably first shipped in October (4-6 weeks after announcement) I sure hope they will continue to honor those cameras that still have the contamination issue.

astrodonkey

Not sure if this adds much to the discussion, but last week I did bite the bullet and order a D600 from Adorama. I did not opt for the "refurbished" models on this camera (seems a bad idea given the history). I figured any new D600 body this late in the game probably would've had the issues worked out at the factory before being offered up for sale. I knew the D610 is in the works but who knows when.

First thing I did was some shots of a white piece of paper at f/22 and sure enough, there are spots all over the thing. I have not cleaned the sensor yet as I'm out of cleaning supplies, but my gut feel is to just send the thing back, especially since the price will probably drop like a rock now. I guess I can wait for the D610.

spraynpray

FWIW IMHO Nikon could be just drawing a line under the D600 with the D610 and only fixing the ones returned (to save on costs). I would expect to return any D600 for rework as necessary, and more than once as they may insist on just cleaning the sensor the first time or two before they change the shutter.

heartyfisher

I think accountants can do magic with things like that ..ie product D600 write off.. D610 profitable big hit !

Benji2505

@Photobug

Trust me, in regards the D610 I am clueless..... I think Mike G got it right. If the D610 is essentially the same as the D600, this is Nikon's way of admitting the D600 is to be avoided.

The idea behind the "upgrade" is to close the chapter "dirt-on-sensor-D600", as it is perceived with the end customers and the retailers ( who most likely took their share of beating). In order to make this move work you have to have some sort of change. I would guess they add a cosmetic gizmo like a button or update the OS. See the SB900 problem fix. Nothing would be worse than keeping everything the same, the retailers would request to return the D600s in stock and the end customer would hear "same camera as the D600, they just fixed an issue that they were not able to get right in the first place".

newfoundlander61

The oil issues with several of the current Nikon models has kept me from buying a new body to replace my D50. Hopefully this will change soon if not, I won't buy.

Photobug

newfoundland said:
The oil issues with several of the current Nikon models has kept me from buying a new body to replace my D50. Hopefully this will change soon if not, I won't buy.

So long your not buying a D600, don't let this stop you from buying a new Nikon DSLR body. I just got a D7100 and checked it for spots on the sensor, it was clean.

Astrodonkey...call customer support and send it back. See the main blog about when the D610 is expected. Could be next month or January.

kenadams

Funny, now that the D610 appears to have the whole oily shutter/mirror fiasco handled, it also squeezes out 0.5 FPS more than the D600... must have been friction.

heartyfisher

lol .. i think when the best engineers get put on the job to "fix that oily shutter" they tend to find little optimizations. They just cant help them selves :-) bet that shutter is gonna be awesome now.. could probably catch a bullet and spit it out again !

Ade

I thought Nikon would put in further improvements, in order to "save face" so to speak. Maybe more will be revealed?

Imagine, had the engineers managed to squeeze in just 1 fps more, they can claim it as the D600S.

donaldejose

I think we will see some improvements other than just a new shutter mechanism. For example, they must be able to tweak the software easily.

Photobug

Heartyfish said: They just cant help them selves bet that shutter is gonna be awesome now.. could probably catch a bullet and spit it out again !

Thanks for the good laugh. :-))

Msmoto

I am going out on a limb and suggest the D610 will have some oil/dust issues of its own. But, the reason for this is a lot of folks will be examining this issue closely with testing which includes a whiter paper at f/16, then post processing to cycle through several contrast increases. And, we will see some dust,etc. But, hopefully this will be in the "normal" range, and not a real issue for the vast majority of photographers. That is to say, not visible on the usual image.

donaldejose

I agree with Msmoto. People are now sensitive to dust on a D600 so many will look very closely at the D610 sensor and surely when you look closely at any sensor you find dust/oil. There will be more reports than normal of people finding dust on the D610 sensor just because more people looked in the first place and those who did looked harder. Dust issues with the entire D6XX series will be a hurdle for Nikon to overcome.