RX100 - water damage ... WHAT ???

The camera was probably built with a "no clean" process, i.e. a solder with less agressive fluxer is used and the fluxer simply stays on the board.
I've seen a similar damage on a brand new electronic module after shipping from Germany to the far east by ship. The customer returned it and we concluded that it was damaged by condensing water during shipping.
 
The camera was not payed by credit card and I am even not sure whether mine offers that kind of cover.

Everything is possible - now it is matter of proving what actually happened to the camera.

In principle - if something goes wrong with a new product within first 6 months after purchase, then it is the seller/producer to prove that the problem with the product happened after the purchase - so far the EU law. That is the ball I can still play (and do right now).

I will keep you posted.
 
Matus said:
In principle - if something goes wrong with a new product within first 6 months after purchase, then it is the seller/producer to prove that the problem with the product happened after the purchase - so far the EU law. That is the ball I can still play (and do right now).
Click to expand...

IMHO, they've already shown this.

It's possible that after cleaning the camera will work again, as I said above, I've seen pretty horrid looking circuits that were completely inoperable be fully resurrected and work perfectly afterwards. However I bet reassembly of the camera would not be trivial. :)
 
So I manage to get a few larger photos of the damaged parts - what is your opinion? (just click on the photos for large ones)





 
I have been abused as a Genius at the Apple store by tounsands of people trying to scam us into the fact that their iPhone has been delivered that way. More than once it had been dropped in the toilet :mad::mad::mad:

Often I took pictures with my iPhone fitted with a macro lens to show the corrosion :eek::eek::eek:

The real fun ones are where you can see the water droplets behind the camera lens :eek::eek::eek:
 
Rogier, I do completely agree. Most of the time when people sink their new toy in toilette, shower or swimming pool, they will try to have it replaced under warranty. Not fair indeed and of course mostly it does not work. But it does feel stupid if the camera shows damage you can not see the reason for. I would not be pushing on the seller if I knew that the camera got a bath. And I definitely wound not rant about it here.

But once you say that you have this kind of experience. Looking at the pictures - would it be possible to 'ovelrook' (whatever liquid) damage the camera took that caused this much corrosion?
 
Matus said:
So I manage to get a few larger photos of the damaged parts - what is your opinion? (just click on the photos for large ones)
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Looks like water damage to one side of the main board. That indicates more than condensation damage, as that would have been all over the board - there have been a few mm of water inside the camera flowing or creeping in from one edge. But the camera had not been moved to other positions while wet, so it did not happen while on the body or in a handbag. Placed in a beach bag one edge down on the wet swimsuits for a night would explain it.
 
This ++++++

sevo said:
Looks like water damage to one side of the main board. That indicates more than condensation damage, as that would have been all over the board - there have been a few mm of water inside the camera flowing or creeping in from one edge. But the camera had not been moved to other positions while wet, so it did not happen while on the body or in a handbag. Placed in a beach bag one edge down on the wet swimsuits for a night would explain it.
Click to expand...
 
If the camera was placed close to some spilled drinks (red-wine or similar that contains some acid components) on a table and nobody realized quickly enough, such kind of liquid could have made it`s way into the camera and caused that damage.

Don`t laugh but I managed to spill a few droplets (droplets only !) of something while slurping a raw oyster onto my Gossen Digisix lightmeter. Didn`t realize it until the meter stopped working 10 minutes later. Had to open and clean it however some contacts had been corroded already ... :eek:
 
Should have gone with a toaster...

sorry I had too, that is awful I hope that you are able to get things figured out,

- james
 
jamesj said:
Should have gone with a toaster...

sorry I had too, that is awful I hope that you are able to get things figured out,

- james
Click to expand...

The moral of the story is indeed: "no electronic stuff as present". Although they (both!) really did like the camera.

I will certainly get the things sorted out, the only opened question is how much it is going to cost.
 
As I did not get a reply from the seller after a week after my last email I contacted directly Sony. I did not get any more positive answer (it was phrased much better and more acceptable though). So I have sent them one of the photos of the damage and made my last appeal in this case, but I do not expect much.

So unless there will not be a miraculous turn to things, I will need your help with ...

... choosing a new camera :)

Yes - I will get one more camera for my friends, but I am not going to go with another RX100 for obvious reasons (I will not be buying any Sony camera for a while I guess.. )

So - the camera. I am thinking of something in the lines of Nikon V1 or Olympus E-PL3. Either of these with the standard zoom lens. Both of these cameras can be had for slightly over 300 Euro and should offer good performance. The V1 has an EVF, but I am not sure how much of a difference this makes for them. EVF can be added to E-PL3 later after all.

Would you look elsewhere at price of say under 400 Euro? I know there are nice P&S cameras, but I find the bigger sensor hard to beat. I had a look at Canon G1X, but it is much more expensive.

Requirements:
- straight forward to use
- nice JPEG out of camera
- usable ISO1600 (for viewing)
- reasonable video
- stabilization
- good LCD, EVF not a must
- built in panorama or 'fun' modes a plus
- price under 400 Euro (to limit the total expenses somewhat)
 
Matus said:
As I did not get a reply from the seller after a week after my last email I contacted directly Sony. I did not get any more positive answer (it was phrased much better and more acceptable though). So I have sent them one of the photos of the damage and made my last appeal in this case, but I do not expect much.

So unless there will not be a miraculous turn to things, I will need your help with ...

... choosing a new camera :)

Yes - I will get one more camera for my friends, but I am not going to go with another RX100 for obvious reasons (I will not be buying any Sony camera for a while I guess.. )



So - the camera. I am thinking of something in the lines of Nikon V1 or Olympus E-PL3. Either of these with the standard zoom lens. Both of these cameras can be had for slightly over 300 Euro and should offer good performance. The V1 has an EVF, but I am not sure how much of a difference this makes for them. EVF can be added to E-PL3 later after all.

Would you look elsewhere at price of say under 400 Euro? I know there are nice P&S cameras, but I find the bigger sensor hard to beat. I had a look at Canon G1X, but it is much more expensive.

Requirements:
- straight forward to use
- nice JPEG out of camera
- usable ISO1600 (for viewing)
- reasonable video
- stabilization
- good LCD, EVF not a must
- built in panorama or 'fun' modes a plus
- price under 400 Euro (to limit the total expenses somewhat)
Click to expand...

Perhaps you should try to look for an older model. I live in Barcelona, which is not exactly the best place to find a bargain, but I've spotted a Nikon Coolpix P7000 (good video with zooming) for as low as 300€, a Canon S95 for 250€ (and S100's should drop in price as the 110 is out already). And that's in brick & mortar shops, so you should be able to get a better deal online. Canon G12's are also still widely available for a lower price now the G15 has come out.
All this in line with the original Sony P&S, as the other alternatives mentioned are more bulky and different kind of beasts.

The bigger sensor of the Sony is the only thing you'll lose (but you win on storage capacity). All the other requirments are met for.

Nescio

PS: the Fuji X10 must be on offer also; if not, it'll be after X-mas for sure.
 
OK, here is the update. I have probably bugged the repair center, the seller and directly SONY enough - I have just got the camera back - not repaired - but at least I did not have to pay those 50 € to actually get it back.

While this is better than nothing, it still is a 600 € paperweight.

Now the next step - as there is not really much to loose, I will probably give it a try to clean the camera interior myself. I have just seen Iron Man I and Iron Man 2 - this should be peanuts :cool: ;)

So - what kind of flux remover should I get for this job?. If anybody has am advice how to proceed I would be grateful.
 
Cleaning will not do the job - you'll have to reconstruct the damaged traces on the PCB (pretty hard to do if the salt ate into the edge of a multilayer PCB), and may have to replace damaged components.

The service would replace the entire board with a new (or factory refurbished) one.
 
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