Page 2 of Inexpensive Digital Camera recommendation please

I think its just a capacitor gone relating to the LCD. The fact everything else works just fine implies it's not going to be anything major.

The whistling noise screams (pardon the pun) a cap going bad. :) Unless that's coming from the flash charging circuit, but then I'm sure you'd recognise that as being the same noise.

I'll PM you my address.

Here's a shot of the last capacitor I came across that went bad:



The explosion it made reminds me of the moon. I don't think yours is quite going to be that bad.


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brilliant, got it thanks, I'll get the missus to post it next week

Obviously can't promise I can fix it, but I'll let you know. :)


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Lol what an interesting noise its making. I'll open it up later tonight and have a look.

Only played with it for a minute or two, but I think the problem is the optical image stabiliser. The noise instantly goes away the moment you switch to playback mode and returns when you exit it, and is unaffected by firing the flash.

It might be something simple or it might be something complicated. I should know later.


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cheers, it's interesting as well, that in portrait mode, if you have the buttons at the top it goes fuizzy, but at the bottom it's ok, I didn't think to turn off the stabilizer, but I think I need that on!

it's made the high pitched whistling noise for ages, but I ignored that hoping it would go away as it didn't affect anything else, maybe I should have got it looked at then :)

have been following huk's recent camera deals, I'm hoping you can fix it, as it's a real dilemma how much to spend, and what to go for.

a £100 camera for £60, or a camera that was released a year ago, down from £300 to £150. Christmas is coming up so we shall see ;)

Quote:
admars says...
"it's interesting as well, that in portrait mode, if you have the buttons at the top it goes fuizzy, but at the bottom it's ok"
Anything else it does thats odd? It might be a few things, or symptoms of the same fault.


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So sat down this evening to open it up, thought before I do that I'll have another play around, see if its the lens stabiliser or the flash, after thinking maybe the flash is always charging when not in play mode too.

Just when I think I may or may not have seen the screen flickering issue when you put it with the buttons face up, it died on me. :( I think it saw the screwdriver coming and thought, "I can't take this anymore!"

Checked the voltage on the battery, was reading 4v, which as its rated at 3.6v means its probably fully charged. So it couldn't be that being flat.

So I figured I may as well open it up, and annoyingly it does seem to have been the electrolytic cap that was probably making the whining noise on the flash. That's the only cap in there that looks big enough to make any sort of a noise.

But as it had the screen flickering issue, thats probably indicative of something relating to the main board (it has one double sided PCB in which is directly soldered to the battery terminals, and has zif sockets going to the LCD, self contained lens unit and flash/beeper units.

I'd say there are a few limited options now...

1. I can watch ebay for you and look out for a faulty one which just has a lens problem (yours is obviously fine), they seem to go for between £7-£15 including P&P. The problem here of course is we may well end up with a working one, but unsure of how long it will work for. :/ When a brand new one is £60 with a warranty, might not be the most cost effective option in the long run. :/
2. Ship it back to you, and you can give it a burial or sell it as faulty on ebay, though I'm not sure how much you'd get for it really :( Maybe somebody who bought one of the others would want it for the lens or LCD. You might get £5-£7 to put towards a new one? Ebay free-listing weekends only obviously.
3. Get a 2nd hand one off ebay, like this one which would be a good deal if you were the only bidder. Or maybe put in a £30 offer on this one? Or if you want a 12 month warranty, £45 for a refurbished one doesn't sound bad?
4. Or go for a newer model.

This item was edited on Thursday, 10th October 2013, 21:17

that's a shame, thanks for trying :( I charged up the battery to full before I sent it, I think I put in the proper Panny one didn't I? I have a 3rd party one as well bought from Amazon works just as well.

I don't know if it's worth the hassle of buying another camera to try to make 1 good one off 2 broken.

I'd rather not buy a 2nd hand camera from a stranger, as you never know how well it's been treated, and could develop same fault as mine, sooner rather than later :(

if you hadn't offered to have a look at it, I probably would have just kept on using it till it died, so it's possible it would be dead by now any.

So basically, I'm back to where I was before I posted, i.e. hukd looking at cameras, so thanks for trying, now to work out how much to spend on a camera, and what my priorities are!

I think I want
1) cheap,
2) high shutter speed is what I want for baby photos. The DMC-S3 is 1/1600, some of the new budget camera I've looked at are 1/2000 so that shouldn't be a problem
3) quick to start up as I normally leave the camera on the dining room table so it's quick to grab if the kids do anything "cute"

I'm gueesing most if not all of this year's ~£100 cameras will be better than those in that price from 2 years ago.

thanks for trying, was going to say you may as well keep it, but just realised whiel talking to missus, I sent it in the case to protect it, so if you could send it back, as you say I can see if I can flog it on eBay.

Cheers

Al

Got another Panasonic, went for a DMC-S5, so a bit newer and better than mine, but a year or so old,uses same batteries as old camera, and was only £45 new from Amazon :)

Happy so far, got some nice pics of the girls, including one of them knocking down a tower of blocks mid fall :)

So I've got a bee in my bonnet about the old one, so if you can live without having it back for a bit safe in the knowledge that you really will get it back at some point and maybe working, I'm hoping to get some time next week for a play!

(If you really need the case and battery back I can send separately)

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