This problem was a simple one and noted primarily amongst early examples of
the 'R'. Cosina determined that the RF alignment was being jostled during
shipping and needed to be 'glued' at the factory. They modified their
manufacturing processes to address it. Of course they fixed under warranty
the ones affected by the problem.
I suspect Cosina CEO Mr. Kobayashi regretted the error because it scared a
lot of the retail dealers and potential customers, gave the Leica-ites a
"See-I-told-you-so" and aggravated early adopters. A lot of people just
couldn't or didn't want to believe that a camera priced so reasonably could
be so good and this easily fixable problem lingers in the memories of
potential buyers.
That said, the CV 'R' series is NOT built to the specification of the Leica
'M' series. At a fraction of the cost, how could it be? Still, they
can utilize most of the splendid array of LTM and/or 'M' lenses on the
market, offer remarkably fine VFs, higher flash synch and TTL metering.
There are also variants that use Contax and Nikon RF mounts giving new life
to some legendary glass.
I note and agree with Windsor's comment regarding the relatively short
rangefinder base. CV's longest lens is a 90/4.0 and that should be
considered the outer limit for accurate focus. Ditto fast lenses like the
75/1.4 an Noctilux though I'd argue that if you can afford those you might
as well buy a Leica M3 or M6 .85.
The only problems I've had with my CV 75/2.5 were caused by my own
inattention. Of course any RF camera requires careful focusing with longer
lenses. I've always considered RFs in general to be 'wide to normal' tools
and use my 75 sparingly for that reason.
Obviously, I'm not a good person to ask if you want to be talked *out* of
getting a CV-R. ;o)
ScottGee1
On 4/10/06, bill latham <to_gishi@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> Hi Andrew
>
> The build quality has been questioned (compared to the
> M Leicas or Canon LTM cameras) probably due to the use
> of plastic body parts. Also, there have been problems
> with focus, it seems the rf goes out of alignment
> "often" -whatever that means.
SNIP!
Regards
Bill Latham
==============================================
List usage info: http://www.zuikoholic.com
List nannies: olympusadmin@xxxxxxxxxx
==============================================
|