I’ve been waiting for Nikon USA’s repair department to adequately repair a D700 since March of 2011.  We’re about half way through January 2012.  Is it me, or is that too long?

My agony results from more than just how long I have been waiting.  It stems from the number of times I’ve received an improperly repaired camera from them.

Here’s a view through the eyepiece of the last camera they sent me:

This is not something you should ever see through the finder of a D700 camera.  There is a darkened area outside the DX crop and EVERY single AF point appears to be activated simultaneously.  There are no settings or circumstances under which you should see either of these things in the viewfinder of a D700 individually, let alone both at the same time.

Here’s how things should look (with one AF point selected)

this is normal

Note that these two images are the same scale, from the same camera.  It’s possible to get more than one focus point to show under normal circumstances, but never all 51 points.  And only the D3 series will darken like this with any setting.  The D700 should only show a line around the inner DX crop box.

After I took these pictures and provided them with an explicit description of the problem (which is intermittent with no clear steps to reproduce) and sending the camera in, they miraculously turned it around in a single day!  …without doing a bloody thing but messing with settings and telling me I’m doing it wrong.

Without any sort of repair having been done, is it reasonable that they sent it immediately back?  Should I accept the same camera back ever at this point?  How could I possibly trust that they’ve done any sort of repair at all at this point?

How this all started…

I damaged my original D700 in March 14th, 2011 while shooting a celebration of the Indian festival of Holi.  This is admittedly my fault.  I then brought it to a local authorized repair shop who immediately determined that the repair was beyond them and shipped it straight to Nikon.  Nikon obviously holds no blame for the horrible natural disasters that befell Japan, where parts needed for repairs originate.  Due to circumstances, I didn’t receive my camera back until June.  I would be perfectly happy with the handling of things up to this point, if Nikon had only provided me with a properly repaired camera.

Instead, what I received was a camera with all of the rubber grips falling off.  It’s my suspicion that it sat in a bin disassembled the entire time it was in their hands, so that the adhesives probably dried out and lost their tack.  These things happen I’m sure, so no big deal, right?  Well, I’m certain these things happen, because they happened to me last time I sent a camera in for repair: my D2x in 2007.  (In that instance, they’d also left a big thumb print on the inside of the camera’s viewfinder)  So apparently, this type of thing is standard operating procedure for the repair department at Nikon USA.

So I sent the camera back for what I believe should have been adequate reassembly.  I got it back in August.  I put it through it’s paces and it seemed to work properly, until I tried the built in flash, which would flash visibly, but would not sync or give any sort of illumination to images.  So…back to Nikon repair.

Up to this point I had been having my local repair shop send it in.  I decided to deal with Nikon directly and called them.  They sent me a label, and I promptly shipped the camera in.  After not hearing anything at all for over two weeks, I called to check on the status of the repair.  I was told that since this was the third time my camera had been in for the same repair, there was a decision pending from management on whether to fix or replace my camera.  This gave me some hope, but after another week of no communications, I called again and was told that the decision had been to repair I was now waiting for a part to arrive.  I politely pointed out the original date that I’d sent in the camera, and that this is a tool for work.  The CSR agreed and made some calls, and someone decided that yes, I should just be sent a “new” camera.

Wow!  (or so I thought…)

I received a “new” refurbished camera that appeared to have been rolled down a flight of concrete stairs.  It was missing a good portion of paint from the bottom plate, the shutter button was sticky, and there was an odd corrosion around the strap lugs.  But the worst was that the one of the hot shoe rails was bent to badly that I could barely mount a flash in it.

Since I had gone so long without this camera (I had started relying on a backup D7000, which is NOT an adequate replacement) and I could, with force, mount a flash, I decided to tough it out.  That only lasted a couple weeks, when I noticed that the camera was starting to lock up when I used a flash in the shoe, and sometimes I was getting images like this:

AF assist hash from SB800 showing in images

As far as I could tell, the flash was into the shoe as far as it would go and was locked in.  I tried several different flash units and had the same issue.  So, I sent it in again.  Again, a couple weeks go by with no communication of any sort about status, so I call and talk to a CSR.  They inform me that they’re again waiting on a repair part and it will be sometime after October until they can finish the repair.  I ask them to forward my call to someone higher up, which they do.  The gentleman on the other end apologizes profusely for what I have gone through, and vows to send me a new camera right away.  He commends me for my patience and calm demeanor in all this.  I say “what else can I do at this point?”

They sent me a new camera, which I received right around Christmas.  I again test it out and nothing obvious is wrong.  Until I shoot with it on 12/30/11 and I get stuff like in the image at the top of this post.  The viewfinder stayed stuck like that until I fiddled with the focus more selector, switching it to manual focus mode and back.  That seemed to do it.  But it kept happening.  Especially at crucial moments like the count down to midnight on new years eve.

This is not how “pro” gear behaves.

So I documented the issue with Nikon and got a shipping label from them.  They sent the camera right back and told me I had the DX crop selected.  I’m sure I did–to test out their hare-brained suggestions that it was an issue with the DX crop (which anyone familiar with the camera can tell you blatantly it’s NOT).  The DX crop doesn’t look anything like that.

This is another broken camera!  Wake up Nikon!  You’ve been trying and failing since March!  Try harder!

My call today got me a service order number, which tells me the camera is being repaired.

The last repair was to glance it over and boot it back.  Should I really waste more of my own time with a camera that had intermittent issues, under unreproducible conditions, from a repair facility that has repeatedly proven they can diagnose or repair this model of camera?

I feel like the only acceptable solution at this point is a brand new camera.  I’ve paid for the original repair and been deprived of a working camera for ten (10) months.  My trust for the repair department is at an all time low.  The last managerial type person I talked to at Nikon (name “Ed”) was less than sympathetic and bordered on argumentative.  He also didn’t appear to be familiar with the features of the cameras well enough to understand the problems, even after looking at the above images.

Is a brand new camera unreasonable at this point?  What else would be an acceptable solution?  (and I will not dignify any suggestions to change brands with a response)

[UPDATE!]  I’ve just found a video of Nikon’s repair department in action…check it out!