X Vario AF Issues Follow Up

[tundraline]

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I work for the U.S. Navy as a Science and Technology Officer. That is my only source of compensation. What's your's?

 

You have just destroyed my opinion of the U.S. Navy. I am truly surprised they would have you (no kidding).

[larsv]

What is your motivation for the rants and continuous repeats?

 

I have my own company. Investments, project management and advisory.

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[barjohn]

You have just destroyed my opinion of the U.S. Navy. I am truly surprised they would have you (no kidding).

 

Well, one of the systems I designed and led the development of is now installed on 160 surface combatants, supporting 4 LCS ships, 73 LCACs, 34 LCACSLEPs, 28 submarines, and 67 Navy laboratories including labs in Singapore,Japan, Bahrain, Guam, Diego Garcia and Afghanistan. I hold a patent on the design. I also hold a patent on another system and am in the process of patenting a new secure system design. I have also managed a team that developed an IED countermeasures system and another team in chemical and biological agent detection systems. I am considered a subject matter expert in systems engineering and design and I have broad scientific knowledge and experience.

 

By the way, why is it that on this forum when people can't present a rational argument for their opinion they resort to personal attacks? I see it as a weak mind incapable of honest intellectual discussion.

 

Larsv,

 

I have stated my motivations but I will state them again:

1. To get Leica to improve its product performance and quality

2. To inform others of my observations and findings, you don't have to like them and you don't have to believe them, that is your prerogative.

 

There have been no repeats other than to defend myself against personal attacks or to provide status updates.

 

So why do you feel you have to defend Leica by attacking me or my motives? I don't question your motives. For all I know Leica pays you to defend them on this forum.

Edited February 14, 2014 by barjohn

[harvey999999]

What is your motivation for the rants and continuous repeats?

 

I have my own company. Investments, project management and advisory.

 

I find your repeated personal attacks and questions about financial gain appalling and childish in the extreme. We are not interested in them. We are only interested in the performance issues with our cameras. BarJohn and others have presented factual information. You have presented none.

 

I would have thought the moderator would have stopped such very bad behaviour, but since he hasn't, I'm leaving this forum - it's become too unpleasant.

[tundraline]

You have just destroyed my opinion of the U.S. Navy. I am truly surprised they would have you (no kidding).

 

I have gone too far, John. Please accept my apologies.

[stuny]

John - I started and ran a successful usability business for a few years and am rather sensitive to how intuitive and easy to use a system is, as well as its documentation. My latest frustration is with one of our vendors -- starting with a bake-off between them and our incumbent vendor. In most ways the newbie was superior, but it lacked two related functions. I provided them with screens and specs and they promised to have if for our roll-out last June. And BTW: those two functions are ones which my entire market segment wants. Those functions are not here yet and their fourth prototype we've tested has no relation to my specs and screens, accessing it is obscure and hidden, using it is far too complex, and it still doesn't work. I've just created an Excel spreadsheet to do those functions tied to their data and that will be our stopgap for who knows what percentage of our multi-year contract.

 

But why bring that up? Any organization which does not consider the user interface (and ideally has human factors engineers on-board and listens to them) will have more complex interfaces than necessary, be more difficult to use, and be less engaging - Engaging is what most of Apple's products do well. It's clear that the camera industry as a whole fails at least to some degree along those lines, and until those organizations wake up to those facts the best we can do is find interfaces that are less troublesome than the rest. Having tried the XV and the Z7R for several hours each I can assure you that for how I use a camera (a bit more complexly than does our colleague Tri) the XV commits far fewer sins.

 

Tundraline – Regarding your tests: I’d still want to take the XV and the A7R to the dealer and do a test at the dealer’s with the Zeiss zoom. After all, the common wisdom is that prime lenses are better than zooms at the same focal lengths. I’d like to know if the sensor size is really the limiting factor or not, and I wouldn’t be too surprised at either outcome. Perhaps doing the test at the dealer’s would still get the XV back in time to return it if your zoom vs. zoom tests indicate that’s the way to go.

Edited February 14, 2014 by stuny

[MarkP]

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I do not have an XVario but it is an intriguing camera which is on my consideration list.

 

I find the personal attacks on John to be offensive and inappropriate, especially those implying ulterior financial motives. What? He's not allowed to express his frustration about the camera, and update progress with his problems? This forum is full of those of us who at various times were/are pissed off about some problem with Leica or a Leica product. I think that John has been particularly methodical and restrained in his approach and language.

 

Whether the problem has only affected a small number of XVarios, or perhaps some others are blaming themselves for product failure, who knows. Other experienced users such as XVarior haven't had AFproblems with their cameras and would have identified such a problem.

 

John clearly has a strong technical background, has performed detailed controlled tests on the camera which does not perform as he believes it should, and is frustrated at the lack of progress addressing this issue.

 

Stick to the issue and stop the personal attacks - it is not becoming of this Forum!

I agree with Harvey.

 

 

Finally, I would like to declare that I have no financial or other interest whatsoever in this matter.

I have specifically reported the posts implying ulterior motives to the moderators.

 

 

ps Harvey,

give the Forum another go - there is always an unpleasant interaction going on somewhere in this Forum, but it's more than offset by what is overall a very pleasant, intelligent, and collegial community of members.

Edited February 14, 2014 by MarkP

[larsv]

I find your repeated personal attacks and questions about financial gain appalling and childish in the extreme. We are not interested in them. We are only interested in the performance issues with our cameras. BarJohn and others have presented factual information. You have presented none.

 

I would have thought the moderator would have stopped such very bad behaviour, but since he hasn't, I'm leaving this forum - it's become too unpleasant.

 

I have. I f you take the effort to read back in this and other threads. This issue is going on since September. The same statements are made again and again. I can understand John's frustration. He is clearly not happy with the product he bought. He is also clearly not happy with Leica as a company. I don't agree with John at all on his perception of the user interface. As I have stated before, it is a matter of taste and preferences. He has clearly stated that in his view that is a fact. That leaves no room for discussion, does it. Earlier on, he has also told us not to do business with Leica. That leaves very little room for discussion, does it.

 

I don't think John's attacks on the product and the company are fair at all. He claims that the product is performing at a level that does not match the price. I think that one pays a premium for any Leica product. That's why I have suggested to sell the product. By now, if Leica hasn't heard the complaints they are deaf. If they are deaf, nothing is going to change. I don't believe they are deaf. John's initial posts I can fully appreciate. It think the ongoing repeats of the same complaints are unbecoming of this forum.

[larsv]

John,

 

I have stated my sources. You're free to doubt the statement. I have not gone that far. I just asked the question and respect your response.

 

regards,

Lars

[larsv]

I will not post in this thread again. Though I stand by what I have stated, I don't believe it changes a jot.

Edited February 14, 2014 by larsv

[tundraline]

I find the personal attacks on John to be offensive and inappropriate . . . . Stick to the issue and stop the personal attacks - it is not becoming of this Forum!

 

I agree with Harvey.

 

ps Harvey,

 

give the Forum another go - there is always an unpleasant interaction going on somewhere in this Forum, but it's more than offset by what is overall a very pleasant, intelligent, and collegial community of members.

 

All well said. My apologies again, John.

[tmldds]

I find your repeated personal attacks and questions about financial gain appalling and childish in the extreme. We are not interested in them. We are only interested in the performance issues with our cameras. BarJohn and others have presented factual information. You have presented none.

 

I would have thought the moderator would have stopped such very bad behaviour, but since he hasn't, I'm leaving this forum - it's become too unpleasant.

 

I hope you reconsider, Harvey. Think of this as a minute version of Congress full of a bunch of, mostly, aging males with diminishing hormones and growing egos:)!

[spylaw4]

If this thread and its principal contributors now calm down and get back to simply discussing rationally the (apparent) issue at hand, I for one will be very grateful.

 

I say apparent as I to my knowledge have not experienced the issue at a frequency greater than I would have expected with any AF system - i.e. occasionally. As a matter of interest I have never had any problem with the X2 at all.

 

Nonetheless it does appear to be an issue for some and so I look forward to further (sensible) discussion and hopefully a solution from Leica once they finally get around to updating the firmware of what is a fine camera.

[jaapv]

Sorry for the delay guys, my internet was down and moderating from an iPhone failed. I'll leave the thread as it is, but I would thank the participants not to revert to personal allegations. This is camera forum, please discuss cameras, not members.

Edited February 14, 2014 by jaapv

[euston]

I have no reason to believe that barjohn is misrepresenting his experience with the XV and yet his perception of it differs substantially from mine.

 

barjohn has a camera that he finds does poorly in his tests, gives him results he can't rely on and has an interface he finds wanting. I have a camera that delivers excellent image quality, unfailingly does what I ask of it and is a delight to use. Funny old world, isn't!

[barjohn]

John - I started and ran a successful usability business for a few years and am rather sensitive to how intuitive and easy to use a system is, as well as its documentation. My latest frustration is with one of our vendors -- starting with a bake-off between them and our incumbent vendor. In most ways the newbie was superior, but it lacked two related functions. I provided them with screens and specs and they promised to have if for our roll-out last June. And BTW: those two functions are ones which my entire market segment wants. Those functions are not here yet and their fourth prototype we've tested has no relation to my specs and screens, accessing it is obscure and hidden, using it is far too complex, and it still doesn't work. I've just created an Excel spreadsheet to do those functions tied to their data and that will be our stopgap for who knows what percentage of our multi-year contract.

 

But why bring that up? Any organization which does not consider the user interface (and ideally has human factors engineers on-board and listens to them) will have more complex interfaces than necessary, be more difficult to use, and be less engaging - Engaging is what most of Apple's products do well. It's clear that the camera industry as a whole fails at least to some degree along those lines, and until those organizations wake up to those facts the best we can do is find interfaces that are less troublesome than the rest. Having tried the XV and the Z7R for several hours each I can assure you that for how I use a camera (a bit more complexly than does our colleague Tri) the XV commits far fewer sins.

 

Tundraline – Regarding your tests: I’d still want to take the XV and the A7R to the dealer and do a test at the dealer’s with the Zeiss zoom. After all, the common wisdom is that prime lenses are better than zooms at the same focal lengths. I’d like to know if the sensor size is really the limiting factor or not, and I wouldn’t be too surprised at either outcome. Perhaps doing the test at the dealer’s would still get the XV back in time to return it if your zoom vs. zoom tests indicate that’s the way to go.

 

Stuny,

If I may go off topic for a moment, I feel your pain on the problem you had or are having with getting a usable interface from your vendor. We go to great lengths to meet user interface needs. One of the hard things to teach engineers is that designing a UI that works well for engineers rarely works well for the users that don't think the same way. As a result, my team was and is tasked to carefully evaluate, test and respond to user complaints about the interface. We target a one week turnaround to provide a fix. To give you an idea of how much emphasis we place on human engineering you would need to see one of our labs. For example, we have a complete nuclear submarine control room set up with cameras, laser trackers, sensors for heart rate and blood pressure, retinal monitors and more, then to test the interface we bring in a crew and put them into a high stress scenario and monitor and record their performance and interaction with the interface. Where do they hesitate, what causes them to increase heart rate, where do they make mistakes, etc. Then the interface is modified to see if we can improve their performance. This is done many times with different crews. The user has to be able to perform their function without having to stop and think about it. It can literally be the difference between life and death. We take human engineering very seriously.

 

On teh topic of the A7 versus the XV, I have tested both A7 & A7R in controlled tests against the XV. The following is my conclusion and opinion: While the XV zoom is better than the A7 kit zoom, it is not a match for their primes. I can't comment on the Zeiss zoom as it wasn't available when I had the A7s. However, the larger sensor and higher pixel count resulted in more detail and equally sharp or sharper images from the A7s, even with the kit lens except in the corners. The A7s AF is significantly faster and more accurate than the XVs. The A7s are not EM-1 or DSLR fast. MF works well on the A7s but not as well as the XV's.

[barjohn]

I have no reason to believe that barjohn is misrepresenting his experience with the XV and yet his perception of it differs substantially from mine.

 

barjohn has a camera that he finds does poorly in his tests, gives him results he can't rely on and has an interface he finds wanting. I have a camera that delivers excellent image quality, unfailingly does what I ask of it and is a delight to use. Funny old world, isn't!

 

I like many things about the camera and even with a UI that I find wanting, I would tolerate it if the AF could be improved. Ideally made more accurate and faster but at least more consistently accurate. The feel in the hand and the quality of the lens that has it punch well above its weight in IQ are really great qualities. I'm glad that you haven't experienced the problems I have seen and I will admit that I am very sensitive to AF issues. Part of it has to do with my eyesight and the fact that I can't always tell whether I have sharp focus or not from the LCD or EVF so I count on the green rectangle and beep. There is nothing more frustrating than getting home and discovering that many of the shots you thought were great are out of focus. Murphy's law being in full effect it is always the ones you wanted the most that are bad.

[jaapv]

I have no reason to believe that barjohn is misrepresenting his experience with the XV and yet his perception of it differs substantially from mine.

Nor do I And there is no way to determine in this forum how representative either opinion is.

The wisest thing to do is to treat all points of view as one person's perspective.

[euston]

The wisest thing to do is to treat all points of view as one person's perspective.

 

Exactly so. I couldn't agree more. It is important, therefore, that one person's perspective should not be immune from challenge when other perspectives contradict it.

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[bill]

Equally, it is important that one person's perspective is not shouted down in thuggish fashion by others just because they disagree. There is far too much of that here nowadays.

 

Sent from another Galaxy