Reasons NOT to buy the Q3???

[jaapv]

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The Leica Q3 is available for pre-order at B&H Photo Video and Adorama

[Smogg]

You should definitely buy Q3! If Leica doesn't make money on these cameras, we'll never see the M12, M13,..😂

[kIB]

On 10/24/2023 at 9:20 AM, -MR- said:

 

I actually wanted to buy the Leica Q3, after some research I have discarded this for now.
Reasons are many, many negative reports from users, also in the forums here.

Some quotes I often read, sometims in professional reviews:

1. blurry and unsharp EVF during / after focusing.
2. extremely long shutter lag / blackout
3. Long delay after switching on the camera  / long startup time
4. crops can't be enlarged in the EVF, you only see the frames which makes it extremely difficult to compose e.g. 70mm images.
5. dust penetration on sensor
6. AF is mediocre and often unreliable
7. EVF starts to struggle / gets laggy in higher Iso  as soon as the ambient light starts to dim
8. Quality of the paint: gets quickly scratched
9. quite disappointing battery life (even with 170,00 Euro (!) battery from Leica) - I know problem of most camreas with EFV and mirrorless

 I still think the Q3 is a great camera, but all these problems scare me to spend 6000 Euro. Especially points 1 - 3 are serious for me.

Leica itself wrote in an advertising "Accept nothing than perfection" :-))

What do you think? Suppose you had to find reasons not to buy the Q3, what would you say? What are your criticisms (besides the price)?

It's not about badmouthing the camera, but listing its flaws and quirks.  

Thank you!

ps

Dear Leica-developers: Give us a  firmware update to solve many of the issues above.
 

I have a Leica Q 3, and I think it is good that you describe these things, so that they may can be corrected.

The only thing I'm disappointed about so far is the battery, which sits and discharges in the camera, even if it's not used - my Nikon e.g. does not.

Whether I encounter some of the other errors you mention will show, as I have only shot a little with it due to specially arising private things that have taken up my time.

But I have to admit that I bought it primarily for the image quality and the special colors it produces, which it does if you use the right light - i.e. side light, then the colors are different and far better than any of the many other cameras I have, except maybe
my Sony Rx1R, which also has a special beautiful rendering, but it is NOT weather sealed, and I have already paid tuition for that.

Good post from you, so that attention can be drawn to it and corrected if you experience these errors.

Let's get things straight. Thank you for your post.

[EV80]

The image quality and how you can edit it is the best I have ever had. Hopefully the rest of the problems will be solved by firmware. If the problem with the batteries cannot be solved, at least if they lowered the price to buy more, it wouldn't hurt. 🤞🏼

[Le Chef]

So much of this thread and another seem to be blown up exaggerations of the number of people who have experienced issues. Welcome to the echo chamber of social media. Some issues are being addressed by Leica and others are due to owners not understanding the obvious; which is what happens when you have everything switched on from the app to BT to continuous focus etc. to battery life. And for others it’s the basic error of simply not reading the owner manual.

In the end it’s your money: you can believe the dramatic hand-wringing exaggerations or you can ask how many people have actually experienced a specific problem and how many have not. Silence does not equal “problem” - it just means owners see no point in contributing to a debate where they say “no problems or no issues”.

[bobtodrick]

31 minutes ago, Le Chef said:

So much of this thread and another seem to be blown up exaggerations of the number of people who have experienced issues. Welcome to the echo chamber of social media. Some issues are being addressed by Leica and others are due to owners not understanding the obvious; which is what happens when you have everything switched on from the app to BT to continuous focus etc. to battery life. And for others it’s the basic error of simply not reading the owner manual.

In the end it’s your money: you can believe the dramatic hand-wringing exaggerations or you can ask how many people have actually experienced a specific problem and how many have not. Silence does not equal “problem” - it just means owners see no point in contributing to a debate where they say “no problems or no issues”.

Yup…for every person who has an issue…many times the result of not reading the (horrors) manual…there are a hundred who are completely happy.

Doesn’t matter what the item…that’s social media.

[EV80]

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The manual explains the operation of the camera. Bugs are something else.

[Le Chef]

6 hours ago, EV80 said:

The manual explains the operation of the camera. Bugs are something else.

Precisely, which is why some of the eye-rolling occurs when owners claim the camera has bugs when the reality is its operator error from not reading the manual.

You also  have accept unrealistic expectations: Leica is a small company, not Fuji or Sony which produce many times the number of cameras and have significantly greater resources to address problems before the camera comes to market.

[idusidusi]

On 10/24/2023 at 9:20 AM, -MR- said:

What do you think? Suppose you had to find reasons not to buy the Q3, what would you say? What are your criticisms (besides the price)?
 

If I was really happy with whatever camera currently in my possession and could see no benefit to my photography to get the Q3 would be my reason #1.

If I read the complaints in this forum, would make me more nervous about dropping the dough would be #2

However, tomorrow is Q3 day for me, so it is too late on both #1 and #2 

[Daniel C.1975]

vor 2 Stunden schrieb idusidusi:

If I was really happy with whatever camera currently in my possession and could see no benefit to my photography to get the Q3 would be my reason #1.

If I read the complaints in this forum, would make me more nervous about dropping the dough would be #2

However, tomorrow is Q3 day for me, so it is too late on both #1 and #2 

Lucky that it‘s too late. You‘ll enjoy it! I really love to use mine.

[Knorp]

🤔 perhaps we should start a new thread: "Reasons NOT to keep the Q3???" ... 🤨

[Ecaton]

Don't buy it if you are looking for a shirt pocket size high IQ solution. That's what the Ricohs are for😉. Otherwise, it has no real competition with Sony dropping the ball on the Rx1s.

[Gueric]

I was one of the first to have the Q3 and sold it a couple of months later. I never had anything as bugged in my hands and it really infuriated me...
That plus some anoying design quirks (in my view anyways) made me go back to my trusty X100V. But as I had sold my X100V to buy the Q3, I ended up with my old and battered X100T 😉 Which, by the way, is much more reactive then the Q3 in many aspects but autofocus.
The nail in the coffin was probably when I opened Q3 files in an app that didn't apply the build-in Q3 correction profile... Ouch!
I think some bugs and lags have been addressed since, but my confidence in digital Leica's has crumbled quite a bit. I wanted to buy the M11 but as it still seems to be bugged all over (> year later!) I went to an old M10 (wich is much more reactive then the Q3 by the way).

[Jipster]

On 10/24/2023 at 3:20 AM, -MR- said:

 

I actually wanted to buy the Leica Q3, after some research I have discarded this for now.
Reasons are many, many negative reports from users, also in the forums here.

Some quotes I often read, sometims in professional reviews:

1. blurry and unsharp EVF during / after focusing.
2. extremely long shutter lag / blackout
3. Long delay after switching on the camera  / long startup time
4. crops can't be enlarged in the EVF, you only see the frames which makes it extremely difficult to compose e.g. 70mm images.
5. dust penetration on sensor
6. AF is mediocre and often unreliable
7. EVF starts to struggle / gets laggy in higher Iso  as soon as the ambient light starts to dim
8. Quality of the paint: gets quickly scratched
9. quite disappointing battery life (even with 170,00 Euro (!) battery from Leica) - I know problem of most camreas with EFV and mirrorless

 I still think the Q3 is a great camera, but all these problems scare me to spend 6000 Euro. Especially points 1 - 3 are serious for me.

Leica itself wrote in an advertising "Accept nothing than perfection" :-))

What do you think? Suppose you had to find reasons not to buy the Q3, what would you say? What are your criticisms (besides the price)?

It's not about badmouthing the camera, but listing its flaws and quirks.  

Thank you!

ps

Dear Leica-developers: Give us a  firmware update to solve many of the issues above.
 

Hmm, you seem to be fishing for negative comments. Consider #4. This is a 28mm lens. Which is why I won't buy it. If you want a 70mm lens you shouldn't buy it either. For every nit picky comment, there are thousands of happy users. People can say all kinds of things, just because negative comments sell/click bait. The only thing that matters is whether people are happy with the camera. Data shows yes. Then try one is see if it's for you. All kinds of reason to go negative about a Leica M10. But I like it better than any other camera I have had (including Nikon full frame cameras, which I love too). What people say on the internet is .... 

[David Wien]

1 hour ago, Gueric said:

I was one of the first to have the Q3 and sold it a couple of months later. I never had anything as bugged in my hands and it really infuriated me...
That plus some anoying design quirks (in my view anyways) made me go back to my trusty X100V. But as I had sold my X100V to buy the Q3, I ended up with my old and battered X100T 😉 Which, by the way, is much more reactive then the Q3 in many aspects but autofocus.
The nail in the coffin was probably when I opened Q3 files in an app that didn't apply the build-in Q3 correction profile... Ouch!
I think some bugs and lags have been addressed since, but my confidence in digital Leica's has crumbled quite a bit. I wanted to buy the M11 but as it still seems to be bugged all over (> year later!) I went to an old M10 (wich is much more reactive then the Q3 by the way).

You do seem to have been plagued with bad luck. If I were you, I should get one of the top iPhones as a camera, and spend the rest of my spare cash on a Ferrari or a Rolls Royce.

David

[Le Chef]

1 hour ago, Gueric said:

The nail in the coffin was probably when I opened Q3 files in an app that didn't apply the build-in Q3 correction profile... Ouch!

That’s not Leica’s problem, that’s the developer of the app. If you want to address corrections use CR1 or LR.

[Le Chef]

2 hours ago, Gueric said:

That plus some anoying design quirks (in my view anyways) made me go back to my trusty X100V

Then why did you buy a Q3 in the first place? There have been many reviews that included an explanation of the physical design of the camera and also the software design. Even if you could not find a Q3 at a dealer you could have posted questions here and other Leica forums to assess your concerns. It seems like you really didn’t know either what you were buying or why you were buying it. For a $6,000 purchase that seems to be a bit sloppy to say the least.

[Gueric]

4 minutes ago, Le Chef said:

Then why did you buy a Q3 in the first place? There have been many reviews that included an explanation of the physical design of the camera and also the software design. Even if you could not find a Q3 at a dealer you could have posted questions here and other Leica forums to assess your concerns. It seems like you really didn’t know either what you were buying or why you were buying it. For a $6,000 purchase that seems to be a bit sloppy to say the least.

I perfectly knew what I was buying and it took me years to make the jump. Years, btw, of using X100T and X100V, so I'm quite familiar with using that type of camera.
But the bugs and lags were unacceptable, especially, as you say, for a 6000€ camera. And that, I couldn't have known. And most still don't as reviewers never talk about them or barely mention them.
As I do quite fast-reaction street shooting, the long startup time and other laggyness were a problem (EVF taking too long to startup with eye-sensor, resulting in blind shooting, picture review taking seconds to come up, and many others...). Some of these were better after the last firmware upgrade.
Designwise I had high hopes for the manual focus but it ended up less great than I expected: much too stiff, release knob too difficult to find and focus distances different from the M lenses. Seems stupid but I use a lot the M6 with 35 Summicron, and I focus by feel. When used to the Summicron, the stiffness and focus scale of the Q3 become, at least for me, a problem.
Besides that the expose comp dial is so hard I mostly needed to take the camera in my left hand to be able to turn it with 2 fingers of my right hand, thus making it very hard to adjust with the camera to the eye. Also quite unusable for zooming while reviewing pictures.
And about the lens: it realy is a 24 (or even less) that's heavily corrected and cropped. I hoped, for the occasional portraits, to have a bit more bokeh out of it than the X100 (28 F1.7 vs 23 F2.0) but that also wasn't true. I don't even understand where they get the 60mp from as the final image is quite a bit cropped from what the sensor captures. So how much mp is the sensor??
And don't worry, I use LR, but was curious to verify the rumours about this lens's hidden 'tricks'.

But off course build quality, AF speed and very clean files are a joy and I regret loosing that.

So yes, some of these points I knew, others I suspected but you'll agree that most of them are very sparsely mentionned or not at all... But man, the bugs and lags were epic... 🤘
 

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica Q

[Gueric]

2 hours ago, David Wien said:

You do seem to have been plagued with bad luck. If I were you, I should get one of the top iPhones as a camera, and spend the rest of my spare cash on a Ferrari or a Rolls Royce.

David

Nope, only with the Q3. And you don’t have to be rich to use Leica gear, you know. Until now I never lost a dime on it (on the contrary).

[Mr.Prime]

Just looked at some Q3 images for the first time and I just can’t quite put my dinger on it but I son’t like the colours as much as the CL. True that I only owned a CL for a few months before I sold it (a few years ago) in anticipation of the CL-2, but the CL colours were very much to my liking and I don’t ‘feel’ the same way about posted images from the Q3 yet. It’s just first impressions, I’ll look some more, perhaps it’s been too long since I’ve had a digital camera.

Edited November 23, 2023 by Mr.Prime