Beacon Camera Club

Hi guys and girls
My Nikon D700 (which I have loved) is now terminally ill and Nikon tell me parts are no longer available.

SO where from here

I enjoy birds in flight and mirrorless sounds sensible.

As Nikon (amongst others) have the ftz lens adaptor so one can use conventional lenses with mirrorless that may be attractive for me

So I have been considering Nikon Z 6ii and Z 7ii - but comments are that autofocus will be a tad slower than D700 and not great for birds in flight

Z9 is stated to get round this and many other problems but is a stack more money (and more than I would really like to spend)

Alternatively Sony and Cannon AF is said to be fester than Nikon Z6/7.

I would be really grateful for any suggestion from any gurus out there

Thank you

Neil Homer-Forbes

A camera doesn’t have to go to the manufacturer for a repair - there are other repairers about...

A z7 could be described as a mirrorless d850, a z6 a mirrorless d780. AF works differently on mirrorless (contrast vs phase detection), but the latest z series have a huge number of focus points across the whole frame. AF speed is different whether tracking an object, or snapping on to an object, etc. Thom Hogan has some good advice at bythom.com/newsviews/index.html .

The D700 came out in 2008, things have moved on greatly since then, especially in terms of processing and speed of processing. A 2022 camera is unlikely to be slower!

Another option - go for Olympus. You’ll get a bump in resolution and lenses are smaller and much lighter.

I use a d800 architecturally (inc t/s lenses), but out and about on longer walks don’t tolerate the weight, so use an Olympus em1 mk iii with oly pro lenses then. I believe the new om1 is faster again. And they have had incamera focus stacking, hand held high-res, pro capture, etc for years. Nikon/Sony/Canon only seem to be catching up to these features. Noise is not the same problem as it was 10 yrs ago thanks to better incamera processing and the latest AI software such as dxo deepRAW or Topaz sharpen AI.

Hope this helps...

Hi Phil,

The place where LCE send cameras to be repaired is:
Don Clark Camera Repairs
15 Long Street
Wootton under Edge
Gloucestershire
GL12 7ES

‭01453 842102‬

Regards,

Maddy