SSM lenses...what's a Maxxum 9 user to do?

Dear fellows,
I'm totally pro about this petition although I don't have and probably won't have D9 or even SSM lens ;-)

However... there is one thing - why do you send it to Sony? chips and motherboard belongs to Konica-Minolta, not Sony. I'm writing it in regard to what Krzysztof ( known here as Szabla ) said on polish Minolta klub forum ( to remind you - Krzysztof is Sony, former KM employee ).

And sorry for not replying to PM's - haven't been on Dyxum for ages...

Edited by Dunadan - 17 March 2009 at 10:59

Dunadan wrote: why do you send it to Sony? chips and motherboard belongs to Konica-Minolta, not Sony. I'm writing it in regard to what Krzysztof ( known hear as Szabla ) said on polish Minolta klub forum ( to remind you - Krzysztof is Sony, former KM employee ).

Hi Jakub,

You are bringing up a good point here. Sure, the Dynax 9 was designed and manufactured by Minolta, not Konica Minolta, not Sony.

However, just as Konica Minolta took over all sales and services for the camera after the fusion of Konica and Minolta in 2003, Sony took over services when they bought "certain assets" from Konica Minolta in 2006. Nobody outside these companies will know the exact details of their contract, but we can see what happened in public.

If you check out Konica Minolta's web site or phone them up for repair services for film cameras, they will redirect you to Sony's web site. And Sony's web site indicates that they do in fact continue to maintain services for "legacy" Konica Minolta products such as A-mount film SLRs and film scanners, and they will point you to various service contractors, who will carry out the repair. In Germany their official service partner for Minolta & Konica Minolta equipment is Runtime in Bremen, and for Sony Alpha and Cyber-shot equipment it is Geissler. It may be interesting to know, that Konica Minolta's European Service Center was located in Bremen and when Konica Minolta left the photo business with end users in 2006, their former repair center became a subsidiary of Runtime, although as far as I know not much is left from these times.

Also, Minolta and Konica Minolta spare parts for film and digital cameras are listed in Sony's parts database (including the Dynax 9 mainboard). And to the best of my knowledge, Runtime, who performed the SSM upgrade, did get the spare parts from Sony, not Konica Minolta.

So, by all practical means, Sony has completely taken over the "front end interface". It is possible, that, behind the scenes, it is still Konica Minolta, who stocks parts and/or manufactures components for Sony cameras (in the case of the DSLR-A100 we knew this for sure), but since we are not coming in through the backdoor, our contact is Sony. If we would have to contact Konica Minolta instead, I'm sure, Sony would have told us already. In either case, we will keep you updated.

If anyone can share some further background info with us, feel free to do so in public or PM.

Thanks and greetings,

Matthias

Minolta USA (before the KM merger) did include information with the SSM lens I bought about the availability of a free upgrade to the Maxxum 9. It would do one camera for each lens bought. Doing the upgrade without a lens purchase would have cost about $150 if I remember correctly. My contact at Minolta at the time said that it involved replacing a circuit board, not just an IC chip. Perhaps that is the way Minolta was doing it here in the U.S. (i.e., it was easier to replace the whole circuit board than just the IC chip), perhaps it did not want to do just a chip replacement (for whatever reason), or perhaps I was misinformed.

I think, but am not sure, that KM continued the practice of including with the SSM lenses sold a notice about the availability of the camera upgrade. All that went out the window with the Sony takeover. Whether that was because Sony did not want to be bothered, Sony had no clue why it would want to continue the upgrade availability (that's my guess), or there were insufficient parts to continue it, who knows? Perhaps some other reason, or a combination of some of these. But, I have no doubt that at the time of the takeover Sony had very little understanding of the SLR/DSLR market and probably had no idea why it might want to keep the upgrade available, assuming that was an option at the time.

Edited by vbpholaw - 17 March 2009 at 15:59

Dear friends,

I have, in the past couple of days, received several emails from people asking if the list would be closed now that we have contacted Sony, or if they could still participate.

Please let me clarify that this is an ongoing project and you are, of course, still welcome to participate. :-)

Thanks and greetings,

Matthias

PS. See also: http://www.mi-fo.de/forum/index.php?showtopic=23071&view=findpost&p=242073 [de]

Edited by matthiaspaul - 19 March 2009 at 15:17

Good morning, Matthias Paul;

     I wish I had known of the existence of this group earlier.

     I have a Minolta Maxxum 9 35 mm film camera (the Dynax 9 relabeled for sale in the United States). I did not know that I would not be able to use the latest Sony Alpha lenses on my 9.

     I would like to be included in the listing of people who want to have their 9 upgraded with the later flex-PC board. I will send to you a Private Message with the information for your gathering and growing collection.

     Regarding the flex-PC boards that are taken out of the the cameras which have had this modification made to them already: I used to build satellites. I have some measure of experience and skill and the tooling for working with very fine and light weight printed circuit board assemblies. It is possible to make repairs to them and change parts on them. If the old flex-PC boards are still available, either as existing stock of old parts or ones removed from Maxxum 9 bodies as they are upgraded, and the new IC chips are compatible with those boards, it might be possible to upgrade the old flex-PC boards to the new specifications so that others might be able to have access to parts assemblies for getting their cameras upgraded also.

Since I get asked quite often if there is any way to distinguish upgraded and non-upgraded cameras without having access to SSM lenses, here's my answer:

Yes, there is. The only 100% reliable way to distinguish non-SSM- and SSM-enabled Dynax/Maxxum/Alpha 9/9Ti camera bodies (without testing SSM lenses or opening the body and check the labelling of IC-1) is to check for the availability of custom function 20-4.

If custom function 20 provides options 20-1, 20-2 and 20-3 only, the body has not been upgraded. If, however, an extra option 20-4 exists, the body supports both SSM and ADI.

Hope it helps,

Matthias

hello Rolf ! we're looking forward to your news !!