Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1997/08/27
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]> I would appreciate feedback on the reliability and in particular > repairability of the Minola CLE. Buyer beware! Minolta will not support this once very expensive camera. It was the nicest camera system I owned and I was quite distressed to trade it in last week, but there is a serious developing problem in the metering system, which if it does not affect the camera now will haunt it. It may not be true, but my source had no reason to lie and is very knowledgeable on things Minolta. It seems, that part of the metering circuit is on a ceramic board. This board was a fairly primitive design and has a habit of developing micro fractures. From what I can gather, this problem makes the meter more sensitive to battery condition until one day "Edward Kangaroo" :-) My baby was in fantastic "nick", but was beginning to demand fresh batteries too often- may have been my imagination, but---. In fear I traded it in. This on top of its flash crashing 5 years ago. Even then Minolta Pooh-poohed its repair and told me it was unsupported. Parts are rare as the camera is rare. When Minolta told me a month ago that it "would not touch my XD7", I finally decided to dump the CLE and clear out the cupboard. When this happens, it will end a 29 year association with the company, and put me fairly in line for a wallet emptying experience with Mr Leica, or perhaps Mr Rollei if he could be tempted to roll in behind the 3003 again. [vain hope, but how good would an autofocus version be? ;-)] All that said, if you could buy a CLE at a reasonable price and could have the ceramic board checked for defects first, it is a great camera!!!! Alastair Firkin http://users.netconnect.com.au/~firkin/AGFhmpg.html