3rd Party Kit Reviews

So I thought it might be a nice idea to put some reviews of third party kit into one topic for easy reference.

I'll start the ball rolling by setting a layout and doing a review, and please feel free to to contribute

Index (by brand name)
Kingston Elite Pro 133x 4gb Compactflash card
Kood Neutral Density Filter ND4 (2 stops)
Phottix BP-40D battery grip for Canon XXD series
Yongnuo MC-36b Remote Cord
Yonghuo RS-80 N3 remote release for Canon

I bought the Hama version of this, and whilst only £15, it's cheaper than the Canon equivalent it does feel poorly made and flimsy it's no where near as cheap as what you paid and doesn't appear to be aswell constructed.

Info
Name: Yohgnuo RS-80 N3 Remote Release
Genuine Equivalent: Canon RS-80 N3 Remote Release
Price: £0.99 + £3.35 P&P
Genuine Equivalent Price: Around £40
Link

So I wanted a remote release, but couldn't afford the estimated £40 asking price of the Canon one. Did some research and heard the ebay equivalents are fairly awesome, and super cheap.

The remote arrived after a week and a half in a box similar to this (unfortunately threw the packaging away):


Unpackaged, no instructions, but it's not rocket science how it works so that wasn't an issue. First impressions? Absolutely fantastic. The button feels firm and responsive, and slips in the bulb setting very easily, and stays there until you want it to move. The wire feels like a piece of rubber, as if it's excellent quality. The connections are all strong, and the wire is around 75cm long.
The connection to the camera is again, brilliant. It's difficult to connect, since the design is pretty stupid, but once it's in it stays in.

Some pictures of the design and build quality:

Plug design:


Connection quality:


Bulb mode:


Overall build/design:


The only downside I would say is one of snobbery. Instead of saying 'Canon', it has a big 'Yohgnuo' at the top. Apart from that, I challenge anyone to tell the difference.

So, some ratings:

Price: 5/5 - absolutely unbelievable price for the money
Design/Build: 5/5 - fantastic build quality, just as good as the Canon
Function: 5/5 - works perfectly

I've got a Phottix BG-E2n battery grip coming from Hong Kong in the next week, so look forward to the review on that

Next up:



Info
Name: Kood P Filter - ND4 (2 stops)
Price: £6
Genuine Equivalent: Cokin P ND4
Genuine Equivalent Price: Around £14
Link

I've wanted a plain ND filter for a while now (have a ND grad) just simply for various things, like a wide aperture during harsh sunlight, or longer exposures on simply subjects.

When buying some stuff on 7dayshop I stumbled across this by accident and thought, hey, for £6 I can't go too wrong.

Ordered, all in, done. 7dayshop delivered in a matter of days.

The filter was delivered in a pretty basic plastic sleeve with a cardboard insert.


You could tell it was cheap, because looking up close the print on the cardboard insert was slightly blurry. No, it's not camera shake, it's actually that blurry.


I was initially quite worried. Opened up the sleeve, and had a quick inspection of the filter. Not really anything off I noticed, was slightly dusty so I gave it a quick blow with the rocket blower and wiped it with a Jessops XL optical cloth (the dog's danglies), and it was clear as day.

It's got quite a nice rounded look to it, unlike Cokin's perfectly square filters.


The camera missed the filter completely (centre spot only focusing), and focused on my reflection!


Shot off a couple of shots with and without the filter.
This one - 1/200 of a second without filter, daylight white balance


1/30 of a second with filter, daylight white balance


As you can see, a pretty obvious green/blue colour cast. Nothing that can't be fixed on photoshop, but still quite annoying. Something I can't complain about though considering it's half the price of the cokins and substantially cheaper than Lee's.

Price: 3/5 - Pretty good value for money, but not amazing
Design/Build: 4/5 - Decent quality, but packaging was rubbish and offers no protection unlike the Cokin hard case
Function: 2/5 - Works okay, but the colour cast is annoying, but as I said nothing that can't be fixed on photoshop - will just create an action for it.

Info
Name: Kingston Elite Pro 133x 4gb Compactflash
Price: £9
Genuine Equivalent: Sandisk Extreme 3 4gb Compactflash
Genuine Equivalent Price: £20
Link

So, not 3rd party perse, but I used to only be a sandisk/lexar man. At work we always got Kingston SD cards coming in to be restored because they were corrupt, so I avoided Kingston like the plague.

Considering the equivalent Kingston card was more than half cheaper than the Sandisk equivalent, and there were guys on here using Kingston and who had never had any problems, I bit the bullet and ordered.
Came in very fancy packaging, much better than I had expected...


...But my god was it a female-dog to get into :bang:


It's worth noting here that the Kingston cards have a lifetime warranty, whereas I believe Sandisk cards have only a 10 year warranty.

The card came in a very useful snap case, similar to the locking ones that Sandisk provide (I use the card pouch that comes with the extreme 3 cards anyway)


Build is fine - firm, rugged and tidy. Pin holes were all aligned correctly, and the decals on the actual card are clean and quite professional looking. (don't understand the flowers/plants though :shrug


Now the important thing - performance.
I stuck the camera at 1/5000 of a second on continuous high speed shutter release - 6.5fps. The card managed 21 RAWs (10 megapixels) before it caught up with the buffer. The extreme 3 managed 23. Uploading times were minimal, did not notice much of a difference, using an in-built card reader. The Kingston 4gb displays 309 shots left on a newly formatted card, in comparison to the Sandisk 2gb showing 148 shots left - just slightly bigger.

I've yet to use it in anger, since it was bought so I wouldn't have to change cards mid football shoot. But so far it seems okay, shot nearly 100 photos with it and nothing bad so far!

Bad points - Sandisk Extreme 3 cards all come with recovery software and a card pouch - good value for money (but I already have the recovery software and 2 pouches)

Price: 3/5 - Half the price of the equivalent sandisk, and just as good performance (so far), however nothing else thrown in - no extras
Design/Build: 5/5 - Just as good as the Sandisk, albeit not as pretty
Function: 4/5 - Slightly slower than the Sandisk, but yet to use it in anger

Used the Kingston card in anger today.
Football shoot, card kept up using high speed continuous shooting and only took 5 minutes to take 3.4gb of data off the card and onto the server.
Big for me.

failingretina said:

I bought the Hama version of this, and whilst only £15, it's cheaper than the Canon equivalent it does feel poorly made and flimsy it's no where near as cheap as what you paid and doesn't appear to be aswell constructed.

Click to expand...

Agreed, I got the Hama too, it feels really cheap, the one here looks sound for the price

Jambo_84 said:

Agreed, I got the Hama too, it feels really cheap, the one here looks sound for the price

Click to expand...

It's fantastic. A lot of people told me that it wasn't worth getting the Canon one but I'm glad I didn't go for the hama one!

Today:

Info
Name: Phottix BP-40D grip for Canon XXD
Price: £53
Genuine Equivalent: Canon BG-E2n
Genuine Equivalent Price: £130
Link

So, missed the post and had to go collect it from the PO.
Nice to see my expensive parcel was packaged nice and tidily, with care taken! [/sarcasm] (yes, #4 DOES show the grip's packaging bent in half to fit in the parcel)






So I'll do this review slightly differently and cover the basics first.
Build quality is excellent. Feels really firm, fits my hand nicely (although slightly too big for my unfortunately slightly feminine hands).
Every single button works fine, despite some reviews. The two buttons on the back are used to change the focus point and fire the flash, or zoom in and out when previewing/reviewing images. The shutter button feels firm, with obvious yet not obnoxious steps for autofocusing/metering and actual shutter release. The scroll wheel is a little loose for my liking but does the trick and it's clear where each step is. The grip works perfectly in continous shutter release mode.




The on/off switch is a little hard to grab, but doesn't pose any serious issues and is easy enough to turn on and off. The battery compartment door release switch is slightly stiff, but again, doesn't pose a serious issue.

The battery compartment is extremely rugged, with firm door closing and barely any play, however it's a slightly different story when the batteries are in, with the tiniest amount of movement from the batteries. Nothing major since they are in and firm by 2 little white hooks similar to the door of the 40D.




The grip is supplied with a contact cover for storage and a battery magazine for use with 6xAA batteries, which I doubt I'll ever use but one day might come in handy.



The manual is pretty useless since hopefully anyone with a brain can figure out how to use the grip, and there are diagrams in the camera manual for how to figure out how to open the battery door and store it.

Now, differences between the Canon BG-E2n and the Phottix BP-40D.

Differences

• The grip on the BP-40D is ever so slightly different to the BG-E2n, slightly grippier but slightly less comfortable
• The rear buttons on the BP-40D are slightly softer and spongier than the BG-E2n
• The ON/OFF switch is more recessed on the BG-E2n and slightly easier to turn on and off
• The scroll wheel on the BG-E2n is far more firm and satisfying
• The battery compartment door on the BP-40D is a lot more rigid and rugged than the BG-E2n, it doesn't feel like it's going to fall off
• The batteries move ever so slightly in the compartment on the BP-40D in comparison to the BG-E2n which has no play
• The front of the BG-E2n says 'Canon BG-E2n' whereas the BP-40D has nothing
• The bottom of the BP-40D says 'Phottix' whereas the BG-E2n has 'Canon'
• The tripod mount on the bottom of the BP-40D feels slightly plasticky, but it mounts on the tripod and is just as sturdy as the one on the BG-E2n and the 40D alone

So, finally, some pros and cons

Pros

• Cheap
• Battery compartment door is a lot firmer
• Grip is grippier
• Works and looks exactly similar to the BG-E2n

Cons

• Not a genuine Canon product - little to no resale value
• Slight play in the batteries inside the compartment
• Settings wheel doesn't feel quite responsive enough

Price: 4/5 - Less than half the price of the BG-E2n, works exactly the same
Design/Build: 4/5 - Pretty much exactly the same as the BG-E2n with minor, minor differences
Function: 5/5 - Perfect

Review completed
Please feel free to add your own reviews and I'll stick a link to the post in the index.

Info
Name: Yongnuo MC-36b Remote Cord
Price: £28
Genuine Equivalent: Canon TC-80N3
Genuine Equivalent Price: £110
Link

So, another quick delivery, arrived after less than a week from the mystical land of Hong Kong.
A rather suspect looking box, don't you think?
Especially for something that fits a Canon


Opening the box, fairly well packaged - a set of batteries, the remote and an instruction manual.


The instructions were probably translated from Japanese, so I wasn't holding high hopes for them, but the English is genuinely fantastic. Could have been an English product had the japanese bits not been there. Plus all the writing on the remote is English.


Evens comes with a little screen protector!


And a set of Duracell batteries! (AAA)


The remote is pretty fantastic. As far as build quality goes, it's extremely plasticky. The bit that looks like a grip? It's just plastic. Nothing on here feels extremely durable, and if you bent it, it's likely it would shatter. The top bit of the remote and the wire feel very heavy duty however, possibly because there's nothing in the bottom bit. The buttons all feel firm and responsive, and certainly work on-screen. You can use the remote as a simple remote release, which kind of defeats the purpose of my Yongnuo remote release, but hey ho One other thing I noticed, it's massive! Why is it so massive?!


The remote has 5 settings on screen - DELAY, LONG, INTVL, N, and a little quaver (music symbol note thing).
DELAY is how long before it releases the shutter, LONG is where you enter the exposure time you've set on the camera, INTVL (interval) is how long between each shot, and N is the number of shots to take, from 1-399, or alternatively an infinite amount (until you press for the shutter to stop).
Below the screen are 2 buttons - lightbulb/lock for turning on the back light or locking the remote, and timer start/stop - pressing this will start the shutter releasing according to the settings, and pressing it again will stop the shutter releasing. You have 4 directional buttons for changing the on-screen settings and a set button for confirming those settings.
All work perfectly, so no comments here.

Testing it out briefly on 10 shots, it's a bit strange to implement. What I think the remote does is take the shot, and then act as if it's re-metering and firing the shot again.
So, for example. You set your camera to manual mode and mf, focus and get the exposure settings right. Your camera beeps to let you know it's in focus. You take a shot, release the shutter button. 10 seconds later, you take exactly the same shot, same settings, same focus. Depress the shutter button half way, beep, depress fully, snap, job done. Now imagine repeating that over and over again in quick succession.
It is very strange to hear.

Also, if you don't set the LONG setting to equal the camera's shutter speed EXACTLY, the remote goes ahead without you. So if you keep the default setting of a 0 second shutter speed, and set your camera to a 2 second exposure and release it for 5 shots, you'll get 2 shots before the remote is sat there saying "Yeah, what now?"
Also, you can only change the exposure time in intervals of 1 second. Great if you have a 30 second exposure, not so if you have a 1/125 exposure, although I suppose setting the exposure time isn't a necessity - just let the remote do its thing.
Another strange thing I noticed - No off button :shrug:
You have to make sure everything is switched off (i.e. blinking lights not blinking) before putting it in your bag. Alternatively, I wrapped the batteries around the remote with an elastic band.


Pros

• Significantly cheaper than counterpart
• Does pretty much the same job
• Feels sturdy
• Backlight for the screen
• An 'infinite' shutter release setting
• Works as a regular shutter release too
• Might not be a Canon product, but it looks professional and the Yongnuo Digital bit looks super fancy!

Cons

• No off button
• Can only change the exposure time in intervals of 1 second
• Maximum amount of set releases is 399 - after that it's infinite
• Not a Canon product - hardly any resale value

Price: 4/5 - Much cheaper than a mega-overpriced timer release remote
Design/Build: 4/5 - Pretty stupid big, but fits hand nicely and all the buttons do what you'd expect and work in the same way
Function: 3/5 - Perfect for a cheapy timer release when the nearest one is quadruple the price, however a lack of an off button, a maximum set release number of 399 and exposure time changes in intervals of 1 second put this to a 3/5 instead of a 4 or potentially a 5/5 - even an off button would have made me a happy bunny.

Speaking of bunnies, Happy Easter! No, pun not intended!