OK, it’s my 50Th birthday soon and i’m Looking to get my self a treat, I have Leica Q and love it so i’m Thinking “this is the one time I will be able to justify the expense to the wife” shall I buy a Leica M. Now it’s quite an investment and I’m looking to hear some negatives to balance up pros and cons.
Has anyone here bought a Leica M digital and then sold it because they just don’t get on with it? What’s your story.
Thanks for taking the time.
Justin44
I have an M6, three M lenses and several LTM lenses with adapters. I've looked at the various digital M bodies quite a few times, but haven't yet made the jump. Summary:
M8 - Not full frame, now pretty old (no longer generally carried by the major dealers), and needs special IR cut filters because of colour shifts with wider lenses.
M9 - Solves some of the problems with the M8 and has a CCD sensor with something of a cult following. Not great at high ISO and has a rather poor, low resolution LCD screen. Has a major issue with flawed sensors that had a tendency to self-destruct over time. Leica used to have a free replacement program, but this has now ended. Early sensor replacements still at risk of degrading. Later replacements had upgraded sensors where this issue was fixed, but they can be hard to identify (a specific factory firmware indicates an upgrade, but this may have been written over if the user installed a later firmware).
M240 - New CMOS sensor that some people like less than the M9 sensor, but better at high ISO and has higher resolution. Better LCD screen and can accept an EVF. Unlike the M9 and M10, can shoot video. The bulkiest of the M bodies.
M10 - Slimmed down body close to the size of a film M. Very expensive, even secondhand.
All the Leica digital bodies take expensive proprietary batteries that have never been made in large numbers, which makes me worry about long-term availability (for several years it's been very hard to find batteries for Leica's Digital Modul R, discontinued in 2007).
As others have said, not everyone gets on with RF focusing. You also have to consider how much you want to invest in lenses - a set of 3 secondhand M lenses may well cost more than a used M240 body.