Mr G
Suspended / Banned
- Messages
- 2,392
- Name
- James
- Edit My Images
- Yes
I eventually bought my pocket wizards 
and so far I am delighted with them.. I had investigated and questioned people about the problems they were having when used with the Canon 580 ex 11, as I have two, but so far so good.
I had emailed pocket wizard but had no reply so decided to go ahead and buy...Then this morning I received this reply from there support service team I thought I would put it up to maybe see what you think.
2 questions regarding distance and flash failure.
Hi James,
You've mentioned two separate issues related to the 580EX II flash, which I'll try to address individually.
First, the 580EX II among several other Canon flashes emits some radio noise around the frequencies that our radios use to communicate, which can reduce their effective range. While this noise does tend to affect the 433MHz frequency European/CE radios a little bit less, it can still present some issues. We've come up with a number of solutions to this issue, mainly our AC5 and AC7 shields, which you can read more about here: http://wiki.pocketwizard.com/index.php?title=Long_Range_Performance
Either of these shields will dampen the RF energy coming from the flashes, and allow for normal operating range. The AC7 shields also offers an umbrella and 1/4"-20 thread mount for easier mounting of your flash/radio/umbrella combination.
In regards to the other issue you've mentioned, we've actually spent quite a bit of time looking into the 580EX II, and various ways that the flash can fail with or without our radios in use. Our research indicates that there's a mechanical issue in the 580EX II that can happen with High Speed Sync, and cause the flash to only operate with full power output. It doesn't require our radios to happen, though a lot of people use High Speed Sync or E-TTL features of their Speedlites for the first time, or more heavily, when using our radios.
Everything we "say" to the flash is an E-TTL command we learned from the E-TTL system - and as such, it's highly unlikely that our saying Hey flash, please fire at one of your known levels is presenting an issue to the flash. There's is a microprocessor inside the flash between the flashs hot shoe and its triggering/tube components. We tell the microprocessor, in its own language, to flash at pre-defined levels - from there, what happens with communications from the flashs microprocessor to the triggering/tube circuits is beyond our control.
After looking extensively into this issue, we firmly believe the issue is in the flashtube/reflector alignment - which our radios can do nothing to move around. It's important to note that this issue doesn't occur exclusively with PocketWizard radios, but does occur exclusively with the 580EX II.
Hope that helps! Let me know if you have any further questions about any of the above.
Thanks,
Ian Ray
PocketWizard Technical Support Specialist
Interested in any veiws on this especially Hoppy's....
cheers
and so far I am delighted with them.. I had investigated and questioned people about the problems they were having when used with the Canon 580 ex 11, as I have two, but so far so good. I had emailed pocket wizard but had no reply so decided to go ahead and buy...Then this morning I received this reply from there support service team I thought I would put it up to maybe see what you think.
2 questions regarding distance and flash failure.
Hi James,
You've mentioned two separate issues related to the 580EX II flash, which I'll try to address individually.
First, the 580EX II among several other Canon flashes emits some radio noise around the frequencies that our radios use to communicate, which can reduce their effective range. While this noise does tend to affect the 433MHz frequency European/CE radios a little bit less, it can still present some issues. We've come up with a number of solutions to this issue, mainly our AC5 and AC7 shields, which you can read more about here: http://wiki.pocketwizard.com/index.php?title=Long_Range_Performance
Either of these shields will dampen the RF energy coming from the flashes, and allow for normal operating range. The AC7 shields also offers an umbrella and 1/4"-20 thread mount for easier mounting of your flash/radio/umbrella combination.
In regards to the other issue you've mentioned, we've actually spent quite a bit of time looking into the 580EX II, and various ways that the flash can fail with or without our radios in use. Our research indicates that there's a mechanical issue in the 580EX II that can happen with High Speed Sync, and cause the flash to only operate with full power output. It doesn't require our radios to happen, though a lot of people use High Speed Sync or E-TTL features of their Speedlites for the first time, or more heavily, when using our radios.
Everything we "say" to the flash is an E-TTL command we learned from the E-TTL system - and as such, it's highly unlikely that our saying Hey flash, please fire at one of your known levels is presenting an issue to the flash. There's is a microprocessor inside the flash between the flashs hot shoe and its triggering/tube components. We tell the microprocessor, in its own language, to flash at pre-defined levels - from there, what happens with communications from the flashs microprocessor to the triggering/tube circuits is beyond our control.
After looking extensively into this issue, we firmly believe the issue is in the flashtube/reflector alignment - which our radios can do nothing to move around. It's important to note that this issue doesn't occur exclusively with PocketWizard radios, but does occur exclusively with the 580EX II.
Hope that helps! Let me know if you have any further questions about any of the above.
Thanks,
Ian Ray
PocketWizard Technical Support Specialist
Interested in any veiws on this especially Hoppy's....
cheers
Nothing to add really. Both are known issues and have been debated on here and elswehere. Seems like a pretty good summary from Ian Ray, PW are very helpful.