This past week, my constant companion, my digital camera, caught a virus of sorts along with my laptop which now needs to be reformatted. I know, when it rains, it pours, right?
Well, what happened with the camera is, my daughter dropped it and after she did, the camera started returning a ‘lens error’ code. When I try to turn it on, the lens doesn’t come out, then the screen flashes a quick ‘Lens Error 12′ then turns black and shuts down.
At the time I bought it, I think I spent about $200. It was a little on the high side considering that now you can buy a digital camera with the same specs for about half the price, I knew I didn’t want to spend money getting it repaired. The cost of repairing it would probably cost the same as buying a new one anyway.
So, I turned online to see if this camera can be salvaged. I found out that this error is common in a lot of these Kodak EasyShare cameras. I lucked out that I am only having trouble now after over two years of constant use. Some people started returning these errors almost as soon as they got their cameras. From what I read in the forums, it really is better to just go on and buy a new one. Photo.net is one place where I found some of the more informative posts about this lens error. The problem is caused by the mechanism that makes the lens move in and out of the camera. Some people found the problem fixed by merely changing the battery - apparently it doesn’t like low levels of battery power and just changing to a fully charged batteries fixed the problem. A lot of people also found that banging the camera fixed the problem.
Why does banging the camera work? It works because apparently, after time, the gears wear out or break off and the small particles that break off fall and cause the other gears to jam or not catch at all. One enterprising person took his Kodak 330 apart to illustrate this problem with step by step photos. Visit this site to find out what causes the lens error on Kodak 330.
It is unfortunate that so many of the products manufactured nowadays are built to be disposable and irreparable. I wouldn’t go as far as calling it a scam or conspiracy as others on the forums, but it does reek of something like the Colonix scam where you are baited to make a purchase by ‘too good to be true’ promises only to find out that you will end up spending more later.
So I’ll probably buy another digital camera, but I don’t think it will be a Kodak. I wish I could afford an SLR, but that will be another dream post.
