Time for a new camera 1DX Mark III or EOS R3

[2BOLD4U]

I have the urge to purchase a new camera and considering making the jump to mirrorless. I currently have a 1DX Mark II, 5D Mark IV and a whole array of lens. I spend 90% of my time shooting sports and the other 10% random stuff for the local paper.  

So, my question is, go Mirrorless or stick with the relabeled work horse the 1DX Mark III?

[rs-eos]

What is your budget?  If going mirrorless, will that budget include new RF lenses? Or, do you wish to just get a body at this point and use your existing lenses?

[2BOLD4U]

If I went mirrorless, I would only get the body to start. 

[wq9nsc]

I use a pair of 1DX III bodies for sports and like their 1DX II and 1DX predecessors, they have performed flawlessly in all weather conditions.  Has the R3 freeze/glitch issue ever been fully resolved? 

At some point, Canon will introduce a hopefully highly reliable R1.  If you want to go mirrorless from your current 1 series, I would wait for it after it is out a few months.

Rodger

[Waddizzle]

“ Has the R3 freeze/glitch issue ever been fully resolved? “

I am almost convinced that this issue is 100% operator error.  I suspect people have their wireless communication enabled and the camera tries to connect to nearby Bluetooth device.  Similar issues have been reported for the R5, R6, and the R6 Mark II.

They seem to always report these incidents when they are among a crowd of people.  They send the camera to Canon for testing, and Canon cannot find any issues.

If you ask them about their wireless settings, the response is usually anger or silence.

[wq9nsc]

Bluetooth was invented in 1994, has been widely used since 2004, and is in a huge range of consumer and professional devices today.  If the camera is locking up because of a poorly designed Bluetooth set of protocols in the communications subsystem, that is a design fault.  I consulted with the automotive industry for years and if your windshield leaked in the rain due to poor gasket design, it wouldn't be blamed on the driver for being stupid and taking the car out when it is raining.  Well designed products don't make the user jump through hoops to use it in the intended fashion just like the issue with RF connection of Canon flashes isn't user error for not using them only in a Faraday cage.

Canon makes incredible optics and sensors but the software and firmware that ties everything together is a weak spot.  This is disappointing but not terribly surprising given that their DPP software has been around for decades and is still clunky and has never properly utilized GPU capabilities like other numeric intensive image software.  I just processed images from a basketball game last week using the most current version (4.18.10.0) and DPP still has the "memory leak" issue that has been present since the beginning. 

I probably put DPP through more than most because I was processing 1,100 images shot with three different bodies but it is still annoying to have to exit DPP every 20 to 30 minutes so that it resumes crisp behavior instead of how it behaves once it grows to over 7 GB of memory usage.  It is NOT a lack of system resources because this dual CPU system has 256 GB of memory per Xeon CPU and each Nvidia workstation graphics card has 20 GB of memory.  It crunches through video using two different editors without complaint but DPP is poorly behaved.  When DPP becomes slow, under 5% of system RAM resources are in use but the program itself has grown fat and slow until it is killed and relaunched.

As more tricks are performed with camera software and firmware, shortcomings in that area become more obvious.  Hopefully Canon addresses this shortcoming in an otherwise well designed set of gear.

Rodger

[shadowsports]

Hi Gents,

Merry Christmas to one and all.  I haven't been following the R1 too closely since I think its announcement is still a ways off.  The only thing I've heard is that it wont have Quad Pixel AF.   An R3 mkII has also been rumored for 2025.  

One of the fixes in the R3 firmware v1.6.0 is "Fixes an issue that may cause the camera, in rare instances, to experience a delayed restart after the camera has gone into Auto Power Off".  I do not know if this addresses the failure to resume behavior.  I haven't seen any posts about it recently (either).  

I considered the R3 heavily before buying the R5 C.  Its all the things a 1 series is in a mirrorless package + 6K video. 

If the Wake Up issue was fixed in v1.6.0 then my vote is for the R3.   Its also $1500 less expensive at the moment.  

Canon R3 vs Canon 1D X III Detailed Comparison (cameradecision.com) 

[Waddizzle]

“ One of the fixes in the R3 firmware v1.6.0 is "Fixes an issue that may cause the camera, in rare instances, to experience a delayed restart after the camera has gone into Auto Power Off".  I do not know if this addresses the failure to resume behavior.  I haven't seen any posts about it recently (either). “

Like I said above, I have strong suspicion ones that the issue is related to wireless communications being enabled when it is not in active use.  

I used my 6D2 quite often with my iPad.  The described behavior is consistent with the camera waking up after an Auto-Power-Off cycle.  It wakes up and looks to establish a wireless connection.  This is a great feature when you are actually using a wireless connection.

I just need to tap re-connect on the iPad and I am good to go.  It makes sense to disable wireless connections when you are not using them.  But some people do not see it that way.

[shadowsports]

I always did this as well.  Never had an issue as wireless or BT was only ever on when I was using it.  GPS (mode2) was always on.   My 6D2 always woke and quickly.  I posted to a R3 thread asking for R3 owners to post feedback after update to 1.6.0