Paul C. Buff, Inc. Technical Forum

I've thought about it and believe that's what a beta program is for, as somebody has already suggested.

1) The unit (if it is indeed as close to ready as I think it is) would be in the hands of a few respected and experienced 3rd parties, increasing the credibility and dispelling any "vaporware" type comments;

2) PCB would get additional testing and feedback - for free, reducing the risk and increasing the quality of the product when shipped.

If there are strong arguments against such a program I'd like to hear them. That said my faith in PCB has increased considerably as I understand he has managed to ship the CyberCommander, a very sophisticated product with an LCD screen and UI complexity similar to what's on the Einstein.

Is your target still end of february or has it been even more delays because of the lead times?

Anything about europe yet?


This question isn't really related to einstein but.
Is is possible to make an analogue powersupply with a currentlimiter so it only uses x Amount of watt to get rid of the initial peak, like the switching digital supply you were going to have in ABmax.

As the person who started this thread I must add it was derailed by some overzealous members. When I started this topic I was mealy interested in approximate release date and availability and the actual images of units because I wanted to propose for my school to get them, since they seem to be in excellent educational price point. But again I am sorry for some of the bad taste and nasty responses that followed.

You will sold separately Pyrex frosted dome? How much it will cost if you sell? I may try to mount it on AB. Thanks.

The frosted dome won't fit on AB. Einstein modeling lamp is smaller and the flashtube is a smaller diameter. There just isn't room on the AB/WL to get a dome to fit between the lamps and the reflector mounting system, plus the modeling lamp sticks way out from the backplate.

Just curious about a ring light for the Einstein line. Is that on the horizon or would I be better served going with an ABR?

There are no plans now for an Einstein-like ring flash.

TS

Perhaps Einstein-like needs to be rephrased. The Einstein-pioneered traits I too would like to see across the product range including on ring flashes and bigger output lights are:

1. IGBT and voltage control (delivering action-stopping flash durations and high color consistency);
2. Flash consistency within 0.10 f/stop
3. Fast recycle
4. Digital wireless control interface and SD card slot for firmware.

It would be disappointing indeed if Einstein is the only unit that has these advanced traits. Item #4 may be less important for the ring flash, but actually could come in handy, for use in conjunction with other lights as well as for use off camera in a pinch. It'd be good to have an optional accessory modeling light attachment for it for such a use.

Regards

Alex

My apologies in advance, but do you have any updates for us on schedule? The anticipation is killing me! ;->

-Dan

We regret to inform customers that our Chief Engineer, Dr. Michael Morgan suffered a totally unexpected grand mal seizure Tuesday, while doing final pre-production testing on Einstein. Fortunately we have an EMT capable staff member who saved his life and we got him to the hospital in time. Mike is home resting now and begging to finish up his work at home despite a pea size brain mass that is thought to be the cause, and which is yet to be fully diagnosed. For those interested, Mike has been my friend and Chief Engineer in two companies, dating back into the 1970s.

We are reluctant to subject him to any excess at this point in time, so much of this work is going to fall on me and on other members of our staff. This is certain to add a couple of weeks to the Einstein release. We anticipate having our production vendor produce about a dozen Einsteins in, hopefully, full final production form, next week. Following successful evaluation of these units we should be ready to go into production.

My own work schedule is already about 14 hours - 7 days a week. We have been scouring employment agencies for additional highly capable engineering help for a year now. Seems our requirements are higher than the available work force. Fortunately we hired one very capable engineer about three weeks ago, but getting up to speed on this stuff takes time.

With the Einstein pre order list now over 2500 units, believe me getting this product right and shipping is our number one priority. I have been testing and using a pre production Einstein for about a month now and can safely report it, at least in my opinion, is a joy in every regard. I hope our customers will bear with us on this.