Sony Come Unstuck

A failure in the glue holding a Sony CCD image sensor in place has caused several manufacturers to issue notices alerting consumers to possible failures.

Cameras and camcorders from Sony, Fujifilm, Konica Minolta and Canon have been affected. According to a Sony spokesperson, the issue arises in environments of high heat and humidity, which impacts the glue holding the CCD sensor in place, causing images to look blurry on the LCD screen or to not appear on the LCD at all.

 
The spokesperson noted that the images are in fact saved correctly on the camera and the incident rate was very low and “not a big concern in North America. We’re not issuing a recall, but a repair.”

Last Monday, Sony posted a notice on its Web site noting that select cameras manufactured prior to March 2004 may produce blurry images or no images at all. Cameras and camcorders manufactured after that date are not affected.

Sony will repair, for free, affected imaging products through Oct. 2, 2007, and cover the cost of shipping and handling.

The other manufacturers who incorporated the CCD have also posted notices on their respective Web sites offering free repairs for select cameras suffering from the defect. The Canon models include PowerShot A60, PowerShot A70, PowerShot A75, PowerShot A300, PowerShot A310 and several of its camcorders, including the Elura 40 MC and Elura 50.

Fujifilm models include the FinePix A303, F410 and F700.

Konica models affected include the 7i/Hi, A1, Xi, Xt, X20, S414 and F300.