It does not give me the slightest pleasure in reporting my dead Pentax K-x White. It has the persistent memory card error no matter what card that I have put into the camera SD slot. I have tried seven different individual SD memory cards of four different brands in Sandisk Extreme III 4 Gig, PNY Optima SDHC 8 Gig, Transand SDHC 8 Gb and Kingston SDHC 4 Gb. All of the memory cards are working fine in my Pentax K20D.
I call up Pentax Customer Support with toll free number 1(800)877-0155 last Thursday and I was mislead by the representative in waiting for her email instruction. It was likely my fault in not confirming the email twice with her. On 2nd call to Pentax Customer Support today on Monday, I was glad to talk to Matt who was courteous and responsive. Instead of email, Matt outlined the critical information that I need to package my dead Pentax K-x to send in.
Here are the rough steps to follow for servicing my K-x under warranty. The address is actually the physical address of CRIS camera service
- Package it for shipment to this address, I will be using USPS priority with $500 insurance
Pentax Service Department
250 North 54 Street,
Chandler, AZ 85226 - Provide proof of purchase as in an invoice or email notification on purchase. In my case, I will send in my Paypal invoice with Beach Camera. It is utmost important that the invoice has the name of the owner and the date of purchase for warranty service
- Provide a brief note on the problem. I am using this blog page to describe my problems with dead Pentax K-x white in NOT able to read any SDHC memory cards.
- Provide contact information as in phone contact and email. I will need to include them in the printout of this blog page
My problem is simply that my Pentax K-x white can't read any memory cards that I have used. The same set of cards work fine on my Pentax K20D in both reading and writing.
It goes as if something get damaged in the card reader in the camera. Matt from Pentax Customer Support offered me the suggestion on camera "reset" and I tried that option but the "Memory Card Error" still persisted. I am in my wit's end on troubleshooting the problem. It appears like a hardware failure.
While I am explaining the problem, there are also two complaints on the physical appearance of my white K-x after nine months of usage. Though it is free from smudges and dirt after months of usage. The white K-x does has its cosmetic problems in having a chrome line worn out easily as you can see in this picture on the chrome line below the shutter release which has lost partially the metallic chrome strip in various spots under the shutter release. And the broken chrome line has become somewhat sharp edges for me to hold the camera.
And another minor cosmetic but critical issue to me is the lost of the red SR label in front. The combination of red SR label is the best recognition of Pentax SR feature that is built into the Pentax body and I really missed that label on my white K-x. I think I lost it after 6 months of usage. The red SR label is at the bottom and it appears as white in the following picture
I truly hope that Pentax Service Department can help me fix my Pentax K-x White and that I get to use it once again without issues. I was informed about 4 weeks of service time and I will send the camera out on August 31, 2010 and I hope my loyal readers cheer me up while my beloved Pentax K-x White is in service.
Update:
- 8/21/2010 -- broken at 9 months of beautiful service
- 8/31/2010 -- shipped out to CRIS with USPS priority
- 9/2/2010 -- arrival in CRIS
- 9/8/2010 -- parts back ordered from Japan
- 10/1/2010 -- parts arrived in CRIS, repair started
- ETA unknown in each call
- 10/11/2010 -- repaired camera arrived at my home from CRIS
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