Extreme teardown - Lumix digital camera

[pecocoa]

I actually have almost similar camera which I had to take apart.(Lumix LS-60 or something) A piece of tape was jamming the optical assembly, because I was testing super macro with a binocular lens taped on the optical assembly. When I was shutting down the camera the tape got sucked inside there. The piece got stuck on rubber surrounding, protecting the lens assembly from dust and things like that. Optical assembly looks identical to what I remember having.

[Knaeckebrotsaege]

Panasonic Lumix DMC-LS2

Last list price: 119eur

was praised in tests as a "cheap entry-level camera that doesn't shoot cheap entry-level camera style photos"

PS: destroying the LCD was a pretty dumb move, as a replacement for said camera costs at least 21 pounds on ebay (from a hong kong seller, so probably crappy quality clone ones), so you could have easily made a profit from a dead camera (for another teardown project perhaps?)

[coondogtheman1234]

How do you power up the white LEDs in an TFT LCD screen? do you just put 3.6 volts to the 2 wires on the ribbon strip the LEDs are on? I have one from an old PSP video game screen from a replacement I did and I want to power up the LEDs and make a light out of them

[bejius]

OMG how tiny are those e-magnet traces ?!

[CampKohler]

Now put the case back together, leaving out all the guts. Fill it full of gravel or something to give it some heft and leave it in a public place. Take a movie to show how long someone pockets it.

[CampKohler]

It's hard to believe they can build all that stuff for the price they do. They must not be unionized. :-)

[CxC2007]

It´s amazing the amount of components of this cameras. the optical mechanics are a masterpiece.

and they are so cheap now.

[douro20]

@CxC2007

Yeah, it has Leica optics.

[MrTurboturbine]

love these videos



[joe72205]

The filter in the aperture is a Neutral Density filter that probably reduces the light level by an f-stop or so.

[superdau]

When doing teardowns I always wonder when I reached the "point of no return". At least clipping a flex connector is a dead giveaway ;) .

I "converted" an old digicam to IR by replacing it's filter to block daylight. Was much easier than it would have been with this camera though, because the filter wasn't glued to the sensor but somewhere before in the optical path. Did I see correctly that there still was another glass on the sensor underneath? (so it'd still be dust proof if converted)

[AnnoyingVerification]

Those are Murata Gyro's, ENC-03 or similar

[Films4You]

Thanks detailed rip-apart teardown; show some of the engineering that goes in to things like this :)

Some people use the Flash circut for shocking, (pun), things.

[orbiter8]

LOL @ cap discharge time :) It's ok you can laugh back though Mike... Got a huge shock myself yesterday from a flyback cap... Up one arm, right across my chest and down the other arm :o Didn't even think the thing had a cap in it. I disabled the ZVS circuit to do some checks and..yep.. The flyback was still producing around 30 pulsing 4mm arcs from it's earth terminal when disconnected :o

Great vid as always.

[AintBigAintClever]

Next time I'm asked "are you any good at fixing digital cameras?" I'll show them this video before telling them to bugger off to Argos* and buy a new one!

*other high street electronics retailers are available.

[dr3wf]

Ive been shocked by one of them caps before lol

[lennyhome]

Great video. I've enjoyed it. The funky stuff at the end that concentrates the light is a fresnel lens.

[donpalmera]

Do you know what processor was in that camera? I couldn't make out the markings from the video. I've seen some really weird stuff like "micro SPARC" that seem to only be used in very special and rad sensitive applications in simple point and click cameras.

[robot797]

the audi gets desinced around 12:00-13:19 just after a video jump

[mikeselectricstuff]

@robot797 Not sure what's happenning there - Sync looks OK in the editor.

Not serious enough to justify another 8 hours upload time!

[robot797]

@mikeselectricstuff 8 hour for 30 min

wow you have slow internet :P

[Seaweedaids]

@robot797 it'd take much longer than that to upload 30 mins at 720p on my internet the joys of british adsl....

[AintBigAintClever]

@robot797 Remember that ADSL is designed for high speed download, low speed upload. 448Kbit for 8Mbit ADSL, 1.4Mbit for 24Mbit ADSL2+. Cable TV areas will be faster if you're lucky enough to live in a cabled area, fibre will be faster but ridiculously expensive in the UK.

[MrGerbilBrain]

@mikeselectricstuff it is 30:30 long, but at my house it takes like 5 min to upload a video of about 3-7min long.

[Gameboygenius]

I have a similar camera (Lumix DMC-LS2) and I'm pretty sure those things are gyros to detect which way you're holding the camera. This gets stored in the file as EXIF rotation data and software that's aware of it can use it. My new point and shoot lacks this, which is annoying me.

I'm disappointed that you didn't max out the shutter until it went completely whack. And the audio desync is annoying. You hear a screw drop and see it a second later.

[batteryhead15]

That cap always gets you in the end.

[mikeselectricstuff]

@batteryhead15 That would really hurt, but you'd have to be sitting on the camera to get a zap in your -end- :-)