Sony A7R V: Intolerable High-Pitched Whine when Pixel Shift is Enabled

2023-03-19 • SEND FEEDBACK |
Related: build quality, digital sensor, pixel shift, Sony, Sony A7R, Sony A7R II, Sony A7R III, Sony A7R IV, Sony A7R V, Sony mirrorless, Sony Pixel Shift, true-color sensor or image

I sold my rock-solid Sony A1 to raise funds for the A7R V, so I do not have the A1 as a backup.

UPDATE March 21: Sony received my camera (Sony Pro Services is excellent), and isn’t sure what’s wrong. They will be sending me a replacement camera.
UPDATE March 23: Sony pro services promptly replaced the problem camera. No explanation is available as to cause, but apparently it was not a simple repair. I have nothing but praise for Sony Pro services every time I use it (infrequently).

....

I sent back my original loaner Sony A7R V; it operated flawlessly.

The brand-new one I received has a serious problem...

When I turn on the A7R V, it generates a high pitched hum, like some straining transformer. Never heard anything like it with a Sony camera before.

The problem seems to be prompted by having pixel shift enabled; I can repeat the behavior at will by disabling pixel shift and powering the camera off/on

I took a video with sound but am not posting it here, at least not yet.

1. Set the camera to pixel shift (4 or 16 shot).
2. Turn the camera off.
3. Turn the camera on... high pitched whine continuously.
4. While the whine is happening, turn off pixel shift and the whine goes away. Turn pixel shift back on and no whine, but power the camera off/on and it whines all over again.

I had no such problem with the previous A7R V or any previous Sony A7R series camera. But I guess all brands can have their issues. Now it seems I have to put things on hold to either get this camera repaired or replaced.

Is it a hardware issue or perhaps some software bug? Dunno, but as of 2023-03-19, there no firmware update for the Sony A7R V. Which is pretty sad, because there are plenty of other issues Sony could address besides bugs like this.

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Adrian B writes:

I had the same problem with my A7R5 in the wintertime with temperatures below 5° C and pixel shift enabled. I forced my camera dealer to exchange the camera because it was new then and the new one does not have this issue, at least not at the moment. My guess is it has to do with the new IS unit.

DIGLLOYD: yes, I think it is related to the image stabilization unit.