RED DIGITAL CINEMA RED Compact EVF

You don't get what you pay for: Poor Example of Buy American

I usually buy from high-quality and top-customer-support brands: Really Right Stuff, Bright Tangerine, Canon (still photography and cinema), Nikon, etc. Buy once, cry once is usually the philosophy that my consumerism abides by. RED doesn't seem to be in the same league as these companies, apparently. I'll go more into my experience with this particular product: I was really looking forward to a native, first-party EVF after trying out the EVF-V70 from Canon for their C700 and other cinema cameras. Ordered this for my Red Komodo X thinking I'd get a similar experience, despite the lack of reviews. Unfortunately, the copy I received failed to even boot up when connected to my Komodo X. I figured I'd solve it by calling their RED support which is based in Foothill Ranch, CA. Nice enough tech, good English, polite conversation, but we exhausted troubleshooting over the phone, and when the customer support rep took over via their antiquated ticketing system, she sent me uninsured shipping labels and requested I send in the whole camera and EVF package ÷ this way (around $12K worth of equipment). She welcomed me to pay for my own shipping if I thought it was necessary. No drop-off repair services are offered unlike Canon and Nikon, which is a bit strange of a corporate hill-to-die-on for nickel and diming. B&H didn't have a problem and were super-professional with sending insured labels for a quick return. I shouldn't have to pay money for a new product and two week repair time that should be working out of the box for $5000. Opposite of white-glove treatment, and probably why Nikon could afford to buy RED and why other DP's are buying Sony, Arri, and Canon. In contrast, two copies of Kinefinity Eagle EVF's (SDI and HDMI) that I purchased and received from B&H worked out of the box. I know, a very low bar to clear, but this EVF just didn't. Disappointing. Build and the compact and clean package without separate SDI and power cables looked pretty sweet when assembling, but a completely non-functioning product and odd choices in repair shipping policy are difficult to ignore.