Anyone have good experience's buying Canon Grey Market?
 

Happy Thanksgiving Weekend To All!
Looking to buy Canon 5D Mark 4 and lenses grey market and wondered if any members here had good experiences and can point me in right direction or talk me off the ledge.
Thanks In Advance
AJ

Negates US warranty. Maybe buy used at B&H or KEH and save even more. KEH gives a 180 day warranty on used.

Agreed on keh as an alternative. They’re here in Atlanta and I ‘be done lots of biz with them with no issues. I personally would not buy grey market dueto the warranty issue (but if you buy from keh, it’s a used product).

+1 on KEH. They are good to work with. I got burned on grey market camera years ago so could not recommend it.

George

So, having shot with Canon gear professionally for the better part of 15 years, here's my 2¢, FWIW.

I would not buy gray market Canon gear in the USA because CPS, Canon Professional Services, nor the "retail chain" of Canon service facilities for "regular customers" absolutely will not touch a gray market camera, period.

So, if it breaks, and if its a DSLR, it eventually will break, it will become a very nice paperweight. I've got one sitting on my desk in my study.

Just some additional info for context: All my DSLRs eventually failed. The thing that usually fails on them is either 1) the shutter or 2) the mirror box mechanism or 3) both. Though, I've also seen some cameras cracked through the frame on more than one occasion, too.

I've dealt with all three of the above failure modes using full-on pro-level Canon DSLR bodies, the 1D-series. These models have considerably improved durability and reliability capabilities over "consumer" bodies, and...they still failed. Canon pro bodies are rated for 300,000 shutter actuations, but I've never seen one actually meet that spec in the real world. And consumer bodies are typically rated at 1/2 that, ~150,000 actuations.

This is why professionals have a very different set of top requirements than amateurs or enthusiast photographers.

Most "amateurs or enthusiast" photographers are focused on what I call "bells & whistles": specs, features, pixel count, frame rates, no. of AF points, whatever. None of the stuff pros care about.

All the pros I shoot with are overarchingly concerned with 1) durability 2) reliability (not the same thing as durability) 3) shutter life 4) the company's service, repair and support infrastructure.

With gray market cameras, you get none of that service & support infrastructure.

So, if I were you, I'd get off the ledge...in the long run, its false economy to buy gray-market.

So Mike's and Ivan's comments on buying used from KEH & B&H is also good advice. Canon will service a used camera that is still within their service policies and the 5D4 obviously still is. Just be sure the camera is a US Market camera. IIRC, the serial number will distinguish a US market camera from a gray market camera. As its a 5D4, and still in production, you could get some nice clean, lightly used bodies and same some money for lenses. I've bought some of my Fuji XF lenses used but like new and the savings can add up when putting together a system.

Also, if you decide to buy used, check out used camera broker MPB at MPB.com; I've sold a bunch of gear to them and they are very good. Also check out the For Sale forums at Fred MIranda's photography web site. You have to pay a small fee to advertise as a seller, but I've bought most of my gear from Fred Miranda's Buy/Sell forum over the years.

If you do decide to buy used, try to get the seller to provide you with the number of total actuations on the shutter. There are somes apps, e.g. Exif Viewer, IIRC, that will tell you how many total shutter actuations have been on a particular camera body. You can't go by the file number because this typically rolls over after 9,999 frames. There are other EXIF apps that also show total no. of actuations.