The Denon Prime Range to avoid ? Be careful with the slightest problem in France

Engine DJ Hardware Media Players
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I had been absent since the end of August because a colleague was killed on a motorbike and subsequently my P4 had a problem. Let me explain… Just after installing an update, one of the small OLED screens in the FX 2 zone broke down! while the weekend before everything was perfect, the Prime 4 has less than 108 performances to its credit (or even less because of the COVID period) with an average use of 10 hours max per event.

I can understand that there is more or less regular wear depending on the user of the fader, crossfader, rotary knob, pitch fader or even an encoder, but here an OLED screen for less than 25 euros is for me invoice 292€. No, but are they serious??? 260 euros of labor or we are told to have the products repaired rather than renewing them to reduce waste and premature obsolescence!

My P4 dates from October 12, 2019, I had it at reseller price. There if the 8 small screens break down one after the other we are on a bill of 2336 euros, is there not a problem???

I think part of it must be taken care of by Denon (Algam). How can a screen fail so easily??? Are the screens poorly powered or poorly managed by the control brain which displays the different information, is the energy saving mode (decrease in brightness when not in use or partial use of the controller) poorly calibrated ???

I have a poor quality connected watch that I have had for almost 7 years (bought for 80 euros), it has a color OLED screen and it still works (certainly no more updates and the battery no longer holds and a change of bracelet), but the screen has never had a problem and yet it has been used for almost 24 hours.

And to think that I bought a P4+ and that I have a Prime GO, I must not have problems at the same time, the bill could be very painful, forced to sell my vehicle lol We have equipment with one hand labor higher than a branded car dealership and even higher than Apple (70 euros on average per hour).

I should have bought a Rane Four rather than buying the P4+.

I am very careful!

The controllers are transported in flight cases and used outside of flight, so the problem of wear and tear such as overheating is impossible!

The worst thing is that according to Algam it will be normal and that the price is almost identical between their after-sales service and the approved supports!

When I was a reseller the labor rate was not €114 including tax per hour, for the Prime 4… there would be 2.5 hours of assembly + dismantling in total.

I dismantled a friend’s P4 because when it was purchased the SATA cable was in it, I took it apart in less than 15 minutes, I admit for reassembly it took me a little over 20 minutes .

I am really disappointed and frustrated!

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You certain that’s an OLED?

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She will be 7 years old next year (July) and the little Chinese are ahead (AMOLED)! Afterwards the thing is that in any case a screen does not break down so easily, you have to look at the use of TVs or Smartphones equipped with OLED and which are on 24 hours a day.

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OLEDs can’t take as rough treatment as LCDs and certainly don’t have the lifespan. They have some advantages, like true blacks, no difference in appearance with viewing angle, and low power requirements, but suffer from burn-in, dead bands over time, and just outright completely dying all of the sudden. It’s very much hit or miss with them, and a device that has a bunch of little ones is certainly possible to have one going bad. It’s a matter of probability.

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The final problem is not the screen because it is only worth €25.80 excluding VAT (it is worth less we will say it will be the price including VAT and not excluding VAT as they tell me, I have given the price on a spare parts sales site, they are making a little margin) The problem is the hourly rate, Algam and their approved partners are gorging themselves! 114€ including tax per hour of labor… they cracked! And I can confirm that the watch was an AMOLED, purchased in China during a long stay, the same watch was worth €249 with a coupon discount of €50 in France, or €199.

OLED TVs are great, nice contrast and no risk of having clouding effects in the corners or other places on the screen

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A lot of the posts on this thread are awkward to read and difficult to follow.

It seems to boil down to

• Nothing should even go wrong • Repairs should be free forever and ever.

Both are lovely ideals, and I’d probably chant either or both of those myself but sadly they’re fantasy across all makes and all models

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At no time do I talk about free! :thinking:

Denon is not a car or a Macbook! :man_shrugging:

In France, consumer rights have sounded the alarm so that, depending on the cost of repair, it is more accessible, in order to favor repair instead of renewing the product, to reduce waste, overconsumption or premature obsolescence, as a result the prices at a large number of brands the hourly labor rate has been reduced and to two price bands depending on the product, small electronics from €39 incl. tax per hour and large type product household appliances €79/hour, a PSA group car dealership takes between €58 and €78 including tax/hour for labor.

Denon is Ferrari, I don’t think so! lol

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But any item can go wrong

It is a genuine business practice that your prices to your customers, who hire you as their DJ, should include a suitable slice to put aside to cover the cost of repairs. How often, or infrequent, a repair is needed is something which you might want to adjust as you go.

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Then you got lucky if it’s lasted.

Not sure who Algam is.

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Except that coincidentally, the problem occurred just after the P4 update when restarting! I have colleagues who spend 3x more evenings than me and apart from problems with worn faders or the play/pause button, they have never had this kind of hardware problem on an X screen.

Furthermore, as I have indicated more than once, I was a former sound and light reseller in a brand in France and I ask my former colleagues for news regarding product problems on different brands and they have not. I haven’t had any feedback like this yet.

So is this a fault with this small screen???

The worst part is that before the release of Engine OS 3.X.X, I never used Area of Effect FX 1/2.

Even the competitor starting with P…, doesn’t take 114€ of labor lol

The video below was hoping to be able to correct the problem by installing from an earlier version, but nothing fixed the problem. I even tried a factory reset with the Wipe utility that Denon support had provided to a colleague following an OS bug, so he could resolve his problem and it worked.

For my part unfortunately the problem is hardware and not software.

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Apparently the oled screens that break down seem to be a disease on a lot of equipment in the prime range. I’ve seen a lot of complaints about this on various facebook groups, both on prime 4s and x1850s. I imagine that these are the same screens or supplied by the same manufacturer.

This problem seems to be recurring, so I’d say one of two things:

Either it’s a case of poor quality screens used to reduce manufacturing costs, which is unacceptable on so-called top-of-the-range equipment at such a price.

Either it’s a bad batch or there’s a problem during assembly, which seems to be the case with quite a few devices manufactured during the covid period.

In both cases, it can and should be considered as a hidden defect and Denon is certainly aware of the failure rates on this specific problem just as they are for the fader problems on the x1850 which are not of high quality.

Don’t get me wrong I love Denon for their innovation but they clearly need to consider raising their quality standards for certain components if they ever want to take over from big P.

When you invest in a prime 4 at €2200, an x1850 at €1500 or a sc6000M at €1700, you expect something other than low-cost components with the aim of reducing costs.

That’s fine for a €450 Numark, but not for a brand like Denon, which is trying to position itself as a flagship piece of equipment.

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Well there we go, you’ve talked yourself out of the discussion. Your friends use their Primes three time more than you do and they haven’t had any issues with the X screen. So you, or rather they, have proved that the problem that you had with your X screen was a bit of a one-off random “one of those things” sort of accidental problem. The sort of issue which could befall any component in any product.

If it’s in warranty then it’ll be repaired free , if it’s out of warranty then you’ll need to pay the going rate… just like anyone else … that’s life - Cest la vie

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The problem was never random or occasional, it happened after the update! I consider that the screen had a defect! Otherwise other users would have had the same problem long before me and in this case it would have been considered regular wear and tear.

You will find it normal that if all the small screens break down (the 8 screens) you end up with a bill more expensive than the product itself just with the hourly labor costs??? :thinking:

A P4 has their internal elements more accessible than in a Mac when changing keyboard and start button. I carried out this repair when I was training at Confluence “Apple Store” diagnostic test, cleaning, replacement of “keyboard + button” parts 2h30 labor, all for €220.

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Generally accepted as a standard issue with X1850 mixer. For more info:

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The same thing is a worry for units like the Opus Quad, Rane 4 etc I think… these devices are getting extremely complex to meet the demands of the consumer and with more and more parts comes potential for more and more issues.

I’m kinda glad the main GUI of my Prime 2 is all based on the display…. Are we getting to the point where it’s just features for features sake?

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There’s something called quality control and it clearly doesn’t seem to be InMusic/Denon’s strong point. I think that when you spend thousands of euros on top-of-the-range equipment, you’re prepared to pay a few extra tens of euros for quality components rather than low-cost ones.

The quality/reliability of the faders on the x1850 is just shameful on a mixer in this price range, especially as they’re not even easily replaceable.

I’ve had a DJM 2000 since 2010 and I’ve never had a single fader problem, yet this mixer has been subjected to thousands of hours of intensive use, club nights with several guests playing on it who weren’t necessarily kind. However, I replaced one of the 4 faders, not because it wasn’t working properly, but simply because it had taken a lot of play and was less tight than the others. But it still worked perfectly well, with no sound bleed or anything.

A friend of mine bought an X1850 that he uses very little at home and one of his faders started bleeding just because it had picked up a bit of dust.

I recently had a fellow DJ ask me for advice on buying a mixer that will be used at festivals with several guests. Well, at this stage I can’t recommend buying an x1850, which seems far too fragile for this type of use.

Denon’s R&D team are killers at the player level and light years ahead of Pioneer, but in terms of reliability/quality/strength at the mixer level there’s still a long way to go before they match Pioneer’s reliability and robustness.

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Thats all fine and well, but when i talk to my local retailer (owner of one of the UKs leading DJ stores) he tells me that neither brand are any better than the other. He said that as someone who deals with DJ gear issues on a daily basis, and basically said the internet is a terrible place for garnering a true reflection of what is happening in the industry. He also said that fans of a certain brand are going to say theirs is more reliable than the other but he was very clear in his view that there are just as many issues across all of them.

I do agree with you that older Pioneer mixers are built like tanks though, i wouldn’t like to comment on the newer stuff.

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This kind of blue sky thinking is somewhat naive… that’s in my opinion, of course. Forums are, after all, all about opinion.

Even Rolls Royce have an extensive service department.

There’s nothing anywhere that says that if you buy a €1000 item, instead of a €500 item, it’ll last twice as long. It usually means it’s got twice as many features. If you want twice the reliability and twice the features then would that be a €2000 item? (Or maybe it’s a €500 item with a €1500 pioneer badge on the front)

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@AIRVince, @MikeC…

I am following my problem with the OLed screen of the “Select Fx 2”, Algam sent me the small screen free of charge on November 30, except that 2 days before, I had given my agreement for the repair to the approved center and that my P4 will be available the week of December 14.

So I contacted the repair center and they told me that they had received the part and that it would be ready between the 18th and 22nd at the latest!

OK ! I call on the 19th and they tell me that it is not repaired because they don’t have the parts??? Hmm… strange since I received the screen in less than a week and the worst part is that during my exchange on December 14, they told me that they had the part, ( they are contradictory, it’s very strange!).

Well, too bad, I make up my mind, I won’t have the choice to do without the P4 for New Year’s Day, to test it. I would catch up in January, I contacted the approved center again on January 4 and I was told to call in 10 days. I call 16 so as not to appear clumsy and I am told that it is finally ready, I pick it up and then something catches my attention: the white skinz of the outline of the main screen has been taken off and therefore folded on the left corner at the bottom and the left vertical part had bumps under this part of the skinz dirt was stuck underneath, I tell myself that there is something fishy, I turn on the P4 and then I realize that the screen is not bright at all, I tell myself that the setting must have been changed, I look at the brightness setting and it is at max, the color is dull the white is not white of the texts but gray very clear, I ask myself the question would they not have damaged the main screen and replaced it, the colors are dull the yellow is khaki and the red is brown, I compare the brightness of the screen with the 4+ and the The difference is enormous, even the screen of the 4+ set to minimum is brighter than the P4 at max!!! Before crying guilty… I have a question for the Denon team: are the screens 100% identical between the two product versions or is there a difference and if so… how do I know if the internal screen corresponds to the original model (ref, supplier brand, serial number, etc.).

Thanks in advance !

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There was a difference between the black and the white Prime 4 units if I remember.

The white Prime 4 units had to have a firmware update to dim the screen so my guess is there’s a difference between some P4 models (early and later?).

Hopefully someone official can chime in as that does sound strange.

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