[Closed] Go Pro Hero 3 - yay or nay?

Absolutely no issues with mine at all, though I've met others who have had problems. Seems it's a bit of a lottery whether you get a duff one or not.

the latest firmware sorted most of the problems. I have one of the first blacks, it was mostly ok but had a few issues, all resolved with firmware updates.

The consensus a while back was that they rushed the QA to get the product released on schedule. Subsequently this left many people with one of the bad ones, some of which would not be fixable even with updates. This, coupled to their poor customer service meant a lot of unhappy customers and the reason I didn't take a gamble myself.

The 3 is fine apart from the poor battery life, circa 40 mins, so buy some extra batteries. The new 3+ batteries will fit the old 3 and give slightly better performance, but still not as good as the 3+ which now gets over 1hr with 'eco' electrics too.

Spacemonkey's comments also relate to the new 3+ which has had poor focus issues. I have been informed by GoPro that all new stock of 3+ from mid Nov has been sorted, but I'm holding out until after Christmas when the prices should come down as no deals at all on them atm.

I got one too, seems a fairly good deal.

Had been holding off to get the 3+ but figured i was only going to be getting that if i saw it for about £300, which is still pretty expensive. And decided to be frugal and save £70 instead.

Of course to do this i still had to spend £230 so my money saving logic isn't without its flaws 😀

mine is really good - I bought a couple of spare batteries of ebay for ~£10
amazing quality, and great mounting options.

OP what price did you get it for?

My only grumble is with the WiFi remote. I reckon I get no more than 130feet range. The website quotes ~600ft range. It's a pain when trying to record a run down a trail remotely.

Apologies for the hijack but does that sound normal? wondering if I have a dodgy remote or wifi card in the hero.

FWIW the go pro app has even worse range.

latest firmware has fixed the freezing problems I was experiencing.

Mega, I've seen back to back tests of the 3 and 3+ in an open field for the App and the 3 only gets 70' wifi range and the 3+ got ~150', so both way down from quoted!!

thanks for all the replies. Have decided to return it, the number of people with issues combined with the high cost and further investment required (all the mounts, spares) etc has turned my feet decidely cold.

Mega;- £229, £70 off in the black friday deal. SP still selling them for £250 apparently. Omar, fingers crossed yours gives you no trouble.

mega, how have you found the eBay special batteries? Just ordered 2 for a tenner too. The gopro doesn't set on fire or anything when you charge them does it?

The biggest problem I had with my Black was setting a screen resolution that worked well for me.

Great product but get a spare battery or two.

I've been holding out for mounts etc as I too thought they were ridiculously expensive. However it seems cheap options are now popping up probably due to the amount of units the gp3 has sold compared to previous models. I know of four folk who've purchased one recently. I've no idea of quality yet but I'm awaiting delivery of this bargain bundle!
[url= http://item.mobileweb.ebay.co.uk/viewitem?sbk=1&nav=SEARCH&itemId=261280339196 ]Mounts[/url]

Can recommend the bargain bucket chest harnesses for c. £10 - they do the job perfectly fine and save you £30 on the official versions!