{"id":9120,"date":"2025-07-03T03:02:38","date_gmt":"2025-07-03T01:02:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/2025\/07\/03\/use-a-third-party-lens-read-this-before-updating-your-nikon-z8s-firmware\/"},"modified":"2025-07-03T03:02:38","modified_gmt":"2025-07-03T01:02:38","slug":"use-a-third-party-lens-read-this-before-updating-your-nikon-z8s-firmware","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/2025\/07\/03\/use-a-third-party-lens-read-this-before-updating-your-nikon-z8s-firmware\/","title":{"rendered":"Use a third-party lens? Read this before updating your Nikon Z8&#8217;s firmware"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<table border=\"0\" cellpadding=\"0\" cellspacing=\"0\" class=\"images singleNoBorder center\" data-image-height=\"null\" data-image-width=\"590\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"image\" style=\"width: 590px;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dpreview.com\/files\/p\/articles\/6954326351\/a_viltrox_and_tamron_lens_are_placed_on_a_white_background.jpeg\" target=\"article-6954326351\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"a viltrox and tamron lens are placed on a white background\" border=\"0\" data-aspect-ratio=\"4x3\" data-thumbnail-height=\"0\" data-thumbnail-width=\"590\" height=\"443\" src=\"https:\/\/1.img-dpreview.com\/files\/p\/E~TC4x3S590x0~articles\/6954326351\/a_viltrox_and_tamron_lens_are_placed_on_a_white_background.jpeg\" width=\"590\" data-filename=\"a_viltrox_and_tamron_lens_are_placed_on_a_white_background.jpeg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/1.img-dpreview.com\/files\/p\/E~TC4x3S1180x0~articles\/6954326351\/a_viltrox_and_tamron_lens_are_placed_on_a_white_background.jpeg 2x\"><\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"caption\" style=\"width: 590px;\"><em>Images: Viltrox and Tamron<\/em><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>Nikon has recently released a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dpreview.com\/news\/2911699596\/new-firmware-lets-nikon-z8-users-create-180mp-images-and-improves-autofocus-precision\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">feature-packed update<\/a> for the Z8, but its rollout appears to have hit a few snags with regards to third-party lenses.<\/p>\n<h2>Issues updating<\/h2>\n<p>Nikon users looking to update their camera&#8217;s firmware should first remove any third-party lenses, according to warnings from Viltrox and Nikon. Failing to do so could cause issues with lens functionality.<\/p>\n<p>A warning on the newly released <a href=\"https:\/\/downloadcenter.nikonimglib.com\/en\/download\/fw\/563.html\" target=\"article-6954326351\">Nikon Z8 firmware download page<\/a> says, &#8220;Do not update the camera firmware with lenses other than Z-mount NIKKOR lenses or mount adapters other than FTZ II\/FTZ attached.&#8221; It goes on to say that not following that warning could cause &#8220;camera malfunction.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Viltrox also <a href=\"https:\/\/viltrox.com\/pages\/af13-1-4z\" target=\"article-6954326351\">has a statement<\/a> on its website saying essentially the same thing as Nikon. &#8220;We\u2019ve recently become aware of a new notice issued by Nikon, advising users not to update their Nikon camera firmware while a third-party lens is attached, as this may cause potential issues or malfunctions,&#8221; the statement reads, in part. Viltrox instructs users to reach out via info@viltrox.com if they experience issues after a firmware update.<\/p>\n<p>While the companies don&#8217;t specify what the potential malfunction is, it appears that the Z8 update could impact communication between the camera and lens, causing issues with autofocus or potentially rendering the lens inoperable.<\/p>\n<h2>Post-update issues<\/h2>\n<p>Tamron has also <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tamron.eu\/newsroom\/newsroom\/notice-regarding-compatibility-of-some-tamron-lenses-with-the-nikon-z8-camera-firmware-3-00-\" target=\"article-6954326351\">issued a statement<\/a> about the new firmware, but it appears to be about issues occurring after the upgrade, not during it. &#8220;After updating the Nikon Z8 to firmware version 3.00, some TAMRON lenses may experience limitations in functionality,&#8221; the company says, adding that its team is &#8220;working hard to analyze the cause and find an appropriate solution.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>DPReview readers have been sharing what they&#8217;ve encountered since updating their Z8&#8217;s firmware on our forums. One <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dpreview.com\/forums\/post\/68337332\" target=\"article-6954326351\">DPReview reader<\/a> shared that all of their Tamron lenses stopped working after updating the Z8 firmware. Another said their Tamron 70-300mm only works when the Focus Limiter setting is off after updating the Z8 firmware.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>The issues seem to be exclusive to the Z8 firmware and not smaller firmware updates that recently came out for Nikon&#8217;s other cameras. However, to be safe, it&#8217;s best to remove any third-party lenses or third-party adapters before updating any Nikon firmware. If you&#8217;ve already updated your Z8 firmware to Ver 3.00 and are having issues, you could try <a href=\"https:\/\/downloadcenter.nikonimglib.com\/en\/download\/fw\/550.html\" target=\"article-6954326351\">downgrading to Ver 2.10<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Author:<br \/>\nThis article comes from <i>DP Review<\/i> and can be <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dpreview.com\/news\/6954326351\/use-a-third-party-lens-read-this-before-updating-your-nikon-z8-firmware\" target=\"_blank\"><b>read on the original site.<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Images: Viltrox and Tamron Nikon has recently released a feature-packed update for the Z8, but its rollout appears to have hit a few snags with&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_customify_content_layout":"","_customify_sidebar":"","_customify_page_header_display":"","_customify_disable_header":"","_customify_disable_header_top":"","_customify_disable_header_main":"","_customify_disable_header_bottom":"","_customify_disable_page_title":"","_customify_disable_content_vertical_padding":"","_customify_disable_footer_top":"","_customify_disable_footer_main":"","_customify_disable_footer_bottom":"","_customify_breadcrumb_display":"","_customify_header_transparent_display":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[51,50,49,39,52],"class_list":["post-9120","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-camera-review-and-news","tag-camcorder","tag-camera","tag-dp-review","tag-news","tag-review"],"rttpg_featured_image_url":null,"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"Brokenmount","author_link":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/author\/sysop\/"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/category\/camera-review-and-news\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Camera Reviews and News<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"Images: Viltrox and Tamron Nikon has recently released a feature-packed update for the Z8, but its rollout appears to have hit a few snags with&hellip;","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9120","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9120"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9120\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brokenmount.com\/bm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}