Well, I'm sure there're reliable brandless or not-so-branded stuff for many things, just that people are usually skeptical about them...
But the percentage of them may be so small that you'll end up buying the unreliable versions...
So I guess it's up to individuals, some swear by brands, which often means reliability...
Unfortunately for the brandless market, one has to pretty much depend on luck...
On a different note, please let me b|tch about an incident that happened yesterday...
I was at Cathay Photo Peninsula with the intention of inquiring about the Manfrotto 561BHDV fluid base monopod...
They have the older model 561B displayed in their store, but that's not what I want...
I approached a salesperson to inquire about 561BHDV and unsurprisingly, I was shown the 561B...
I told him there's a newer version which has the HDV alphabets and a 701 head as well...
So he approached a female colleague of his and she too claimed that the 561B that they have in store is the HDV version...
I was a little fuming then and asked them to check their Manfrotto catalogue, which happened to be an older version featuring 561B... *Faint*
After a few phonecalls and frantic referral to their bible of pricelists (which always annoys me), they concluded that the 561BHDV is not being brought in...
The whole process really ticked me off...
Being the distributor, this is the kind of service they provide for product inquiries?
Without the wonders of the internet, I could've been tricked into buying the 561B, their so-called HDV model...
Is there anywhere else in Singapore that I can find Manfrotto products cause I'm quite hesitant to step into Cathay Photo again...