Ronin 4D Price Drops and ProRes RAW license is now $1

[eatstoomuchjam]

DJI just dropped prices for the Ronin 4D series.

The 6K version is now $4,999 (down from $6,800)

The 8K version is now $9,999 (down from about $13,000)

The raw license just went from $979 to $1.  Wish I hadn't bought it just a few months ago, but that's great news for existing owners who haven't bought it yet.  Note that with the base 6K package, the RAW license is likely to be useless without buying an overpriced DJI ProSSD ($800 for 1TB).

https://www.cined.com/dji-ronin-4d-price-drop-raw-license-now-1-instead-of-979/

If I'm guessing, I'd say that DJI are both aiming for a big sales bump with all of the press the R4D has been getting lately (especially with Adolescence) as well as finally undercutting the Komodo-X, C80, and Ursa Cine 12K.

I'd still say that it wouldn't be my choice if I only had one camera, but since I got it, it's been to set with me for every short film that I've worked on and I've used it every time.  The image from it is really nice, especially from the 8K.

[The Dancing Babamef]

the camera is really attractive for the right person but i just can't but help look at the price of the media for it though.

am i misremembering or did they have some kind of adapter that you could put your own M.2 SSD to?

[eatstoomuchjam]

26 minutes ago, The Dancing Babamef said:

the camera is really attractive for the right person but i just can't but help look at the price of the media for it though.

If you want to record in the high-quality modes (PRR or 4444XQ), you need to use their ProSSD which is $800 for 1TB.  At such a price, you might think that it would be an incredibly high-performing SSD.  You'd be wrong.  It's a mediocre USB-C SSD with a magic chip that tells the camera to use it.  At this point, you might think you'll find a way to buy one and then swap the 1TB disk inside it for a 2TB or 4TB one.  It is, after all, an NVMe SSD inside (if I remember right).  You'd be wrong again.  Someone tried this and even though the camera recorded to it without complaint, the files all came out unusable.

31 minutes ago, The Dancing Babamef said:

am i misremembering or did they have some kind of adapter that you could put your own M.2 SSD to?

Without the ProSSD adapter, the camera natively takes CF Express Type B.  I'm not sure, but I think it can record over USB-C to an SSD.  Both of these options will be limited to H.264 or ProRes 422.

[The Dancing Babamef]

wow, so i was way off lol. that's another thing i don't recall hearing these caveats when i was looking at the reviews for this. 

[eatstoomuchjam]

ProRes 422 is a nice codec.  Many people probably buy and use this camera and never miss raw.

[The Dancing Babamef]

that's true. maybe i'm just a balls-to-the-wall type of guy.

if i see me not needing to edit the footage extensively i switch out from NRAW to H265. but it's still kind of a bummer that they had the ProRes RAW internally but patched it out. especially how cheap fast CFxB cards have become, for one DJI SSD's price you could get 2 or even a 4TB model of CFX. and it would be that big of a hassle.

[eatstoomuchjam]

It has ProRes RAW internally.  You have to pay $1 for a license to turn it on and you need to record it to ProSSD.

[MrSMW]

On 4/1/2025 at 6:37 PM, eatstoomuchjam said:

The image from it is really nice, especially from the 8K.

And the industry is fairly confident it's the same sensor in the S1Rii, so I have exactly the same thing, albeit just like an octopus that has had 7 of its 8 limbs removed. Kind of...

[eatstoomuchjam]

7 hours ago, MrSMW said:

And the industry is fairly confident it's the same sensor in the S1Rii, so I have exactly the same thing, albeit just like an octopus that has had 7 of its 8 limbs removed. Kind of...

Yup.  Curren Sheldon bought one to pair with his R4D 8K for the documentary he's working on right now and (in general) he seems really happy with it.

And even if your octopus has 7 of 8 limbs removed, it's better in a lot of ways than the other one.  The S1R II does all sorts of things that the R4D doesn't - from open gate mode to recording raw to inexpensive (compared to ProSSD!) CF Express cards to much better control of codecs (R4D insists on ProRes RAW HQ (c'mon) and I think insists on ProRes 422 HQ if you choose ProRes.  Oh, and to use lenses that weigh more than about 700g.

[The Dancing Babamef]

11 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

It has ProRes RAW internally.  You have to pay $1 for a license to turn it on and you need to record it to ProSSD.

yeah, besides those two big caveats... and it WAS capable of PRR actually internally though.

[eatstoomuchjam]

$1 for a license is a big caveat?

It's still capable of it actually internally, just only to their special media.  Why?  Probably because they like money, but they'd probably say that CF express cards were overheating and dropping frames in their testing, just like why BMD made their own special media for the UC 12K.

[The Dancing Babamef]

are you purposefully misunderstanding what i say?

i meant the external recording to proprietary media, for one, i don't think you can go to any local electronics store and buy the DJI SSD straight off the shelf.

and considering the fact that the DJI SSD doesn't come with the product, for two. not at least on the 6k. it's standard on the 8k version though.

if you want it after the fact, you have to shell out 169€ for the SSD mount and 749€ for the 1TB PROSSD.

[eatstoomuchjam]

I'm not misunderstanding what you say.  You're saying it wrong and I am correcting you.  Recording externally refers to using a separate unit such as a Ninja V, Video Assist, or XDCA-FS7.  Those are systems that have their own processors to implement the codec.

DJI implement all of the codecs within the camera. Their ProSSD adapter does not have ProRes RAW and ProRes 4444XQ built into it.  It is just a device to convert CF Express to USB-C.  As far as I now, it has no processor at all.  To look at mine, you'd never know it wasn't part of the camera when I received it - it looks like an "external unit" than a USB-C SSD taped to the side of the camera would look.

As to the rest, what I said was "You have to pay $1 for a license to turn it on and you need to record it to ProSSD." and you responded "besides those two big caveats."   The way things work in English, if I make a statement that has two parts and then someone responds respond as you did, the default assumption is that the "two" refers to the two parts of my statement, not two parts of half of my statement that existed only in your brain.  Other people can't read your mind.

And no, you can't go into most local electronics stores and buy a ProSSD.  You also can't go into local electronics stores and buy high-performance CF Express Type B cards (or in many cases, any CF Express B cards at all) - you'd likely have to go to a professional video store for either one - or just order from B&H, CVP, Amazon, or whatever online retailers deliver to your area.

And yes, they are too expensive.  I've said as much repeatedly (and with some foul language when I bought 3 of them - because as I've also said, the camera insists on using the HQ variants of things and burns through disk space almost as fast as it runs through batteries, and that's really fast).  And as I also said before, many users probably just use normal ProRes and never miss having raw.  While raw tends to be fairly common in the narrative space, it's almost nonexistent in much of the commercial and wedding industries, both of which, I'm told, have been pretty big adopters of the camera.