Panasonic DMC-GF3 Service Menu

I recently bought a used Panasonic DMC-GF3 and wanted to check the shutter count on the camera. I looked through some forum posts with instructions on how to get into the service menu to check, but none of them seemed to work for me. After a little bit of trial and error I finally figured it out. I’m posting the instructions here for people to look at if they need to check too. I figured it out about a week after I got the camera so I’m not entirely sure what the shutter count was before I got it, but right now it’s at around 2400 and I’ve taken maybe 400 photos or a little more. The camera says the first time the clock was set was on September 9, 2012 and I got the camera on July 27, 2013.

** I’ve read that your SD card has to be formatted for the camera and have at least 1 picture taken on it, but I already had an SD card with a bunch of pictures taken with the camera already so I didn’t bother tested a blank card.
1) Turn OFF your camera.
2) While holding PLAYBACK (The green play button above the dial) + Q.MENU/FN + RIGHT (same as W/B selector), turn ON your camera.
** To verify that you’ve entered the Service Mode you can go to MENU -> SETUP and you’ll now see a new option on the 4th page called ROM BACKUP.
3) While holding PLAYBACK, press MENU + LEFT (same as Auto Focus selector).
** You’ll be brought to a screen with 16 sets of numbers. Mine were all 0’s.
** You can press the Q.MENU/Fn button to get a different set of numbers. I believe these are the most recent error codes?
4) Repeat step 3. (While holding PLAYBACK, press MENU + LEFT (same as Auto Focus selector).)
** I forget what the names were, but the listed options were: Firmware, some sort of Serial Number, Power On Count, Shutter Count, Flash Count, and Auto Power Off Count.
5) Press Q.MENU to go to the next page. This page shows when the clock was first set on the camera, I believe the last 2 times, and how many times the clock was set.
** To exit the Service Menu just turn off the camera and turn it back on.

6 thoughts on “Panasonic DMC-GF3 Service Menu

  1. It wasn’t working for me at first but I found the missing step : make sure the camera is NOT in IA mode first. Then as described above.
    Thanks !

  2. Uhmm…a little embarrassed, but …how do I get out of Service Mode?!

    I tried to set it to “normal” by pressing right, but I still see “ROM BACKUP” and the Yellow Triangle with Exclamation Point.

    I also tried installing new FW (created using PTools)

  3. To answer my own question (after downloading the GF3 Service Manual from here
    http://elektrotanya.com/panasonic_dmc-gf3_series.pdf/download.html)

    I set the camera to INITIAL SETTINGS

    Page 16 of the Service Manual
    – Press and hold MENU (Center of D-Pad) and RIGHT while turning off the camera

    And when I came restarted the camera and finished the initial setup, turning off the camera did not show the Yellow Triangle with Exclamation Mark! just the normal Lumix screen!

  4. Randomly found this place while searching to do a shutter count on my gf3, and out of all the methods I found on google, your solution is the one that really work! So, thank you.

  5. Pingback: Panasonic GF3 怎麼看快門數? – 活人手扎本

  6. My GF3 stopped showing the live view on the screen took it to technician said the shutter had failed camera was toast , found this page re service mode and tried to apply and find out how old camera exposures etc during the process (had entered the service state ) it became apparent thay the screen was now showing the live view ! Somehow reset !! Didn’t get to see the figures but overjoyed ! Thank You .

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