Yes it does but I don't believe it's fully functional in all modes so check it out very carefully. Typical Canon hamstringing it so you can only use it how they see fit.
Also if you buy a top end ETTL flash (Canon or Nikon) and only use in manual with radio slaves you are kind of wasting your money - paying for lots of stuff you'll never use. Reason I went for second hand SB28s.
Check out http://michaelbass.blogspot.com/
He does all sorts of funky mods, gadgets and upgrades for strobes.
Yes
I believe all that is true. All depends on how you work and if you're happy with ETTL. Under job conditions I found it fiddly and stressful (go back to interface school canon) and much prefer the simple control and stability of manual operation.
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Yeah Canon flashes are very cryptic and fussy, such as no second curtain flash off camera.
I think I have everything pretty much figured out at this point. I actually went through each function several times before it started to sink in, and using it in real life and looking at the light spread on the images.
It SHOULD NOT be that hard. You expect that type of obfuscation with car stereos, such as trying to link up much less use a Bluetooth device with them, but I would think car stereo engineers are a lot less apt than Canon engineers. There really is no excuse.
The way I see the Canon 580 now is in three blocks.
The first block is ETTL and EV adjustments, that, in real use, make it almost like manual mode, but you find the sweet spot faster because the camera is good at setting the flash for fill. And that's the key. The flash is always fill in ETTL, unless the ambient light is so low as to provoke the flash into being a key light. So knowing that, if you want to use the flash as a key, such as in shade, I just crank it up +2 or more. That usually does it. Now you're using it like manual mode pretty much, but the EV doesn't give you as much latitude as manual mode. I mean I don't think you can get full flash power using EV in some instances, and you don't know which instances, but I may be wrong. That's a confusing area with Canon flashes.
The second block is manual mode. Use the histogram and walk it up or down where you need it. If I need fill flash, I do not use this mode. Again, if you need second curtain sync because your doing people who are moving and using slow shutter speeds, you are out of luck--thank you Canon.
The third block is just filed in my head as "special functions," such as stroboscopic, curtain sync, High Speed synch, and I think that's about it.
Once you have the button pushes down, the stress goes way down. It's just those stupid button pushes that screw with you. I like the one where when you want to use manual mode off camera, you push the mode button for 2 seconds, or you can't access the manual option on the LCD. On camera, and you just use the mode button to cycle through to it. OK Canon, why not keep the button pushes the same for each function? That's frustrating as hell.
I also like the idea of flashes per second Hz and number of flashes explained in the manual under Stroboscopic use, which no one here has yet to figure out, including me (another thread I started).
Other than that. It's pretty easy now with the frustrations of limitations that are NOT mentioned in the manual. But I had to do it repeated times to start getting the hang of how the stupid Canon flashes work. They are made to be fully auto, or they are just simply badly laid out.
The way I see Canon flashes is that they are more "fun" that professional oriented, unless you leave them on camera for full functionality and use ETTL all the time with only EV adjustments--which does work quite well, even with bounce flash. But it's just not right.
Maybe that's why pro commercial photographers almost always use Nikon equipment--not talking about wedding photogs, but commercial fast paced photographers.
