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Poor battery life with CHDK?

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Offline dennisfox74

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #20 on: 25 / February / 2009, 01:52:44 »
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I was shooting with, and without the flash, and got maybe 20 or so exposures. 

From the sounds of it, this is kinda' unusual,  I might try it again with a new set of batteries to see if I get the same result.
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Offline reyalp

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #21 on: 25 / February / 2009, 02:02:32 »
Quote from: dennisfox74 on 25 / February / 2009, 01:52:44
I was shooting with, and without the flash, and got maybe 20 or so exposures. 

From the sounds of it, this is kinda' unusual,  I might try it again with a new set of batteries to see if I get the same result.

I'd describe it more as "horribly broken" than "kinda unusual". Canon claims 500 exposures with NiMH AA (the CIPA standard is mixed flash and no flash) and you are getting something like 1/20th of that. Either your batteries are toast, or there is something wrong with the camera.

Does the battery door get hot ?
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Offline dennisfox74

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #22 on: 25 / February / 2009, 02:26:14 »

I'd describe it more as "horribly broken" than "kinda unusual". Canon claims 500 exposures with NiMH AA (the CIPA standard is mixed flash and no flash) and you are getting something like 1/20th of that. Either your batteries are toast, or there is something wrong with the camera.

Does the battery door get hot ?
[/quote]

Not in the slightest.  Infact, other than that, and a couple hot pixels that have developed over time, the camera performs wonderfully.  One thing though is that I haven't tried it again since the camera was literally brand new.  After that I never used anything in it but lithium batteries.  It is possible that the camera ate them quickly because it was in it's burn in period. (I've seen this before with a number of electronic devices).  I should probably give it a try with NiMH's again. 
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Offline whim

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #23 on: 25 / February / 2009, 03:07:26 »
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It is possible that the camera ate them quickly because it was in it's burn in period

i would say it's more likely to apply to your batteries ... rechargables usually only reach their max capacity after a
couple of charge/discharge cycles. That said, this effect is unlikely to boost them more than 20-30 %

wim

edit:

BTW your observed 'camera burn-in' might be caused by it charging up it's internal battery, the one that feeds the
        clock while changinging main batteries ...
« Last Edit: 25 / February / 2009, 05:32:34 by whim »
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Offline barret

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #24 on: 25 / February / 2009, 09:39:19 »
that's really weird what you're describing.

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Infact, other than that, and a couple hot pixels that have developed over time, the camera performs wonderfully.
how old is your camera? i have my s3 since 2 years, lots of shots made, lots of long exposures too, but not a single hot pixel. are you sure?

on my s3 i get about 700 shots from 2500 or 2800 mAh rechargeable batteries. i never use normal alkaline batteries. But, after about 1.5 years of heavy using, my rechargeable batteries drained totally and i couldn't charge them anymore (camera didn't even start).

maybe that's the case?
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Offline fudgey

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #25 on: 25 / February / 2009, 14:16:15 »
I'm guessing the usual i.e. faulty set of NiMH cells and/or no-good charger.

Should be easy enough to test that theory e.g. with a flashlight... if they don't last long in a lamp, there's not much charge in them for a camera either.
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Offline dennisfox74

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #26 on: 25 / February / 2009, 17:20:49 »
To answer the last three posts, The camera is about 2 years old, has taken thousands of exposures now, (I shot over 300 with it two days ago), and other than the two hot pixels, and the unusual battery life at purchase, it hasn't shown any other issues.  It doesn't get hot, doesn't show any abnormalities in the photos, (Even the dead pixels are mapped out now thanks to CHDK), and generally performs wonderfully.

The A550 uses a small button type battery (CR1220) for it's memory, that is replaceable, and non rechargeable, so that would negate the "charging it's internal battery" theory suggested by Whim.

Also, I've dealt with a lot of different electronics, and many different cameras, which have shown shorter battery life during the first couple uses.  this period is generically referred to as a "burn in" period. In my experience working for Olympus cameras, and my personal experience as a photographer working with Nikon, Canon, and Olympus cameras, it wasn't uncommon for a camera to "eat" it's first set or two of batteries before showing a more normal usage time.  I'm surprised that it seems to be such an unusual concept here.  Though, burn in's are less noticeable on some things than others. 

Is it possible that I had a bad set of rechargeable batteries? Yes.  Though, they did perform adequately in other devices that I used them in, such as the wireless keyboard and mouse combo they routinely spent their charges on.  But admittedly, they weren't the best batteries, (Energizer), and the charger wasn't the greatest either, I doubt that it did any conditioning to the batteries, it was just the one that was sold with them. 
I intend to try a better set of batteries with a better charger, when I can afford to get them.  On that note, can anyone suggest a good make of rechargable NiMH batteries that would be good for a camera?  i was looking at PowerEX 2700's.  I heard someone mention that they found 2900's, but haven't seen anything higher than 2700's myself, so if someone could provide a link, I'd be grateful. 

Thanks. 
Dennis
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Offline peabody

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #27 on: 25 / February / 2009, 20:54:33 »
Dennis, have you tried cleaning the battery contacts in the camera?  My brand new A590 told me to replace the batteries when I turned it on with a set of freshly charged batteries.  After cleaning the contacts, the same batteries lasted many hours.
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Offline peabody

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #28 on: 25 / February / 2009, 21:16:16 »
Fudgey, I ordered Eneloops and a 550ma charger from Amazon today.  But with free shipping, it will be a couple weeks before they arrive.

I don't think I have a way to formally test them, but I'll try to give you some general assessment of how well they work.

There's a local bar that has "live art" twice a month where a local artist paints a portrait while everybody watches.  I want to do a timelapse of that process, and that would be a three-hour session with a picture every 5 seconds or so.  Of course I'll have everything manual, and no LCD, to conserve power, so it probably won't be  a very representative test.  But maybe it will give me a general idea of how well the batteries perform.


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Offline dennisfox74

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Re: Poor battery life with CHDK?
« Reply #29 on: 26 / February / 2009, 07:00:50 »
Quote from: peabody on 25 / February / 2009, 20:54:33
Dennis, have you tried cleaning the battery contacts in the camera?  My brand new A590 told me to replace the batteries when I turned it on with a set of freshly charged batteries.  After cleaning the contacts, the same batteries lasted many hours.


You know, believe it or not I never thought of that. I just assumed that as the camera was brand new at the time they were clean.  I'll have to give that a look just to be sure. 
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