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General discussion

Battery life only lasts 20-30 shots

Sep 14, 2004 8:49AM PDT

I have a (discontinued) Kodak Easyshare CX4200 and from the beginning, rechargable NiMH batteries have lasted only 10 shots before the low battery warning comes up and 20-30 shots before it completely dies. Now looking at CNET's reviews, even cameras with "terrible" battery lives can live up to at least 100-200 shots.

Even with regular disposable AA batteries, I can't get more than 30 shots.

Does anyone know the possible problem?

Discussion is locked

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Re: Battery life only lasts 20-30 shots
Sep 14, 2004 1:15PM PDT

Digital cameras draw quite a bit of power.

With NiMH batteries, any digital camera should get over 100 photos per charge.

Alkaline batteries will not last near as long as one charge of the NiMH batteries.

It is possible that your NiMH batteries are defective.
I have had to replace a set of NiMH for one of my cameras.

NiMH batteries come in different power capacities.
The last ones I bought are rated at 2000mAh capacity.

The time you spend with the camera connected to the computer to download photos can really eat into battery time. You can spend more battery life downloading photos than taking the photos. I purchased a card reader and don't connect the camera to the computer any more.

...

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I'm assuming this is in one day. It it's multiple days, I
Sep 14, 2004 2:21PM PDT

sometimes have to charge the battery even when the camera hasn't been used. It still draws power.

If it's one day, I've seen the batteries drain pretty fast in low light situations where I've got the shutter half way down in the auto focus position for extended periods of time. In those circumstances, I've felt the bottom of the camera get hot because of the high discharge.

If it's 20-30 quick shots, then my camera will do considerably better than that.

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Re: Battery life only lasts 20-30 shots.. So does my...
Sep 14, 2004 11:01PM PDT

My old Canon Digital Elph did that too.

It's not a bug or defect but the state of the technology of that day. Today, I get at maximum some 60 shots on the old Digital Elph with a new freshly charged battery and the old battery gets 10 to 20 shots. If I run the LCD display or zoom in/out a bit, I get less shots.

NOTHING IS WRONG with my Canon camera. It's just how it was then.

NOW I have a few newer cameras and my HP 812 gets well over 100 shots on a set of AA's and I've yet to find where my DX6490 peters out since it has a charging dock and it recharges as it downloads pictures.

I think you are comparing then and now.

Bob

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Re: Battery life only lasts 20-30 shots
Sep 20, 2004 4:07AM PDT

NiMH batteries discharge even when in storage outside of the camera. Some say 2% - 3% per day.

I suspect that the batteries may have "residual memory" but I am told that they don't.

What I have been doing lately is charging the batteries fully, removing them, and in a couple of hours charging them some more. Seems to increase the number of shots I can take. Imagining things?

But what I really should be doing is buying new batteries. 400 - 500 recharges on four year-old batteries must mean that it is time for new ones.