Battery worry

Isambard

I bought a new battery and I'm a bit concerned that after taking probably 50 shots it's still showing 100% charge. You hear about fake batteries and it concerns me as I got it from Ebay, which may not have been too wise.

I thought seller (from Germany) seemed OK as he had a rating of over 129,000 and 99% + .

It's branded "Intensilo"

Any thoughts?

Paulw

Non-brand batteries (Canon, Nikon, Sony, etc) can cause problems. Usually, the biggest problem, is that the camera can't read the battery, so doesn't know how charged it is. This is what you are seeing. The camera won't know how much the battery is drained and will always show 100% charge even if it is almost empty.

Personally, I'd never buy an alternate brand battery, since you never know what it's doing, but that's just me.

CabanSail

I have a mixture of genuine and non-genuine batteries for various Nikon, Canon and Olympus cameras. I have never noticed any difference in any of them. Have just had two batteries die for my D300 body. They are close to ten years old have been charged many times. One was genuine and the other non-genuine.

Many of mine will still show 100% until they been used for many more shots than 50. Often the indication of capacity is taken from the terminal voltage and that will hold up longer on a brand new cell.

Isambard

CabanSail wrote: »

I have a mixture of genuine and non-genuine batteries for various Nikon, Canon and Olympus cameras. I have never noticed any difference in any of them. Have just had two batteries die for my D300 body. They are close to ten years old have been charged many times. One was genuine and the other non-genuine.

Many of mine will still show 100% until they been used for many more shots than 50. Often the indication of capacity is taken from the terminal voltage and that will hold up longer on a brand new cell.

This was my experience exactly with my old camera (just got this one and it takes different batteries of course!) I'll use iot away for a few weeks and se if the reading falls eventually.Otherwise I'll just have to make sure I regularly swap and charge then... or I might buy a genuine one and just keep the other as a spare....

I avoided the branded ones (SOny) on ebay as I thought they might be more likely to be the dodgy ones.

CelticRambler

I've got three Canon branded batteries and three non-branded, and haven't (yet) noticed any difference between them, neither in performance while being used nor in the process of recharging. I don't get a % read-out but if I had any less than four bars after only 50 shots, I'd be pretty upset. Unless I'm using a flash or video, I'd typically get to about 200-300 shots before the battery icon drops to three bars.

Isambard

I was worrying about nothing....dropped to92% yesterday after a couple of hundred shots.... I was worried by a BBC programme the previous morning about fake batteries catching fire...

Thanks everyone for the reassurance.

stronglikebull

I often find my batteries, branded and non, don't drop from 100% for quite a few shots. 50 wouldn't be that much to be honest.

I use Hahnel brand batteries in my Canon, and find them excellent. I have 4 of these and they hold the charge better than the original Canon batteries that came with the camera.

pullandbang

stronglikebull wrote: »

I use Hahnel brand batteries in my Canon, and find them excellent. I have 4 of these and they hold the charge better than the original Canon batteries that came with the camera.

I'm the complete opposite. I've 1 Hahnel battery and about 7 or 8 Canon for my 5DmkIII's. If I happen to put the Hahnel into a camera on the morning of a wedding, I'm changing it by the time we get to the hotel whereas I could shoot two weddings on the original Canons. I've tried a few third party batteries over the years and none of them have come close to the originals.

flyingsnail

In my experience with Hahnel battery they hold their charge better than the canon when not being used, ie being left in the bag for weeks or months but when it comes to number of photographs it can take the canon will win.

I had a Duracell for my 5D mk3 but the power levels never register so it goes straight from 100% to 0 with no warning so I have swapped to all Canon battery now.