Keeping the camera turned on all the time

<p>I saw this thread in the EOS forum :</p>

<p><a href="http://www.photo.net/canon-eos-digital-camera-forum/00VkXZ">http://www.photo.net/canon-eos-digital-camera-forum/00VkXZ</a></p>

<p>And was surprised to see that nearly all the people who replied say they never turn the camera off, not even when changing lenses or flash!</p>

<p>I always turn my camera off when putting it in the bag, changing lenses, flash, removing/inserting the SD card, removing/inserting the battery etc.</p>

<p>Is this seemingly unusual behavior just a Canonian cultural thing? Or are there Nikon users who keep their cameras on all the time too?</p>

<p>I'll usually turn mine off once I'm stowing it in a bag, and try to always have it off when swapping out CF cards, or mounting the battery grip if it's not already on. But I rarely turn it off to swap lenses. Have done so untold thousands of times, and never a problem. But you should always do what makes you the most comfortable.</p>

<p>Don't know, but you're not alone. Mine's off unless it's in use. I also never hot-plug anything that connects to a cpu, be it a card, a chipped lens, a remote flash, or even the USB cable for download. But then, that's just me looking to avoid transient charges to micro circuits, your mileage may vary. |;-}}}</p>

<p>I turn it off when putting it in the bag or changing lenses or batteries. When using the self timer, I turn it off between shots because it's too easy to start the self timer going. This is on an M8 but it applies with any of my DSLRs.</p>

<p>My camera is always on. And why not? It turns itself "off" (stand-by mode, really) after X seconds, anyway.</p>

<p>The notion that you need to turn it off to change lenses, flash, storage or even batteries, is a myth. Spend less time worrying about trivial things like this and more time shooting.</p>

<p>What is really scary is pulling SD/CF cards out with the power on! Even on my desktop and laptop, I first soft-eject the device before physically pulling it out. Since the cameras don't have a soft eject I assume that the card is always in a mounted mode. I wonder if this explains why a lot of people complain about failed cards - I've never had a CF or SD card fail on me, either on cameras or on computers, so I was always puzzled why so many people talk about card failure.</p>

<p>It's so awkward to turn the Canon bodies on and off compared to Nikon so it is only natural that people don't do it. I use my power on/off in the same way as a safety on a gun.</p>

<p>Nikon cameras are always on, as long as there's a battery in them. The on-off switch only affects things like the user interfaces, the amount of time the CPU spends sleeping, etc. The lens mount is powered up (30 seconds with a multimeter will verify this) the hotshoe serial interface is powered up, the 10 pin interface (large Nikons like D3 or D300) is live, and the card slots are powered up. Nikon cameras have been this way since my old 8008 (about 20 years ago).</p>

<p>Nish raises a valid point about the card slots, but a camera is not like a computer. There's no multitasking to speak of, no complex file systems, just plain old FAT, and the directory is written imediately after file data. If the flash writing light is off, the card can be pulled. People talk about card failures because:</p>

<ul>

<li>They use cheap cards</li>

<li>They let cards get dirty</li>

<li>They use too small cards, and the ESD gets them changing cards in the field where it's not that safe</li>

</ul>

<p>Thanks Joseph. I never thought of it that way - that it's always on. But now it make sense.</p>

<p>In fact my D80's top display is always on. So I guess it could be said that the off switch is merely a standby sort of thing.</p>

<p>The Nikon camera manuals all caution you to turn off the camera when changing lenses or cards, and specify power on/off order with flashes. Conservative? Yes. Myth? No.</p>

<p>I sometimes turn it off when I'm walking around between shots if I've been out for a while because I don't have a backup battery yet. Then I routinely forget to turn it back on until I try to change aperture or something and (suprise!) nothing happens. Other than that, I generally turn it off when I plug in the USB cable. Sometimes I forget. </p>

<blockquote>

<p>What is really scary is pulling SD/CF cards out with the power on! Even on my desktop and laptop, I first soft-eject the device before physically pulling it out. Since the cameras don't have a soft eject I assume that the card is always in a mounted mode.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>That's not how it works in a camera; there is no such thing as a "mounted" mode. That's just a pseudo-state in high-level operating systems like Windows, Linux or Mac OS because there are an infinite number of possible sub-processes that could be accessing the card. "Unmounting" a device simply disables access to it at the lowest level.<br>

With a camera, it's either accessing the card (access light on) or it's not. If the light is off and there are no queued write actions (ie.: removing during a long exposure), it's perfectly safe to remove it. You can even remove it while it's being read; camera firmware is fairly sophisticated at dealing with this.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>Nikon cameras are always on, as long as there's a battery in them. The on-off switch only affects things like the user interfaces, the amount of time the CPU spends sleeping, etc.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Good point. Anyone else notice how, even when the camera is off, the access light goes on for a brief moment when you insert or remove the card?</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>The Nikon camera manuals all caution you to turn off the camera when changing lenses or cards, and specify power on/off order with flashes. Conservative? Yes. Myth? No.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Camera firmware is designed deal with all types of connectivity (flashes, lenses, etc.) with everything always powered on. Nikon has been known to put silly warnings in their manuals to cover themselves. Power on/off sequence indications are likely there to cover Nikon's butt in case of a firmware bug.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>I sometimes turn it off when I'm walking around between shots if I've been out for a while because I don't have a backup battery yet.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>That's not necessary. After the metering times out, it uses so little power, it will last for weeks.</p>

<p>I always turn the camera off even between shots if I am not immediately going to shoot another one. Always off for lens changes and would not dare to have the power on when hooking up the USB to computer or changing flash cards (never do that anyway) so I am extremely AR when it comes to that. Once in a great while I will discover that I left power on to change a lens and I always freak out wondering if I messed something up. I wonder if it would be a good idea to remove the battery when in the case not being used. Or maybe best that it is in there if that is actually hot standby?</p>

<p>This thread has definitely been informative. Now I don't have to waste time remembering to switch my camera off - which is itself a rather tiring process when it's something you think about all the time :-)</p>

<p>Yes, Nish, a very enlightening thread. Thank you for starting it!</p>

<p>I turn the D2H off only to swap camera batteries or media cards. As others have noted, it's probably not even necessary for swapping media cards. I don't turn it off to swap lenses, flash or other accessories such as connections for the Pocket Wizard.</p>

<p>When out and about I usually leave the camera turned on, even when in the bag. Occasionally I've forgotten to turn it off and discovered the camera turned on in the bag, still with a partial charge, several days or even a couple of weeks later.</p>

<p>Same with my old Olympus digicam, tho' in that case it's because it's fairly slow to start up and has an efficient power saver circuit. So I tend to leave it on when carrying it around.</p>

<p>The "turner-offers" would last about three minutes as a PJ or sports shooter. Despite what manuals may say, nothing is going to happen changing lenses, cards, or batteries. If it was a problem, all those PJs and sports shooters, along with the red carpet shooters, would be damaging cameras left and right. It seems to be an amateur fetish, from what I can tell with both this thread and the one on the Canon forum.</p>

<p>I tend to turn off my camera only when I put it in the bag, pretty much because I don't want accidental button presses to do anything. For card swaps I turn the camera off, although I use 16 GB cards so I don't swap too often. I haven't seen the source code or hardware schematics of Nikon's memory card interface, so I don't really know when it's safe to remove a card or not.</p>

<p>Me too, I never turn off to change lenses, never did, on 6 different AF Nikon bodies, and I never had the smallest problem. I usually turn off the camera to change CF card or to put up and take away the battery grip, but I have forgotten now and then, and again, nothing happened. Same with flash (but I rarely use flash anyway).Basically, I shut off to change card because it is a habit, not because I am the least concerned of what would happen otherwise.</p>

<p>I would not give so much weight to what Nikon puts in the manuals: I believe it was on the D200 manual, where they were explaining how you actually take a picture, and there was a note "to perform this function, the camera should be turned on"...</p>

<p>Even not knowing what Joseph points out above: these cameras are sturdy things. Only a fool would design the circuits so that it is enough to take away a lens without shutting off to cook the CPU. It is obvious that somebody is going to do it, and it is going to happen soon, no matter how many times you write it in a manual. The week after the camera is on the market, their repair center would be flooded.</p>

<p>Ciao</p>

<p>L.</p>

<p>I never turn my D300 off. Lens changing is fine. Does not affect battery drain.<br>

Thanks for an enlightning thread to all. </p>

<p>I usually turn off my camera when I put it in my bag or when I switch lenses. Sometimes I forget to do it and by now I felt "guilty" when I did so whwn switching a lens... Reading about your habits and experience make me feels much better ad gives confidence that Nikon engineers provided to us a very good product, so I may be less restrictive in my use. Thanks for sharing this info! </p>

<p>I did hot switch lenses and flash from Fuji S3 to D300, autofocus on two weeks old D300, went dead,good thing I was able to change camera in store. Since that always turn of my camera when I change anything. After all camera is electronic device with electric connections, I believe camera makers spent lot's of money trying to make it as foolproof, as possible, but you still taking your chances.<br>

Most of the time you can change light bulb without turning switch off, but in some cases it burn out right away, in more rare cases it will blow up.<br>

All of this from my own experience. </p>

<p>It's so awkward to turn the Canon bodies on and off compared to Nikon so it is only natural that people don't do it. I use my power on/off in the same way as a safety on a gun.<br>

<em>I don't know how Pete stole my words!</em></p>

<blockquote>

<p>It's so awkward to turn the Canon bodies on and off compared to Nikon so it is only natural that people don't do it. I use my power on/off in the same way as a safety on a gun.</p>

</blockquote>

<p><em>I don't know how Pete stole my words!</em></p>

<p>I never turn it on. All my frames turn out blank.</p>

<p>Any suggestions?</p>