D200 vs D70 battery for travel

[aaron l]

I took my newly aquired D200 to Idaho last week to run it through

it's paces and it was a joy to use with the 18-70. The killer I

noticed was the battery life, as it didn't take too long before the

battery indicator started dropping (30% chimped shots, 2-3 seconds

average). I only did about 100 shots/day so I didn't get a chance

to try and kill the battery. This is not an unknown thing and I

have yet to aquire another spare En-el3e and I don't anticipate

getting one before my month long trip to Morocco and Egypt in mid-

May.

 

I've used my D70 with spare battery and it's worked quite well for

travels in China and Japan (never used the spare once) and have

since upgraded to the D200 for the flexibility, speed, resolution,

etc. However, I'm concerned that running around in the day will

leave me with a dead battery before shooting is done. On travel I

shoot up to 600 shots/day. Did purchase a MB-D200 to mitigate this

issue but the extra bulk defeats the smaller package of the D200

running around cities.

 

I am looking to see how other people have dealt with this problem

until spare batteries are readily available. Do you just sack it up

and haul the MB-D200 to Africa? Keep the shot count low and never

chimp? Take the D70 thus defeating the entire D200 purchase?

Looking for ideas and experience to mitigate this issue.

 

As an interesting side note, last night on the D200 I put on a 24mm

f2.8, AF-C, Single shot, S priority 1/60, JPG-FINE, review off,

quality priority, 2GB UltraII, only made the focus motor run 10

times putting my hand in front of the lens, shot a desk scene and

ran the intervelometer at 3 seconds for 300 shots twice for 600

shots total. The battery only dropped to 80% remaining capacity!

That's not real world as the focus motor wasn't busy but what

gives? No one reports beyond 400-500 shots/charge average. What's

the killer? Running the AF-S motor on the 18-70? Chimping?

 

Thanks!

Aaron

[joseph_smith3]

I have a D 200 with the MB D200. I usually have no problem exposing 10 2 gb flash cards before I have to recharge. (I usually recharge after 5 cards. When I do this I find that one battery is still almost completely charged and one requires a charge.) I have found that use of the menu and LCD on the camera takes a huge toll on the battery. Depending on how much you use these features vs others will result in a wide range of battery life statistics. One advantage of the MB-D200 is that you can use AA batteries too. That is one reason why I got it. I also bought a second charger for the battery so I can charge two at one time. Joe Smith

[mountaingoat]

I recently purchased a D200 but have no other digital camera body to compare it with. I put it in high speed (5fps) mode at the local race track using a 28-200mm zoom and shot over 600 pictures in a 2-hour period, and the lens was constantly changing focus. The battery was dead after that but it wasn't fully charged when I started. I picked up a second EN-EL3e battery because it explicitly states in the manual that it is not compatible with the EN-EL3 battery from the D50/D70/D100 cameras. I think the extra battery is worth the $50 and the battery charges in under 2-hours so you should be set unless you are going to be in a far-off remote back-woods land for extended periods of time where there is no electricity, in which case you would use the MB-D200 and AA's

[ShunCheung]

I think it is important to pick up at least a second battery for any DSLR. The main issue for the D200 is that the EN-EL3e is somewhat hard to find in these days.

[aaron l]

Yes, I agree Shun. I've got orders in at Ritz and on the waiting list in Calumet San Diego and on B&H. Jon - if I could find two more, I'd buy them and be done with the matter entirely.

 

Thank you for the stats, Joseph. That's great battery life with that many CF cards. Much better than I've heard. Apparently the LCD is the battery killing factor.

[timberwulf]

If you're concerned about battery life, turn off or shorten the time for the feature that displays the image on the LCD after every shot. You can always hit the play button if you want to check your highlights, etc. This should greatly prolong battery life. :)

 

In the mean time, keep an eye out. I must have gotten lucky and got a spare for my D200 from B&H a little while back. Wish I had bought two. :)

[warbler5]

Aaron,

 

You need to pick up more batteries...period. After receiving notification that my D200 had been shipped ;-) ,I got on-line and ordered two batteries from a major chain site (starting with the letter R) that said they were backordered, and within 24 hours, I received notification that one battery was being shipped. I can wait for the second battery. You should place orders with several sites...hopefully, you should be able to pick up some batteries.

 

I think I would forget about chimping completely, if I were worried about battery depletion...turn the LCD off most of the time, or set it so that it is only on for a few seconds, just to be sure you are getting a picture.

 

On my D100, which has been very good about battery depletion, I noticed a change when I added AF-S/VR lenses to my lineup. I have since heard that VR is the culprit, but maybe it's the AF-S, as well.

 

Enjoy your trip!

[joseph_smith3]

I need to add that the 10 flash cards results were based on using a 500mm f 4.0 P lens, manual focus, but with an electronic interface. I doubt if I would have gotten that many cards with my 300mm AF-S lens on the camera. Also, I have three of the EN-el3e batteries. You always need at least one more than you think you will need. Joe Smith

[ilkka_nissila]

I get about 800 shots on my D200 when using non-VR lenses, and with VR it seems to be about 500 per charge. I have a second battery of course, it wasn't hard at all to get (less than a week of waiting from Calumet). Of course you can wait until next year if you just wait until someone has one in stock - that's not the way you buy these things.

 

Bring your charger and set the LCD so that it doesn't play back the images automatically after each shot. Don't use the big LCD unless you have no other choice. That way you should be fine. Don't shoot just randomly but only probable good shots.

[aaron_lee___minneapolis__m]

You have to cycle the battery 3-5 times before you will get full capacity of a Lithium-Ion battery. It's physics.

 

I got less than 200 shots on my first run through, now I get about 500, still with lots of chimping.

 

Aaron Lee

[twmeyer]

Joseph Smith says "I have a D 200 with the MB D200. I usually have no problem exposing 10 2 gb flash cards before I have to recharge." and the one long day I had with the MB-200 and NiMh AAs gave very similar results. After 11+ gigs of RAW plus Fine Jpgs, the batteries showed low, but not gone. This is with a 17-55 2.8 Nikon at a wedding, very little chimping, no post image preview and no menu changing.<p>I believe that the D70 batteries work in the D200 (or is that backwards?) but not the other way around (or is it?). Do some research (duh) before trying this... t

[ShunCheung]

Please don't confuse things. The D200's EN-EL3e can work on the D70/D70s, D50 and D100, but the earlier EN-EL3 and EN-EL3a for those older DSLRs cannot work on a D200.

[wilfred_wong]

i feel that my D200 battery seems last longer now then when it was new. i suspect discharge the battery a few times makes the meter more accurate.

[aaron l]

I've been working on getting the battery through a couple cycles. I set the LCD to 10 minutes off and left the display on. Every 10 minute LCD cycle seems to drop the battery 7-10% per 10 minutes. I ran my 80-400 with VR on with a shutter speed of 30" to kill the battery down to 9% I'll get that thing cycled yet.

 

I've got orders in to several distributors and hopefully one will come through.

 

Additionally, I was reading Rob Galbraith's site on CF memory speeds between Ultra II and Extreme III and saw only a 18% difference average speed between the two types. I'm heading out with a 40GB HD-to-go! unit for storage and will pick up a few more 2/4GB Ultra II cards. That should do it for a month I hope!