Nikon Batteries?

[linda_roina]

I have a D50 with 3 Nikon batteries. These batteries discharge quickly. Why I do not know. My son

borrowed it (the camera) and said something is wrong with the batteries. I guess they all 3 could be bad

but find that hard to believe. I thought it was the mode it was used in but he says no. Got any ideas?

[sam_thompson2]

There were a few Nikon batteries that were recalled. Yours might be one of them. You should check to see if they were the ones recalled. Otherwise your charger or camera might be defective.

[mooredriven]

Linda,

 

I have a D50, with the original battery. The battery last all day for a typical photo shoot. I could probably take photo's for several days without recharging. I would suspect the camera at this point, unless the batteries fall within the recall serial numbers.

 

Dale

[linda_roina]

What about continuous autofocus being on? Doesn't that drain the batteries also?

[tom_luongo1]

The EN-EL3 recall was a precautionary safety recall. If one of your batteries is affected, by all means return it, but this is unlikely to be your issue. (I haven't heard of any performance related recalls for this battery.)

 

With 3 batteries affected, the issue is most likely the charger or the camera. Does the D50 show battery level? Use that to confirm the charger fully charged the batteries. If the D50 shows 100% and the battery level rapidly declines, the issue is probably the camera and you'll have to send it to Nikon for service.

[oskar_ojala]

Sounds like a camera issue. My friend had a similar problem with a film-based Canon.

[mooredriven]

Linda,

 

Regarding continuing focus always being on. I have not seen any difference. I carry an 18-200mm with VR that I believe would drain the battery faster than a non-VR lens. Speaking only for myself, I've not had any issues with the battery draining prematurely, regardless of my set up.

 

Dale

[work-page]

Here's a couple of things that drain the batteries, but that don't show up as pictures on the SD card..

 

Formatting an SD card. In general, the bigger the card, the more energy it takes to format. Don't use format as a replacement for deleting one or two pictures if that's all there is on the card.

 

Deleting pictures. It's a bit like formatting a small piece of the card. Efficient for a small number of pictures. But if you've got a large number of shots that all need to go, use format instead.

 

Playing around with the menu settings. Obvious. The LCD backlight takes energy to run and the processor inside the camera sometimes needs to work very hard. Same holds for image review. Make sure CSM-17 (Monitor Off) is set to a short time, e.g. 10 seconds.

 

Hooking up the USB cable. The D50 has true high speed USB2.0. That's good because it's fast, it's bad because of the electricity bill that comes with it.

 

Using VR lenses as stabilised binoculars. Tempting indeed, but the hissing noise coming from the lens tells that there are motors in there working very hard.

 

Exposure metering. The 420 element matrix is being read out and processed all the time. There a good reason that there's a custom function to tune it: CSM-18 (Meter Off). Make sure it's not set to 30minutes.

 

FV-Lock metering. If you've CSM-14 (AE-L/AF-L) set to FV-lock, the flash fires every time you set the FV-lock.

 

Using the built in flash. The penalty is a 50% reduction of the number of shots that you can take on a single battery charge.

 

Having the AF-assist light work. Beyond draining batteries, it's obnoxious, use CSM-7 (AF-Assist) to get rid of it.

 

Hope this helps..