How many is too many

[Marvin]

<p>I've had my 7D for quite a while now. How do I find out how many shutter snaps I've taken? How many can be taken before the camera is about to quit? Might this be a good time to retire the old 7D and consider the new one?</p>

[bobatkins]

<p>The camera will most likely quit somewhere between 1 and 1,000,000 shutter cycles, with the highest probability somewhere around 150,000 cycles.</p>

<p>There are dozens of EOS 7D Shutter Count programs. Google is your friend. There are aps, windows programs, mac programs, linux programs etc. Pick the one you want.</p>

<p>If you are looking for an excuse to buy a 7D MkII you will certainly find one. Your 7D could shutter could fail tomorrow - or it could outlive you. There's no way to tell.</p>

[kurt_von_goerlitz]

<p>“The Answer to the Great Question... Of Life, the Universe and Everything... Is... Forty-two,' said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.”</p>

<p>― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy</p>

<p>;)</p>

[Andy Collins]

<p>Retire the 'old' 7D when it no longer functions like it should or when it's no longer useful to you. Buy the new one anyway and use the old one as a back-up. The best excuse for buying the new one is because you just want to. That's <em>my</em> excuse anyway...</p>

[PuppyDigs]

<p>Shuttercount is a standalone app that runs on Mac or PC and works great. But you'll need to fork over $2.99. It's great when buying and selling cameras since everybody seems to demand shutter cycle counts.</p>

[JDMvW]

<p>Bravo for Bob Atkins, especially, for his answer.</p>

<p>"Clicks" are not a sufficient, rational reason to retire a camera. Just admit you want a new one and indulge yourself.</p>

<p>Of course, if you have to convince a spouse or partner that this is a "good idea" there are lots of subterfuges that will serve: choose according to the acuity of the partner (not of the lens).</p>

[rick_m.]

<p>You should ignore the shutter count on your 7D and immediately buy a 7D MK II. Here is why.</p>

<p>You are obviously concerned that yours might quit and leave you unable to take important pictures. As Bob correctly pointed out yours might very well be on the verge of quitting if you have between 1 and a million actuations. IN fact it might have already malfunctioned but you just haven't noticed it because your pictures come out really good. Rather than risk it you should always have a "backup camera".</p>

<p><br />A backup camera (for anyone other than a working professional photographer) is defined as being that camera body which has fewer megapixels that the other camera you own. It is the camera you no longer use for your child's outdoor daytime soccer games because it does not perform as well at 1,248,306 ISO. It is the one that protects you from the horror of having to be that guy who stands on his tiptoes to look into the cell phone he is holding sideways every time his daughter gets the ball. A backup camera is the other camera you own that does not have a good flash on it either. A backup camera is the one over the left shoulder of your Domke Photogs vest at the town picnic. Everyone needs a good backup camera. You will not be taken seriously as a photographer unless at least once in every photographic discussion you mention what your backup camera is. It does not matter what your main camera is. You area allowed to be quirky. But your backup camera is your pride and joy. It tells everyone what kind of photographer you are. <br /> So order your 7DMKII immediately. There is not a moment to lose.</p>

[jamie_robertson2]

<p>Why not buy yourself another 7D that has less than 1000 shutter actuations? Never mind the fact that it may have been used to record 1 million hours of 1080p video in salt spray conditions... as long as it only has a few shutter actuations it will be OK, right?</p>

[Marvin]

<p>Wow!<br>

I seem to have touched a nerve. I wonder why.</p>

[phule]

Marvin, the question has been asked 1000 times about

every camera made. The answer does not change. It will

fail when it fails. Some fail very early some fail very

late and the rest fail somewhere in between. There is no

way to predict when any individual camera will have a

fault. If you are a professional photographer then you

should have a backup. If you are not then do whatever

you and your wallet wants.

[Marcus Ian]

<p>For what it's worth, the shutter or your new 7Dmk2 will likely fail in the same manner, in the same realm of shutter count number (ie. sometime between 1 and 1,000,000).... </p>

<p>Seriously, unless you are getting paid for shooting, I wouldn't even worry about it. Shoot till it fails, then send it off and, for 1/4-1/8 the cost of a 7D mk2 (depending on what the retail is when it finally does fail), have it the shutter replaced... Unless you just want (and can afford) the mk2, in which case, buy it now... </p>

[Marvin]

<p>I suppose that the issue is that things wear out - everything does. So, when looking to buy a used item e.g., a camera, it is reasonable to ask "how much has this been used".<br>

If you were interested in buying a used car wouldn't you ask "how many miles has it gone?"<br>

If you currently own a car, don't you think that it "has X number of miles on it maybe it's time for a new one."<br>

Seems like a reasonable way to think about most anything. (maybe not about your marriage)</p>

[rick_m.]

<p>It is a perfectly reasonable question to ask when you are buying one. Ask away if you are buying used. That is not, however, what you asked. You wanted to predict when your camera will fail. What you got were some humorous answers basically saying, "who knows"? <br>

You use the car analogy. That is not a good one. The clicks will tell you to some extent how much wear there is on the shutter and mechanicals but those failures and repairs are only part of the story. Replacing the shutter does not "zero time" your camera.</p>

<p>I had a D2Xs. It had about 67,000 shots on it. For a professional body this is nothing. I shot a rodeo with it, brought it home, set it on the carpet in my office and it died. Dead. Toes up. Wouldn't power up at all. Off to Nikon where they told me it would cost about $600.00 to repair. This didn't work for me because I had another D2xs, a D4, a D300 and a D7100. So I just sold it used on the auction site and moved on. I doubt this is much different than what you would do.</p>

<p>What we are saying is that you may be buying yourself some trouble. You have a fine camera that works very well. You can check the shutter count if you want to. So what would you do if you found out it had 150,000 actuations? Try to sell it to an unsuspecting person? (I hope not.) Buy a new one? Send it to Canon and have just that one piece (shutter) repaired at considerable expense even though it is working fine and might last a few hundred thousand more clicks?</p>

<p>Unless you are photographing time-critical tasks such as important events (in which case you should already have a backup camera) your choice to buy a new one is just a matter of can I afford it?.....which one?....and will the new one make me grin? </p>

<p>So don't worry. Do whatever makes you happy. If you have a spare $7K that you are not using, get a 1DX. Then sell it as soon as it is out of warranty and get a new one.....;)</p>

[Marcus Ian]

<p>Actually, I think the car analogy is a very good one, only instead of a car with 10,000 (or however many) moving mechanical parts, half of which are frequently abused to excess, you are talking about a device which contains, essentially, 1 mechanical system consisting of 10 or so discrete parts - all of which are coddled away deep inside a very tough shell.</p>

<p>Just like you would ask how many miles are on a car when purchasing used, you should certainly ask how many exposures are on a camera when purchasing used. Just like buying a car, the higher that number is, the lower the perceived value. And, just like when buying a car, that answer is utterly useless in predicting when/if a specific failure will occur. That failure is far far more dependent on how the camera was used (just like the car), than a count of miles/exposures. I'd buy a camera w/ twice (or more) the exposures from a photobug than I would (at all likely) from a newspaper photog, or a wedding photog... Just like I'd not buy a used taxi or police car - regardless of mileage -the abuse is terrible!</p>

<p>Personally, I don't think that simply since (one of) my car(s) has 250,000 miles on it, I should get a new one. Instead I think, if I bought a new or used replacement, I would be looking at a significant increase in cost of ownership, similar fuel economy, more expensive insurance (even if I paid cash for the car), and (most importantly) a lot less fun to drive. The only reason I'd consider replacing it is if I could get one that is as great (or better) to drive, or a major mechanical fault developed that made the use suddenly similarly/more expensive than replacing it - plus I could find one I enjoyed using as much. Over the last decade at least, the answer to both questions has been no. That said, the 7D2 may be significantly better to shoot with than your 7D, in which case I'd do it in a heartbeat, however, I'd wait on that decision until you can play with it first...</p>

[angkordave]

<p>As a pro, Ive never had a camera fail through a shutter failure' I have one main-board failure and general body wear means I'll replace a DSLR every 2-3 years. A camera that is used frequently is less likley to fail than one that is stored for months between occasional uses. <br />Camera bodies become obsolete in most cases well before the shutter wears out.</p>

[wayne_campbell]

<p>To sum it up......you'll be the first to know!</p>

[Mark Keefer]

<p>When it fails, pay a couple hundred to get it fixed. There is also Live View mode, yeah go mirrorless with a 7D mirrorless you don't need no stinking mirrors. ;-)</p>

[dan_south]

If you open a raw file from the camera in Photoshop, you can get the shutter count from a section in the metadata. I don't

remember where it is exactly, but do a search. This has been discussed many times before.

[phule]

<p>[[if you open a raw file from the camera in Photoshop, you can get the shutter count from a section in the metadata]]</p>

<p>This is not true for many Canon cameras. </p>

[g dan mitchell]

<p>Shutter life estimates do not provide a point at which the shutter <em>will </em>die — they provide an estimate of a point at which the manufacturer anticipates that a (small but significant) percentage of the units might begin to have problems. It is possible for a shutter to fail earlier... and it is <em>likely </em>that your shutter will continue working long after that point.<br>

Unless you have far, far exceeded this estimated value it probably doesn't make a lot of sense for most photographers to replace a camera just on that basis.</p>

[w_t1]

<p>You touched a nerve because you failed to use google, as Bob said, and you asked a question that's asked a gazillion times before, as Rob noted. I am continually amazed at people here, and people on FB that I know personally that will post questions that are answered in a couple of seconds with a google search. SMH.</p>

 

[savagesax]

This may sound like a strange answer to the PO's question.

 

First the shutters can go anytime. High 5's to the people posting above - advice was dead on. Here's the

GREAT news. I haven't heard of any shutters going out on these cameras. Most people upgrade before

the shutters die.

 

More GREAT news. The cameras are so inexpensive now I'd buy another camera before replacing the

shutter. Even the same model! For example I have 2 1Ds Mk 3 camera's with low shutter clicks.

However if one of these cameres dies due to a shutter, I'd sell it on ebay for parts and buy another used

one from KEH or some place like that!

 

Well recently I sold one of my 1Ds mark 3 cameras and I bought a 5D mark 3. The camera I sold was

great, but the rubber/leather looked horrible. I asked the folks on this site how to make the

rubber/leather look new again. Well the advice was perfect. People on this Canon site are smart, great,

and fun. This is my favorite site to visit. Yes - Yippie! The camera looked new again. I sold it allowing

me to get the 5D iii.

 

Well thats my advice. Use your cameras until the shutter dies or you drop it off of a plane or you drop it

into a lake.

 

Have a blast with your camera(s)s and and buy something when you what a new toy!

 

Back in the days, mainly the 1980's through about 2003 I shot with Hasselblads. These cameras and

the lenses were expensive. I learned how to do my own repairs. Although expensive, fixing Hasselblads

wasn't really that hard. If there was a light leak I could fix the leak for about $2 in 10 minutes.

Hasselblad would charge $200.

 

Long story short regarding this post, I won't touch the shutters regarding the Canon cameras. Just

replace them.

 

Take care, happy shooting folks. bob