I'm getting more and more frustrated with the poor battery life with the Z8. Today it hit another low - over a span of about 30 minutes I shot one 17-second 4K60P video clip and 45 HE* raw files (in short 15 fps bursts), and that was enough to take a freshly-charged battery down to flashing red. I always have airplane mode on, so wifi/bluetooth can't be causing a drain. Most of the time between shots, the camera was switched off. Most days, just having the camera switched on will kill a battery in about an hour, whether I'm taking photos or not (and if I'm not shooting, it goes to sleep after 30 seconds, until I wake it up again). What else could be causing the batteries to run down so quickly?
ArizonaImage wrote:
Sounds like a defective battery... I would try a different battery and see if you get the same results. Thats completely abnormal
I have 5 batteries, all genuine Nikon EN-EL15c, bought from three different stores. I haven't gotten an acceptable number of shots with any of them so far; at first I just assumed being new batteries it would take a few charge cycles to get them up to peak performance, but the opposite seems to be happening.
I get about 4 hours of fairly active photography (in an event photography environment) on one battery, with thousands of images.
molson wrote:
I'm getting more and more frustrated with the poor battery life with the Z8. Today it hit another low - over a span of about 30 minutes I shot one 17-second 4K60P video clip and 45 HE* raw files (in short 15 fps bursts), and that was enough to take a freshly-charged battery down to flashing red. I always have airplane mode on, so wifi/bluetooth can't be causing a drain. Most of the time between shots, the camera was switched off. Most days, just having the camera switched on will kill a battery in about an hour, whether I'm taking photos or not (and if I'm not shooting, it goes to sleep after 30 seconds, until I wake it up again). What else could be causing the batteries to run down so quickly?...Show more →
I agree with @ilkka_nissila , that Z8 will better go in repair. Just not mention you use 3rd party batteries though as that could void warranty. Good luck.
molson wrote:
I'm getting more and more frustrated with the poor battery life with the Z8. Today it hit another low - over a span of about 30 minutes I shot one 17-second 4K60P video clip and 45 HE* raw files (in short 15 fps bursts), and that was enough to take a freshly-charged battery down to flashing red. I always have airplane mode on, so wifi/bluetooth can't be causing a drain. Most of the time between shots, the camera was switched off. Most days, just having the camera switched on will kill a battery in about an hour, whether I'm taking photos or not (and if I'm not shooting, it goes to sleep after 30 seconds, until I wake it up again). What else could be causing the batteries to run down so quickly?...Show more →
Sorry to echo the masses, but I think its your camera.
Do you experience the same kind of battery drain when shooting stills throughout the day? I don't do video, so I can't speak to the drain with respect to video, but I don't experience severe battery drain with stills. I have my camera set to stay awake (infinity symbol), and will work a scene or subject for a prolonged period of time. I power down if I am pursuing something different, but will otherwise leave the camera powered on.
The Z8 can do long video takes on one battery; this is generally not a problem. It should be able to record about two hours of video on one EN-EL15c charge.
OwlsEyes wrote:
Sorry to echo the masses, but I think its your camera.
Do you experience the same kind of battery drain when shooting stills throughout the day? I don't do video, so I can't speak to the drain with respect to video, but I don't experience severe battery drain with stills. I have my camera set to stay awake (infinity symbol), and will work a scene or subject for a prolonged period of time. I power down if I am pursuing something different, but will otherwise leave the camera powered on.
Vinnie_VdB wrote:
I agree with @ilkka_nissila@ , that Z8 will better go in repair. Just not mention you use 3rd party batteries though as that could void warranty. Good luck.
Does he say anywhere in this thread that he uses 3rd party batteries?
Several times, weeks ago, I was following Molson's posts on his poor battery performance. I followed each of his posts with my own post on how happy I was with my Z8 battery performance. Isn't that right Molson?
When are you going to send your Z8 to Nikon for their diagnosis? Nothing will change if you do not. Ok, it will get worse I suppose
Has anyone asked you on this thread if the Z8 gets warm just sitting there? Does it have a short? That's the extent of my electrical knowledge.
I'll guess that you have a short in the Z8's electrical system.
Just a suggestion: Turn your Z8 on and leave it sitting on a table. Come back in several hours and pick it up. If you feel an area on the camera what is warm I think that means you have a short..... but I am not a technician.
bs kite wrote:
I'll guess that you have a short in the Z8's electrical system.
It seems to be worse when I'm using the 100-400 zoom. This wouldn't be the first time I've had a Nikkor lens with an electrical fault (the early AF-S 300mm f4 had a recall for installing an internal ground wire to fix an electrical issue).
If it's not the lens, it must be the camera, because it's highly unlikely that all five batteries are defective... but then again, Nikon did have to recall a bunch of batteries just a few years ago, too...
The camera seldom gets slightly warm (barely noticeable), even when I do shoot for extended periods, but I've never come anywhere near the number of shots per battery charge that other people are getting. Intuitively, drawing down 2000mA in 20 or 30 minutes should produce a significant amount of heat, and it was hot and sunny (around 25ºC) yesterday when I was out shooting, and even though I was holding the camera the whole time, I never noticed the camera getting hot.
molson wrote:
It seems to be worse when I'm using the 100-400 zoom. This wouldn't be the first time I've had a Nikkor lens with an electrical fault (the early AF-S 300mm f4 had a recall for installing an internal ground wire to fix an electrical issue).
If it's not the lens, it must be the camera, because it's highly unlikely that all five batteries are defective... but then again, Nikon did have to recall a bunch of batteries just a few years ago, too...
The camera seldom gets slightly warm (barely noticeable), even when I do shoot for extended periods, but I've never come anywhere near the number of shots per battery charge that other people are getting. Intuitively, drawing down 2000mA in 20 or 30 minutes should produce a significant amount of heat, and it was hot and sunny (around 25ºC) yesterday when I was out shooting, and even though I was holding the camera the whole time, I never noticed the camera getting hot....Show more →
I hope someone responds to this who knows more than we do because I honestly do not know what to say in response to your 100-400 sentence.
Someone with this knowledge will probably respond ...fingers crossed.
I added a sentence to my short comment. I did read your comment about the camera not getting hot.
What if you turn on the camera, set it on a table and come back in several hours. Do you agree, that there should be no decrease in battery during that time.?
bs kite wrote:
I hope someone responds to this who knows more than we do because I honestly do not know what to say in response to your 100-400 sentence.
It's just what you would call an anecdotal observation; it was the only lens attached to the camera for the camera for the shortest battery life episode so far. I brought it up because it wouldn't be the first time I've had a Nikon lens with an internal electrical fault.
Way back at the start of my engineering career, I was responsible for product reliability testing for a large multinational corporation... I guess I'll have to dust off of that old skillset and try to determine the root cause of the problem, because sending my Z8 and all of my batteries and lenses to Nikon in the hope they can sort it out is not something I want to contemplate.
Is this a known issue because I am about to pull the trigger for the Z8 as a second body to my Z9....maybe just get a refurbished Z9 from Nikon instead?
TooManyShots wrote:
Is this a known issue because I am about to pull the trigger for the Z8 as a second body to my Z9....maybe just get a refurbished Z9 from Nikon instead?
It's an isolated issue, and it hasn't been even determined that it's the camera that's at fault (yet).
molson wrote:
It's just what you would call an anecdotal observation; it was the only lens attached to the camera for the camera for the shortest battery life episode so far. I brought it up because it wouldn't be the first time I've had a Nikon lens with an internal electrical fault.
Way back at the start of my engineering career, I was responsible for product reliability testing for a large multinational corporation... I guess I'll have to dust off of that old skillset and try to determine the root cause of the problem, because sending my Z8 and all of my batteries and lenses to Nikon in the hope they can sort it out is not something I want to contemplate....Show more →
And if you think you can dust off that old skillset and begin applying it to this problem...., you may gradually learn and then suddenly a light will come on!
I will let you know about my battery life with power on but not touching the camera. This will be quite later though.
