The Site With the Lamp

March 15, 2006

I am about to reluctantly charge the battery on my Nikon D70S. The battery is not completely dead yet, but I need to go out of town in a few hours. It's unlikely that I will have a chance to charge it once I leave home.

One of the few complaints I have against the D70S is it's battery. The battery indicator will remain at the full position for a long time. During this current charge cycle it stayed that way until over 500 shots were taken (most of them with the flash).

The very first time I used this camera, after the indicator moved from the full position it was good for only about another 10 shots. As with most rechargables the battery's efficiency improves after you have charged it a few times and graudally tapers away after a while. And this is a clasic example of that currently the counter reads at 708, and it may be possible to shoot about another 100 shots with that and my CF card only has enough room for 145 shots anyway. But the risk of it emptying after another couple of shots is also high.

The CF card is also worth commenting about. When it's empty the camera says it's good for 145 shots but invariably, it holds more than that. The last time i filled it up, it went past the 200 shot mark!