FZ20 - Battery charging time?

[rqy99g]

Hi

I bought a FZ20 the other day charged the battery, didn't notice how long it took just gave it the 2 hours as described in the manual. I took around 20 pics with flash, uploading to my PC after every 5 pics or so (I haven't been able to buy a larger card yet!). The next day the battery was flat.

I recharged noticing that it only took around 25 minutes for charging to complete! After 2 or 3 more photos and 2 hours switched off, I switched the camera back on to find it was flat again!!

Jessops have since changed the battery. The charger consistently only takes 1 hour to charge batteries (I've since bought another) not 2 as described.

I don't think I'll ever get 200 photos out of 1 battery as suggested in some reviews.

How long does your battery take to charge?

Any other thoughts or experiences?

[genece]

It takes about 1 1/2 hrs to charge the battery.

How your battery live goes is dependent on how you use the camera.

If you spend a lot of time reviewing photos on the LCD your battery life is going to be much less than if you do not.

Also it has as much if not more about how long the camera is on as it does how many photos you take.

Another thing using the camera to upload photos to the computer is not a good Idea.....Please do yourself a favor and get a card reader.
They speed up the upload time and save wear and tear on the camera and battery and they are inexpensive . Here in the USA you can get one for 5 dollars.

You can get way over 200 photos a charge, as a matter of fact I have taken over 1000 photos a day on 3 batteries.

Pay attention to how you are using the batteries, but it is possible your charger or battery is no good.

[rqy99g]

Thanks for the reply Gene.

The weathers been pretty poor in the UK lately so most shots have been taken in-doors with flash and I suppose with the camera being new I have switched it on and off many times reviewing my 5 wonderfull pictures! (I bought a 512mb 133x card yesterday which will cure that one!).

It's a good point about the card reader I'll go back to my PC store for one ASAP.

I think I'll have to wait until I can get outside in decent light to see how long the battery really lasts. However I'm still concerned that the charger only charges for 1 hour before showing fully charged.

Simon
Bolton, UK

[Bill Markwick]

Hi


How long does your battery take to charge?

Any other thoughts or experiences?

Mine takes about one hour and 45 minutes. Your one-hour time seems a bit short. Since you've replaced the battery, the problem will be a defective charger, a battery that needs conditioning, or a defective camera that's drawing too much current.

Assuming the camera is okay, you can check out the charger by measuring the battery voltage after it's been fully charged. This isn't easy - the battery contacts are well hidden. I've used small resistor leads wrapped around the meter's probes. Perhaps your camera store can do this for you. Anyway, a lithium-ion battery should read 8.4 volts, or even a little higher if it's fresh from the charger. Anything less points to charger problems.

Assuming the charger is okay: Equipment manuals don't stress conditioning enough. New batteries should be fully discharged and then fully charged 2-3 times to bring their capacity up to full. If you're removing the battery when the camera's battery gauge starts flashing red, it isn't fully discharged and probably has 20-30 minutes of life left in it. Keep the camera going until it exhausts the battery and powers down for good (as opposed to the automatic batterysaver powerdown). Recharge the battery. Do this two or three times. I've done this for everything I own that has lithium batteries and they've been meeting their specs perfectly.

And if that doesn't work, it points to the camera. They should replace it under warranty.

Regards,
Bill

[rqy99g]

Bill thanks for the useful info.

Simon

[genece]

I do not have any expertise in the field but I charge Litium batteries whenever the urge hits and from all I have read there is no need to discharge a lithium battery and I have some that are over 5 years old and still ticking.

I never leave a battery go all the way down...thats exactly when the shot of a lifetime would present itself. Neither would I do that with My cell phone or Laptop.



http://www.batteryuniversity.com/partone-12.htm




I suppose we each can make up our own mind.

[Bill Markwick]

I never leave a battery go all the way down...thats exactly when the shot of a lifetime would present itself. Neither would I do that with My cell phone or Laptop.

I suppose we each can make up our own mind.

Battery parameters are so complicated and so interdependent that they sometimes look more like black magic than science. An entire mythology of batteries has arisen, much of it wrong.

Anything I post about batteries comes from engineering notes and/or long experience in circuitry. Normally there's no need for deep-discharge, as you say, but the peculiar behaviour of the battery under discussion calls for some remedy or other. Deep-discharge conditioning is a good start. And I don't mean running it into a short - the camera will decide a safe cutoff voltage, usually about 3V/cell.

Bill