D70 vs.C-5050 Battery Life

Anyone care to comment on D70 battery life?

I have a C-5050 that I shoot in TTL mode i.e. I don't use the internal flash. I easily get 2 one hour dives and 100+ SHQ pictures on one set of batteries. A friend of mine shooting a Nikon 5000 has to change batteries after every dive all else being equal.

So in this context, how does the D70 stack up? Will I be able to get 100 SHQ pictures on one set of batteries? 100 RAW pictures?

Peter, I did 3 dives last weekend with the D70.......shot at least 150 RAW images and the battery stills shows to be full

I expect to be able to shoot for 2 full days of diving with this battery.......BTW, I supplimented my Nikon battery with a Lenmar backup....I had great luck with Lenmar when I had a cp5000

FWIW, I use a Sandisk Ultra II 1GB card....the camera says it will hold 94 RAW images, but when I started shooting random shots around the house....it actually held 196 RAW images

Awesome after the cp5000

Karl

Thanks for the info Karl. Now I have one less reason not to get a D70. All I need now is an Ikelite housing with iTTL support.

BTW I ordered a Sandisk Ultra II 1GB card yesterday, and about two weeks ago I switched to PS CS and started shooting my 5050 macro in RAW format. All toward getting ready to move on.

Again, Thanks. Peter

Sounds like me.......when I decided to make the leap, I bought my 60mm, 105mm and topside 24-120VR before the camera was ever released.....got some good deals on ebay

Karl

I have had my battery in the D70 sometimes as long as a month and I change the battery just out of principle. I have had the D70 for around 4 months and I have changed the battery in it about 4 times. I think the last time I changed it was because I did a firmware update to the camera and wanted to make sure it was full. I bought a second battery on ebay for around 12 bucks and it lasts about as long as the nikon one. Your mileage may vary.

Tony

It's because it doesn't have to power the rear LCD unless you're reviewing a photo.

Cheers

James

To the best of my knowledge, the D70 does not use any significant amount of battery power. I've taken Hundreds of photos, reviewed them all in the view finder many times, and never recharged a single time. I've never then the charge meter drop below full.

In fact, you really don't need a but a second battery for it at all. Nikon kindly includes a "battery holder" that you can fill with off the shelf batteries in the unlikely event that the rechargeble Lithium Ion battery runs out of juice.

In a refreshing switch from the 5050, you only limitation you'll face is in the capacity of your memory cards.

Dave

I use a Sandisk Ultra II 1GB card....the camera says it will hold 94 RAW images, but when I started shooting random shots around the house....it actually held 196 RAW images  

This is because the D70 writes lossless compression RAW files. The uncompressed RAWs are about 10MB hence ~100 on a 1GB card. But when the camera actually writes them they are about 4.7MB. The actual size depends a bit on the content of the image - which is why the camera cannot predict how big they will be until they are written and the "shots remaining" cautiously predicts the minimum (assuming it will not be able to compress any of the remaining images you take).

A rough guide is to mulitply by 2 when you see how manyy shots you have remaining. Apologies if I am stating the obvious.

Alex

It's hard to believe comming from a consumer digital, but the D70 (and probably most DSLRS) hardly use any battery power at all. The difference is astonishing really.

With my old Canon I could get just over one dive without changing batteries. With the D70 you hardly ever need to change batteries and I could easially see you going multiple days of diving without a change.

I typically take a few hundred pictures a month topside and rarely think about changing batteries. I've stopped carrying around a spare.

It's like it used to be with a film camera. You just don't think about the battery.

The battery is bigger to start with and without the LCD video feed it just uses less power.