Quantum QB1c and D7. First impressions. Pictures.

Hi!
Went by the store today and picked up my Quantum Battery-pack QB1c.

It's charging at the moment. According to the manual it should take 3-4 hours, and it doesn't say anything of charging it any longer time the first time. Might be that the Charging logics built into the battery-pack don't take those things into consideration anyway... We'll see.

Anyway. I took some pictures using my Canon A20.
The whole album is at:

http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumIndex?u=1761154&a=13606146&f=0&vt=vp

But I'll make a short initial impression presentation with pictures right here...

This is the packages from Quantum you need to get it to work with the D7:

http://albums.photopoint.com/j/View?u=1761154&a=13606146&p=52689256

Here is a chaotic view of everything inside the QB1c and the XDC4 packages. Notable extras here are Cableholder pads to attach to the QB1c or even the D7. I might not have choosen the best places for them in the later shots. But if I change anything I'll note that in upcoming updates. Also note the metal clip. You can attach that to the battery-packs tripod-mount and hang it on the tripod or something like that. Or, if you turn it over, it becomes a belt-clip. Pretty good to have...

http://albums.photopoint.com/j/View?u=1761154&a=13606146&p=52689257

A closer look at what becomes the backside (but some could decide to have it as frontside) of the pack. The connector up to the right is where you plug in the wall-plug adaptor for charging. Here is also the status-indicators for the charging (Four leds indicator). The button to the left of the indicators is actually a power-on button. Brilliant! No risk of draining the battery just because it is connected to the camera when not in use.

http://albums.photopoint.com/j/View?u=1761154&a=13606146&p=52689259

View of the bottom of the pack. I had hoped for a tripod mount on the bottom. No such luck. I didn't really expect it. The casing is plastic and although it seems pretty tough it isn't the absolute most impact tolerate type of plastic. I don't think my kind of use ever will make it break though.

http://albums.photopoint.com/j/View?u=1761154&a=13606146&p=52689262

A side-front view of the pack, my worst shot yet. But you can see in all the black shades the two side-connectors. One is for the Camera-cord, and the other could be used for an external flash.

http://albums.photopoint.com/j/View?u=1761154&a=13606146&p=52689266

Here is the Back and front view of everything assembled. Sorry about the poor quality shots, but I was in a bit of hurry, and thought it was better to get something online sooner rather than waiting until tonight when I have time to set everything up for better shots...

http://albums.photopoint.com/j/View?u=1761154&a=13606146&p=52689267

One thing you notice in these last two shots is that the pack "sticks out" on the hand-grip side. It looks nasty, and it feels strange holding it. But I didn't feel like I got a bad grip or that it got in the way of my hand reaching anything. Actually, for my small hands it gave my thumb a more natural position to swing down and feel the magnifying button on the camera. Earlier I felt I had to search for it when I wanted it...

http://albums.photopoint.com/j/View?u=1761154&a=13606146&p=52689269

Well, that is my initial impressions.

I hope it helps out in any way. I will of course return with updates on how long it lasts and more about the feel and handling of the package.

Best Regards

Bo Eriksson

Thanks!
Nice and demonstrative mail. Glad to hear from You later.

Bo Eriksson said:

Hi!
Went...

Click to expand...

Here is my first update.
I started the charging of this battery-pack at around 12.40 today.

The red led (first) started flashing indicating that the first 25% of the charging had begun. After about 1 hour 10 minutes the red led went solid and the next led (green) started flashing indicating that the next 25% capacity had begun charging... nice touch, but nothing unusual so far.

At 16.01 the last led started blinking, and still did so when I started writing this first update. Now it is 17.58 when the last led finally went solid light. So the first charging went fine and took some hefty 5 hours and 15 minutes. Knowing my old NiMh batteries I should probably leave it on for the night. The manual hints that you should make it practice to have it charging a whole night as standard.

While sitting at work pushing up the time to get home I read a bit more about the pack. It's main purpose is to drive flashes, and evidently has an auto-off function at 30 minutes of inactivity (described as "no flash"). This can be bypassed however by pressing and holding the on-button for 3 seconds. I will test and see if this is necessary...

I will return to this thread tomorrow with the first run-time, if I actually get to do any photographing-test tonight, but I think it will work out fine and you will have a report.

Expectation for tonight:

Not too much, I think the battery-pack wont give it's most until several overnight carges and total usage drains, but, again. We will have to let time tell if that is right...

Best Regards

Bo Eriksson (running to the door to get home)

Bo
could you please make a LIST of the required items:
1. QB1c
2. XDC4
ONLY THOSE ?? anything else needed ??

Bo
Waiting for your update

Yes that is correct.

The QB1c contains belt-clip,manual and power-adapter for charging. The only thing missing in that package is the cable.
And The cable for the D7 is the XDC4.

Best Regards

Bo Eriksson

hatem tawfik said:

Bo
could you please make a LIST of the required items:
1. QB1c
2. XDC4
ONLY THOSE ?? anything else needed ??

Click to expand...

It's now the morning after the night before...

A note about connecting the power-pack. When the power-switch for the power-pack is of this breaks the power to the camera. This is all for the better, but I have not tested what would happen if you pull the plug while the camera is on. I will test that tonight though.

Best case scenario is that it goes on with the internal batteries without any disruptions, but I wouldn't bet on it. You may have to switch the camera off to go to internal mode.

Here is the results of the first session with the QB1c.

I managed to drain the QB1c in 1 hour and 38 minutes...

But wait 'til I tell the whole story before you cancel any orders.

This test was a complete stress-test, and I am pretty pleased with the results bearing in mind I only did a full charge for the first time and never gave it time to trickle-charge over night or anything.

I set the camera to full automatics, I switched to LCD-mode, and I flipped up the flash and I used a IBM 340Mb Microdrive for this session. The LCD was active every one of the 98 minutes it was on. I took 375 pictures in Highest resolution and fine quality. I deleted all the pictures on the microdrive two times to get going. Every single picture used the dual flashes from the built in flash!

So, 375 high-res pictures with flash in 98 minutes. Not too bad considering the charge-time I allowed.

So what is the bad news. Well, there is a couple of things I noticed.

1. During this extreme test the handgrip-side went actually hot! I hadn't succeeded in making it hot before this. Now I know what they are talking about. But it took more than 40 minutes during this test before it got hot. and it never once failed under the duration of the test.

2. Reading the manual I got the impression that the last of the four charing-lights would start blinking BEFORE shutting power off. No such luck. When the red light flashes, the power is gone. This is unfortunate for a number of reasons, but I think I can learn to live with it considering the options and that this is the only pack that attaches to the camera-body (and is universal for all 6 volts devices I might add).

You should also know that the charging indicators have three green lights and one red. The shut down one and one until only the red lights, and when it goes to that mode you have aproximatly 25% time left doing what you do, so you have no exact knowledge as to when the power will fail. With a little use you will probably have a very good idea, but I would have liked any kind of pre-warning that it's gonna shut down.

When the power went it was during the writing of the 376th picture, and that pictures data was never completed and thus not readable at all actually. That is a bit ugly. But pulling the plug and turning on the camera with the internal batteries I could just erase the faulty frame.

I would want to finish off with a good note. The second charging reported all green light somewhere between 3 and a half and four hours (I didn't see exactly when), so When the initial charge is done it will be faster the next time around.

Now the battery has charged overnight, and it sits in my camera-bag, and I will either do a new stress test or go out photographing tonight, Weather will decide which it will be.

My conclusion this far:

I am pleased despite of the shut-down problem. I think it will give you very long "normal" shoot-times. Bear in mind that this test was on the overly extreme side... And its considerably cheaper that the Minolta package, and has the advantage of letting you choose where you want it. On the belt with an irritating cord hanging or on the camera (with maybee an irritating extra weight)...

Best Regards

Bo Eriksson

I just thought of something...

Although these two items is all you really need to connect and use this power-pack you might want one more item. An extension cable. Wearing the battery on the belt you will be able to use the XDC4 cable , but it is of the "telephone-type", which means it will possibly be more irritating than anything else. So you might want to extend the XDC4 with a highly flexible straight wire.

I think Quantum has this as an option, but if I decide to get one I will buy a female and male connector of the type the camera has and a good straight flexible cable and solder it myself...

Just a thought...

Best Regards

Bo Eriksson

hatem tawfik said:

Bo
could you please make a LIST of the required items:
1. QB1c
2. XDC4
ONLY THOSE ?? anything else needed ??

Click to expand...

Bo

Thank you very much, 375 pics is great, almost as much as the G1, I am not cancelling my order. Thank you
Hatem Tawfik
Cairo Egypt

Bo Eriksson said:

It's now the morning after the night before...

Click to expand...

Hi Bo Eriksson,

Sounds like

"Today is the tomorrow I waited for all day yesterday..."

Thanks Bo for the review, you have my attention.

George

Bo Eriksson said:

It's now the morning after the night before...

A note about connecting the power-pack. When the power-switch for
the power-pack is of this breaks the power to the camera. This is
all for the better, but I have not tested what would happen if you
pull the plug while the camera is on. I will test that tonight
though.
Best case scenario is that it goes on with the internal batteries
without any disruptions, but I wouldn't bet on it. You may have to
switch the camera off to go to internal mode.

Click to expand...

Bo thanks a lot.

Regarding pulling the power plug during operation, Minolta does not recommend it. I have done some tests with it. If you pull it very slowly, you will actually find the camera powering of for a moment. This is because of the plastic at the plugs tip, holding the contacts wide and keeping the internal batteries disconnected. If you somewhat faster, the camera may just crash. If you do it very fast, it may continue operation.

Jake.

Hi again all!

I repeated the previous tests. This time the battery had been charging all night, and on the morning I put it in the camera-bag. I did not use it for the whole day, and when I got home I fired it up.

First I did the pull the plug test. Don't do it is my advice. I seriously hope that all belt-clip solutions has some kind of way of locking the contact to the camera. If the battery-end pops out doesn't matter, then the camera goes down pretty nice. But you should turn the cameras switch to off before powering it up again. However, IF you pull the plug out of the camera and have internal batteries installed, it will (or did anyway) crash pretty ugly. There is not too much of alarm anyway though, because once you power it down and up again everything is business as usual.

As I said, othervise I did the same test as the night before. Microdrive 340Mb, Flash on on every single picture, all automatic, low light indoor condition, Highest resolution, fine quality. I did do one thing different. I was way more intense in firing off pictures!

The result of this increased intensity is that I was able to drain the battery to shutdown status in only 75 minutes... But what 75 minutes then. Three complete reformats of the microdrive and... hold onto something... 516 successful pictures taken!!! Yes, and that is with flash on every single one! The battery shut off exactly as the day before. While saving shot 517 (although yesterday shot 376 if I remember correctly). But going to viewing mode just tells you it's unable to show that picture and it does not complain or do any errors in removing it.

I think that is great performance. But doing this intense sessions do make the camera hot still, so I will not perform any more intensity tests. I will however probably do another update after the weekend on my real-life experiences with the battery pack...

Best Regards

Bo Eriksson

with LCDor EVF

As I said.. Exactly the same settings besides the intensity of shooting pictures.
LCD on all the time... An it was really on ALL the time.

Best Regards

Bo Eriksson

hatem tawfik said:

with LCDor EVF

Click to expand...

Dear Mr Erickson,
Very very comprehensive review. helps a lot

i haven't got a D7 but I am very interested if only because of its 28mm angle of view.
Some questions and observations.

(1) Does the Quantum not unbalance the camera especially when used vertically? Does the battery stay in position or does it want to spin round the tripod socket? How heavy is the Quantum? The Minolta needs all the extra weight it can manage. I haven't yet seen a sharp shot taken with one (anticipate flames and howls of protest!) and am guessing that camera shake must be partially responsible.

(2) It's a real shame that the Quantum itself doesn't have a tripod socket; believe me you don't want to use a wire to the Quantum when using the camera on a tripod or you are effectively locked to the tripod!

(3) Does this sound insane? I have both an old Metz 402 and a Metz 60 (potato masher flashes); I don't suppose there is any sort of an adaptor that could be rigged up to use this heavy duty battery supply with the D7? I bet you there is but I don't know enough about the subject to check it out.or risk it.

One last point, tell me that you don't have to have a double flash from the on board flash if you don't want more than one. I would want to use the camera with studio flash eventually if I were to buy one.
Thank you again.
Jerome

Jerome said:

Dear Mr Erickson,
Very very comprehensive review. helps a lot
i haven't got a D7 but I am very interested if only because of its
28mm angle of view.
Some questions and observations.
(1) Does the Quantum not unbalance the camera especially when used
vertically? Does the battery stay in position or does it want to
spin round the tripod socket? How heavy is the Quantum? The Minolta
needs all the extra weight it can manage. I haven't yet seen a
sharp shot taken with one (anticipate flames and howls of protest!)
and am guessing that camera shake must be partially responsible.

Click to expand...

you should really look at more postings of peoples albums. I've seen LOTS of exteremely sharp images from the D7 and I've shot very sharp images myself with mine. In fact, very nearly all of my images are extremely sharp! First of all, the lens is of very high quality and helps greatly in the sharpness. Additionally, I learned years ago the general rule of thumb that when shooting with telephoto lenses to use a shutter speed that at least equals the focal length you are shooting at. Meaning, If I am shooting at 200mm my choosen shutter speed is at least 1/200 sec or faster. This will still any hand shake you may have.

The few non-sharp images i've gotten from the D7 were because the subject moved during the exposure (such as wind blowing a flower in macro mode).

The sharpness of printed images I have from the D7 compare to those I have from my Maxxum 7 with Minolta's "G" series lenses and i'll put the sharpness and optical quality of those lenses against ANY 35mm lenses on the market. They are that good. I use to shoot Nikon's and had a full array of nikon glass and comparing images from both sets of glass i'd say the Minolta was actually better but than the Minoltas are newer and i'm sure has better muticoating and glass than the older Nikon's did from 10 years ago. Minolta put the same attention into the lens of the D7 and it shows.

Jerome47940 said:

(2) It's a real shame that the Quantum itself doesn't have a tripod
socket; believe me you don't want to use a wire to the Quantum when
using the camera on a tripod or you are effectively locked to the
tripod!

(3) Does this sound insane? I have both an old Metz 402 and a Metz
60 (potato masher flashes); I don't suppose there is any sort of an
adaptor that could be rigged up to use this heavy duty battery
supply with the D7? I bet you there is but I don't know enough
about the subject to check it out.or risk it.

One last point, tell me that you don't have to have a double flash
from the on board flash if you don't want more than one. I would
want to use the camera with studio flash eventually if I were to
buy one.

Click to expand...

There are work-arounds to the first preflash. Search the forum. I think Steve Dean posted about how he did it as a start.

Jerome47940 said:

Thank you again.
Jerome

Click to expand...

First of all, very good and usefull testing Bo! It will be interessting knowing how the "real life" photography works out...

Jerome, I just have to ask: You are shure your monitor is sharp?

Remember that the monitor has only 72-76 DPI, not the best if you want the sharpness you look for. I have gotten some of my picture enlarged (so far only in 20x30 cm) on real photographic prosess/paper - and they are pin sharp!

And I agree with you regarding the missing the tripod socket.... - that's bad.

Keep us posted Bo....

I'm picking up my 5600 HS(D) tomorrow, so I guess my chargers will run hot the next few days....

Terje F

Jerome said:

Dear Mr Erickson,
Very very comprehensive review. helps a lot
i haven't got a D7 but I am very interested if only because of its
28mm angle of view.
Some questions and observations.
(1) Does the Quantum not unbalance the camera especially when used
vertically? Does the battery stay in position or does it want to
spin round the tripod socket? How heavy is the Quantum? The Minolta
needs all the extra weight it can manage. I haven't yet seen a
sharp shot taken with one (anticipate flames and howls of protest!)
and am guessing that camera shake must be partially responsible.

(2) It's a real shame that the Quantum itself doesn't have a tripod
socket; believe me you don't want to use a wire to the Quantum when
using the camera on a tripod or you are effectively locked to the
tripod!

(3) Does this sound insane? I have both an old Metz 402 and a Metz
60 (potato masher flashes); I don't suppose there is any sort of an
adaptor that could be rigged up to use this heavy duty battery
supply with the D7? I bet you there is but I don't know enough
about the subject to check it out.or risk it.

One last point, tell me that you don't have to have a double flash
from the on board flash if you don't want more than one. I would
want to use the camera with studio flash eventually if I were to
buy one.
Thank you again.
Jerome

Click to expand...

--Terje F

Jerome said:

Dear Mr Erickson,
Very very comprehensive review. helps a lot
i haven't got a D7 but I am very interested if only because of its
28mm angle of view.
Some questions and observations.
(1) Does the Quantum not unbalance the camera especially when used
vertically? Does the battery stay in position or does it want to
spin round the tripod socket? How heavy is the Quantum? The Minolta
needs all the extra weight it can manage. I haven't yet seen a
sharp shot taken with one (anticipate flames and howls of protest!)
and am guessing that camera shake must be partially responsible.

(2) It's a real shame that the Quantum itself doesn't have a tripod
socket; believe me you don't want to use a wire to the Quantum when
using the camera on a tripod or you are effectively locked to the
tripod!

(3) Does this sound insane? I have both an old Metz 402 and a Metz
60 (potato masher flashes); I don't suppose there is any sort of an
adaptor that could be rigged up to use this heavy duty battery
supply with the D7? I bet you there is but I don't know enough
about the subject to check it out.or risk it.

One last point, tell me that you don't have to have a double flash
from the on board flash if you don't want more than one. I would
want to use the camera with studio flash eventually if I were to
buy one.

Click to expand...

Jerome,

A workable solution to #1&2 is to mount the D7 on the Stroboflip bracket so that when you get your off-camera flash going you will have someting to mount it on and be able to keep the flash adjusted over the camera lens... and then mount the QB1 on the underside of the bracket....The D7 is light enough that the combined weight of the camera, bracket, and battery is comfortable and gives the unit some mass so you do not shake so much at the longer focal lengths.
3) seems to me that the metz models run 9volt batteries rather than 6v.
Stuart

Hello, Bo,

I've been lurking on this thread, and checked out the pack at B&H; $146 is the price they emailed me.

Thanks so much for your efforts re: info on this pack. Really functional, but how is the weight? You mentioned it was a bit different, but did not compromise the security of your grip. Did it get in the way of your using the zoom, focus ring or any other control? I like the added weight, did you feel it reduced camera shake at all with your hand-held shots?

Thanks,

Brian K

Epperson has it for 140