Battery meter on the Canon Powershot S45?

Hello

Does anyone know if the Canon Powershot S45 has a battery meter? I have tried all the menus and I haven’t found any option to turn on. It is very annoying not knowing if you battery is at 10% or 90%.

Thanks

HCB

There is no meter you can turn on.

As your battery depletes, an icon with a half-filled battery will appear in the LCD. This is supposedly a low battery warning, though no where does it say how much charge is left (I have taken > 20 flash shots after it comes on). When you battery is really close to "empty," a "change battery" message is supposed to show (I have never depleted my battery enough to see it).

Anyone have ideas on what % charge remains when these messages appear?

Herlander said:

Hello

Does anyone know if the Canon Powershot S45 has a battery meter? I
have tried all the menus and I haven’t found any option to turn on.
It is very annoying not knowing if you battery is at 10% or 90%.

Thanks

HCB

Click to expand...

it conveniently tells you a few seconds before it dies. =P

Thanks David,
I guess I will have to buy a second Battery

David Gard said:

As your battery depletes, an icon with a half-filled battery will
appear in the LCD. This is supposedly a low battery warning, though
no where does it say how much charge is left (I have taken > 20
flash shots after it comes on). When you battery is really close to
"empty," a "change battery" message is supposed to show (I have
never depleted my battery enough to see it).

Anyone have ideas on what % charge remains when these messages appear?

Herlander said:

Hello

Does anyone know if the Canon Powershot S45 has a battery meter? I
have tried all the menus and I haven’t found any option to turn on.
It is very annoying not knowing if you battery is at 10% or 90%.

Thanks

HCB

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

I wouldnt buy a second battery. Just turn the lcd screen off and you'll be fine. I just did a trip to Vegas, filled my 256MB card over 3 days, and only charged my camera up for an hour each monring, and never did I get a low battery message.

Herlander said:

David Gard said:

As your battery depletes, an icon with a half-filled battery will
appear in the LCD. This is supposedly a low battery warning, though
no where does it say how much charge is left (I have taken > 20
flash shots after it comes on). When you battery is really close to
"empty," a "change battery" message is supposed to show (I have
never depleted my battery enough to see it).

Anyone have ideas on what % charge remains when these messages appear?

Herlander said:

Hello

Does anyone know if the Canon Powershot S45 has a battery meter? I
have tried all the menus and I haven’t found any option to turn on.
It is very annoying not knowing if you battery is at 10% or 90%.

Thanks

HCB

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

I would definately buy a spare battery... Oh I did.

I thought I wouldnt really need one in the original bundle that I got, but a week later I got another one. Without one you lose the ultimate convience of digital photography, the ability to take hundreds of pics without worrying about cost.

David Gard said:

There is no meter you can turn on.

As your battery depletes, an icon with a half-filled battery will
appear in the LCD. This is supposedly a low battery warning, though
no where does it say how much charge is left (I have taken > 20
flash shots after it comes on). When you battery is really close to
"empty," a "change battery" message is supposed to show (I have
never depleted my battery enough to see it).

Anyone have ideas on what % charge remains when these messages appear?

Click to expand...

I don't know how much charge remains when the low battery warning comes on, but I estimate 10%. You should immediately pop the battery out at that point and charge it. I've heard the Li-Ion batteries last longer if you recharge them frequently, rather than running them down first. (This is the exact opposite of all the warnings we hear about NiCd batteries.) And letting the battery run down so low that the camera turns off is likely bad for the battery if you keep doing it.

Carl

I would certainly get a second battery as the camera doesn't really tell you until it's almost dead. More of a dead battery indicator rather than a low battery indicator.

It's happened to be where it has the low battery indicator, and I might have shot maybe 3 more photos before it went totally dead. Worst thing is not being able to take a picture because of dead batteries...
--
-Freeman
-------------
Canon G2+420EX
Canon S30

Carl Lum said:

I don't know how much charge remains when the low battery warning
comes on, but I estimate 10%. You should immediately pop the
battery out at that point and charge it. I've heard the Li-Ion
batteries last longer if you recharge them frequently, rather than
running them down first. (This is the exact opposite of all the
warnings we hear about NiCd batteries.) And letting the battery run
down so low that the camera turns off is likely bad for the battery
if you keep doing it.

Carl

Click to expand...

look at this site.
https://www.batteries4everything.com/index.html

Ray Pollock said:

I wouldnt buy a second battery. Just turn the lcd screen off and
you'll be fine. I just did a trip to Vegas, filled my 256MB card
over 3 days, and only charged my camera up for an hour each
monring, and never did I get a low battery message.

Click to expand...

Who wants to use the cameras without the LCD? That's giving up half the advantage of using a digital camera, especially considering the crappy optical viewfinder on these cameras.

If you're going to be shooting for more than a day without a chance of recharging, definitely get a spare battery. What's and extra $40 for a little peace of mind?

Carl Lum said:

David Gard said:

There is no meter you can turn on.

As your battery depletes, an icon with a half-filled battery will
appear in the LCD. This is supposedly a low battery warning, though
no where does it say how much charge is left (I have taken > 20
flash shots after it comes on). When you battery is really close to
"empty," a "change battery" message is supposed to show (I have
never depleted my battery enough to see it).

Anyone have ideas on what % charge remains when these messages appear?

Click to expand...

I don't know how much charge remains when the low battery warning
comes on, but I estimate 10%. You should immediately pop the
battery out at that point and charge it. I've heard the Li-Ion
batteries last longer if you recharge them frequently, rather than
running them down first. (This is the exact opposite of all the
warnings we hear about NiCd batteries.) And letting the battery run
down so low that the camera turns off is likely bad for the battery
if you keep doing it.

Click to expand...

True, but you must also bear in mind that lithium batteries are only good for about 500 recharge cycles, so you don't want to overdo it and recharge them too frequently either.

Why can't Canon come up with a battery level meter like Sony's InfoLithium???

Mike Hunt said:

True, but you must also bear in mind that lithium batteries are
only good for about 500 recharge cycles, so you don't want to
overdo it and recharge them too frequently either.

Click to expand...

Yes, I know that Canon only rates their battery at "300 charge cycles" and that worries me a bit...does it meann "300 FULL charge cycles" or "300 times sticking the battery into the charger"? If the former, then I can stick the battery into the charger 4 times at 1/4 discharge and consider that "one charge cycle". But if it's the latter, then yes, recharging the battery frequently will kill it off faster. But this will also run against the mantra of "recharge Li-Ions any time you want because there's no memory effect"!

Carl

Carl Lum said:

Carl Lum said:

True, but you must also bear in mind that lithium batteries are
only good for about 500 recharge cycles, so you don't want to
overdo it and recharge them too frequently either.

Click to expand...

Yes, I know that Canon only rates their battery at "300 charge
cycles" and that worries me a bit...does it meann "300 FULL charge
cycles" or "300 times sticking the battery into the charger"? If
the former, then I can stick the battery into the charger 4 times
at 1/4 discharge and consider that "one charge cycle". But if it's
the latter, then yes, recharging the battery frequently will kill
it off faster. But this will also run against the mantra of
"recharge Li-Ions any time you want because there's no memory
effect"!

Click to expand...

That's okay, that's why every business has a marketing department. :=)

So long as the lithiums provide me with all this convenience and performance, I can live with spending $40 on a replacement after a year. Or, I can spend $40 on a spare now and by alternating use of the batteries, expect about two year' worth of life from them.

I don't recharge my battery every day, 365 days a year, so I think it's safe to assume I'll get at least a year's worth of use out of it, if not longer, as I have for other lithium batteries.

Everytime you snap a pic without the LCD screen, it pops up on the lcd screen for you to look at anyway. If you don't like it, delete it. I found it useful to turn off the lcd screen, and to keep my camera turned on in between pics so I didn't have to wait for the delay of turning it on before taking a picture. No need to have the lcd drain the battery in between pics when you're not using the camera.

Mike Hunt said:

Ray Pollock said:

I wouldnt buy a second battery. Just turn the lcd screen off and
you'll be fine. I just did a trip to Vegas, filled my 256MB card
over 3 days, and only charged my camera up for an hour each
monring, and never did I get a low battery message.

Click to expand...

Who wants to use the cameras without the LCD? That's giving up half
the advantage of using a digital camera, especially considering the
crappy optical viewfinder on these cameras.

If you're going to be shooting for more than a day without a chance
of recharging, definitely get a spare battery. What's and extra $40
for a little peace of mind?

Click to expand...

I tried an unscientific test last nite:

I put in a freshly charged battery (a generic "Digipower" battery with the same specs as the Canon), and started shooting pics around the house. Auto mode with flash, large superfine, LCD on. Shot as fast as the flash recycled and focus would lock. Occasionally, I zoomed the lens in or out, or turned camera off/on.

After 150-170 images (one filled 256 MB CF, plus 20 images), the low battery indicator came on. After another 140 images, the second 256 MB CF card was full, and it was time for bed. So, after 310 flash images over 90 minutes, the camera was still shooting (although the flash cycle time was getting noticeably longer).

Based on this, I would say that the initial low battery indicator comes on when there is still 40-50% of the battery charge left. I'll resume the test this evening, to see how many more shots I get before camera stops functioning.

(the approximation comes from not looking at the actual number of images taken with the first CF... I expected that it would be the 127 shown as the initial "shots remaining." But, apparently my images compressed well, because the second CF card full contained 158 images)

I did have one odd occurance repeat... after 10-12 shots as fast as the flash would cycle, the camera's autofocus would stop locking on the subject (no green boxes to indicate the autofocus points/locks). Turning the camera off and then back on would restore the autofocus. This happened multiple times over the 90 minutes I was shooting. Has anyone else experienced this?

Ray Pollock said:

Ray Pollock said:

Who wants to use the cameras without the LCD? That's giving up half
the advantage of using a digital camera, especially considering the
crappy optical viewfinder on these cameras.

If you're going to be shooting for more than a day without a chance
of recharging, definitely get a spare battery. What's and extra $40
for a little peace of mind?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

True, but I'll turn the LCD back on before taking the picture. The optical viewfinder is just terrible on these cameras. If it weren't for the LCD, I wouldn't buy them at all.

Ray Pollock said:

Mike Hunt said:

Ray Pollock said:

I wouldnt buy a second battery. Just turn the lcd screen off and
you'll be fine. I just did a trip to Vegas, filled my 256MB card
over 3 days, and only charged my camera up for an hour each
monring, and never did I get a low battery message.

Click to expand...

Who wants to use the cameras without the LCD? That's giving up half
the advantage of using a digital camera, especially considering the
crappy optical viewfinder on these cameras.

If you're going to be shooting for more than a day without a chance
of recharging, definitely get a spare battery. What's and extra $40
for a little peace of mind?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

I repeated the test with the "official" Canon battery, fresh from the charger. Again, all pics with flash, red-eye reduction/LCD/AF assist all on:

236 pics over 90 minutes before low battery indicator came on. Camera rested for ~ an hour while I put kids to bed. Then 68 more pics until camera shut down and said "change battery."

So, the Canon battery lasted 300 flash pics on a charge, and the low battery indicator lit with just over 20% of charge remaining.

Both batteries lasted at least 300 flash pics, in these very unscientific tests... but the time of appearance of the low battery warning differed. This suggests that the voltage-power curve for the batteries differs... the Canon battery holds max voltage for a greater number of pics, but then falls more rapidly towards the end. The Digipower battery appears to drop voltage faster (thus lighting the low battery indicator), but then falls more slowly (more pics after the indicator lights). With either battery, there was a reasonable "cushion" ( 70 to over 140 images) between the first appearance of the low battery warning and the "change battery" shutdown.

Of course, the number of pics will vary with conditions... flash, use of the LCD, zoom, time spent reviewing images, temperature, etc. But, this at least gives me an idea of what the "low battery" indicator actually indicates.

As for the autofocus/auto exp not locking in... it appears that it was simply that the flash wasn't fully charged yet (?).

David Gard said:

I put in a freshly charged battery (a generic "Digipower" battery
with the same specs as the Canon), and started shooting pics around
the house. Auto mode with flash, large superfine, LCD on. Shot as
fast as the flash recycled and focus would lock. Occasionally, I
zoomed the lens in or out, or turned camera off/on.

After 150-170 images (one filled 256 MB CF, plus 20 images), the
low battery indicator came on. After another 140 images, the
second 256 MB CF card was full, and it was time for bed. So, after
310 flash images over 90 minutes, the camera was still shooting
(although the flash cycle time was getting noticeably longer).

Based on this, I would say that the initial low battery indicator
comes on when there is still 40-50% of the battery charge left.
I'll resume the test this evening, to see how many more shots I get
before camera stops functioning.

(the approximation comes from not looking at the actual number of
images taken with the first CF... I expected that it would be the
127 shown as the initial "shots remaining." But, apparently my
images compressed well, because the second CF card full contained
158 images)

I did have one odd occurance repeat... after 10-12 shots as fast as
the flash would cycle, the camera's autofocus would stop locking on
the subject (no green boxes to indicate the autofocus
points/locks). Turning the camera off and then back on would
restore the autofocus. This happened multiple times over the 90
minutes I was shooting. Has anyone else experienced this?

David Gard said:

David Gard said:

Who wants to use the cameras without the LCD? That's giving up half
the advantage of using a digital camera, especially considering the
crappy optical viewfinder on these cameras.

If you're going to be shooting for more than a day without a chance
of recharging, definitely get a spare battery. What's and extra $40
for a little peace of mind?

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

I wonder if a firmware upgrade could provide one? Do any other Canon models have a battery meter? Canon, are you listening?

Regards,
Mark

Herlander said:

Hello

Does anyone know if the Canon Powershot S45 has a battery meter? I
have tried all the menus and I haven’t found any option to turn on.
It is very annoying not knowing if you battery is at 10% or 90%.

Thanks

HCB

Click to expand...