A7 m4 eating batteries

[HLfoto]

Hi, my first tread in this forum!
Last night I was shooting a wedding with my new A7 m4. Also using my old A7 m3.
The m4 camera became very warm! I had to turn it off for periods of 10 minutes to let it cool down. I have never experienced that with the old m3 camera!
Also that the new a4 camera was "eating" batteries!
Sony A7 m4: 763 still shots using 3 batteries
Sony A7 m3: 868 still shots using 63% of one battery.
Is this normal?
Is there any setting I have overseen?
Both cameras in airplane mood
Both cameras with newest firmware updates

 

[MattPointZero]

Hi, my first tread in this forum!
Last night I was shooting a wedding with my new A7 m4. Also using my old A7 m3.
The m4 camera became very warm! I had to turn it off for periods of 10 minutes to let it cool down. I have never experienced that with the old m3 camera!
Also that the new a4 camera was "eating" batteries!
Sony A7 m4: 763 still shots using 3 batteries
Sony A7 m3: 868 still shots using 63% of one battery.
Is this normal?
Is there any setting I have overseen?
Both cameras in airplane mood
Both cameras with newest firmware updates

Definitely not my experience - just to confirm you are saying you went through three batteries to take 763 shots?

If so, something is wrong! I haven't paid close attention to the number of shots between a mark 3, 4 or R1v and A1, but only because the mark iv has been like all the others - incredibly good battery life compared to all other cameras I have used. I don't think you should be seeing any difference from what you expected from the mark 3. I can't think of a setting that would make this drastic a difference.

 

[neilt3]

Unless your video recording it shouldn't be heating up at all . IIRC it stops recording after around 30 minutes , and if your constantly recording film , it will get too warm .

It can be helped by having the rear LCD away from the body for better cooling .

If your a stills photographer, apart from a lot of long exposures, the camera shouldn't really be generating any real heat .

That would suggest a short circuit or faulty component resulting in the battery drain .

I have an a7Riv and while I've been on holiday a week or so back during the heatwave, the camera never got hot ( well , no hotter than everything else in a damned heatwave!) , and never needed switching off other than to between shooting to stop the EVF staying on while the camera was on a shoulder strap .

I went a few days without having to top the battery up .

Something's clearly wrong with your camera , I would suggest returning for an replacement.

--
https://www.flickr.com/photos/neilt3/sets

 

[Phil Shaw]

Both of my A1 camera bodies started eating batteries (much lower battery life than previouly used to) after I recently updated to the latest firmware. The firmware supposedly maintained my settings on the cameras, and I did not find anything obvious to dispute that. I did find that Airplane mode was set to off, but I have no recall of ever having changed that setting previously. I could not find any obvious setting that might have been causing the battery drain so I set Aiplane Mode to On, and battery life returned to match my previous experience of shooting all day without needing to worry about batteries.

Maybe check that Airplane Mode setting again.