Which Battery Type is good for Canon A590 IS digital camera to take more then 150 pictures with one time charged battery

We owned a sony that had the alkaline batteries and had BIG BIG problems with it. Everytime we re-charged them or put in brand new ones, after taking 10 pictures the battery light flashed on and said low batteries then the camera would shut off. We took it in to sony Cevice Center and they said that there was nother wrong with it but we still were unable to use it. We then purchased the cannon A590 IS and noticed that it also uses alkaline batteries and we were told by lots and lots of people that this camera will have the same problem the sony one did cause of the alkaline batteries and that we should take it back. This camera was not a cheap one and we do not want to have any problems in the near furture with it cause we cannot afford to go out and buy another one.

We would like to know if cannon has had any problems with there camera that uses alkaline batteries??

The key is to get batteries that can handle the high energy needs of the camera. And that means a high mAh, or Milliamps per hour (mAh). The mAh is important because it's the easiest way to distinguish the strength of a battery. The higher the mAh, the longer the battery life. So make sure the mAh of your battery hits a minimum of 3000. Otherwise, the camera will suck it dry in no time.

Switch over to rechargeable NiMH batteries with a higher mAh rating. As stated above the mAh rating is very important.

Energizer sells such now days with a 2450 mAh rating in packs of 4 for a little over 15 bucks, Duracell likewise sells such (Theirs are 2650 mAh), Sanyo under the Eneloop name, Kodak, as does Rayovac (You need the high energy rechargeable batteries and not the regular rechargeable), and pretty much most battery manufactures.

Anyhow what you are looking for is NiMH with the highest mAh rating you can get.

Other things you can do is... In the cameras settings switch the Image Stabilization from continuous to shoot only or Pan Only. The IS function will consume power if it is on the entire time. At least turn off the display, if not the camera, when you are not shooting. Doing both of these things will draw less power hence increase the number of shots you get from your batteries.

Don't use regular Alkaline Batteries unless you are in a pinch- as stated before they will be sucked dry in no time. On the other hand they are cheaper and universally available.

Alkaline batteries just don't work well with digital cameras, and are single use. The load required is too great for alkaline. This happened to me on more than one camera, and I have read about lots of people having this problem on internet forums.

Lithium batteries are much better than alkaline, but very expensive and also single use. Too expensive when there is a far cheaper alternative which I now use and am amazed how well they work.

Lithium-ion rechargeable batteries are ok, but expensive and not as good as the ones I describe below. I have Nikon lithium-ion's for my digital camera, but they were very expensive.

The successful batteries I use are NiMH, nickel metal hydride, and 2000mAh. This is not just the ordinary NiMH, these are the newly designed ones, for sale only in the last few years. There are still early version NiMH for sale, but not very good because they lose their charge over time. This is called self discharge. I was using this old version, and the self discharge was terrible.

The new design rechargeable NiMH have a very low self discharge, claimed to be 85 percent of the charge left after one year. As well, they are fine for the high load needed for digital cameras. I have used a set of Eneloop AA batteries and a Eneloop charger, plus several sets of Kodak NiMH AA's also charging with the Eneloop charger. You may never have heard of Eneloop, but they are one of the leaders for this advanced battery, and are available at Costco for an amazing price. I got all mine at Wal-Mart in Dec. 2007, and the price was so inexpensive I bought just a few to try out, and went back for the rest a week later (now a total of 20 AA's). Batteries of this type come pre-charged, and can be used right out of the package. I use them in my wireless mouse, camera, cd disk player, etc. I have a couple relatives also happily using these type.

The new batteries take a large number of pictures, over several weeks, without recharging, and sitting on the shelf in the camera between uses.

The rechargeable NiMH cells that offer a high capacity, say 2500mA (milli ampere hours), are good if you want to shoot a lot of pictures in a short time, say 1 - 3 days. If you are like most consumers, your camera will sit on the shelf unused for several days. The high capacity cells self-discharge, meaning a loss of capacity every day just sitting - "self-discharge". The new tech cells have a very low self discharge, and therefore, if they sit for a few months, you can still get many shots without a recharge first.

Check the following link to Eneloop batteries. You may also find forums on the internet where this subject is discussed.

http://us.sanyo.com/batteries

Most of the battery blogs have let their content go stale (Most haven't been updated in 2 years). Most of the data is from 2006-2007. Anyhow metaefcient added this article in 2006 (Read the comment dates and post date... even though it says 2009 it was posted in 2006) http://www.metaefficient.com/rechargeable-batteries/best-rechargeable-batteries-battery-chargers.html .

What is most interesting is the comment posted relating to a test done by a retired engineer . The results were (Recall this was in 2007)

For AA low self discharge battery:
#1MAHA IMEDION 2100 mAh
#2Kodak Pre-Charged 2100 mAh
#3GP Recyko 2100 mAh
#4Duracell Precharged 2100 mAH
#5Hybrio by Ultralast 2100 mAh
#6Ansmann Max-e 2100 mAh
#7Nexcell EnergyON 2000 mAh
#8Eneloop by Sanyo 2000 mAh
#9Hybrid by Ray-O-Vac 2100 mAh


Even in 2006-2007 Eneloop was not the leader in this type of battery.

Since then Duracell has added higher capacities to their pre-charge batteries and Energizer improved their batteries to compete (note
they now indicate on their packaging that they now last 4x longer than their 2005 product).

Australia Choice Magazine has a free report on high capacity batteries;

http://www.choice.com.au/viewArticle.aspx?id=105496&catId=100285&tid=100008

They compared batteries from;

* DICK SMITH ELECTRONICS
* DURACELL
* ENERGIZER
* EVEREADY
* FUJIFILM
* # GP
* INCA
* KODAK
* # MEMOREX
* PANASONIC
* SONY
* # VARTA

The short of it is that Kodak 2500 mAh rechargeable , FujiFiml 2500 mAh rechargeable , Duracell 2650 mAh rechargeable , and Energizer 2500 mAh rechargeable batteries should get you 7-8 times more photos than regular Alkaline batteries.


They also have a review from November 2008 on rechargables (Must become a member to see the report though) http://www.choice.com.au/viewArticle.aspx?id=106580&catId=100285&tid=100008&p=1&title=Rechargeable+AA+batteries%3a+review+%26+compare

They compared;

* Camelion Always Ready
* Duracell Rechargeable 2650mAh
* Energizer Rechargeable 2500
* Eveready Rechargeable
* Kodak Digital Camera Battery
* Kodak Pre-Charged Digital Camera Battery
* Sanyo Eneloop Ready to Use Rechargeable Battery
* Uniross Hybrio Ready to Use
* Uniross Rechargeable 2700mAh
* Varta Ready2Use Mignon

(It will cost you $5.00 to get this report)

You are right about stale information. There is a lot of misunderstanding in this new technology and many comments fail to understand even what self-discharge means. I continue to find old style NiMH AA's in good camera stores at high prices. My experience with the rechargeable high mAh cells within the last 10 years and up to 2 years ago were bad. They died quickly and performance was not as promised within a few months of use.

The test result you list above done by a retired engineer seems to be interested only in the rated mAh. From what I have read elsewhere, such small differences of 100 MAh in rating makes no significant performance difference. That is what I have found with 2000 and 2100's. Is there any more to the engineer's test report that is not in your post?

The free report from Choice Magazine has hardly any meat on this link. Am I missing something, or is this conclusion the whole thing?

Could you describe what the Choice Magazine review from November 2008 covers? Are you recommending the report and is the $5 charge worth more than the many user comments in several forums?

I would like to get some quality, objective test results that could guide my next AA purchases.

There is quite a bit more. He tested discharge rates and capacities. There was another really good study done in 2007 I will post if later (This report had no charge).

The first of the Choice magazine reports (the free one) is 3-4 pages... you have to click the links... The Hybrios did better then the Eneloops while Duracell precharged did about as well as the Eneloops. Both were middle of the pack with Rayovac trailing. You can decide if it is worth 5 bucks....

The spambot is not allowing the first few links (Older Reports) These are the most current reports;

Report 4 (From March 2009)

Compared;

* Duracell Rechargeable Pre-charged
* Powerex Imedion
* President's Choice Rechargeable
* Rayovac Hybrid
* Sanyo Eneloop
* Sony CycleEnergy

http://www.stefanv.com/electronics/low_self_discharge.html

Report 5 (Also from 09);

http://www.edn.com/blog/1470000147/post/80042408.html

Report 6 (From Late 2008)

http://servaas.com.au/blog/index.php/low-self-discharge-rechargeable-aa-battery-test-results/

Report 7 (Forum post data for report 6);

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1023&message=29564509

Report 8 (Also from Late 2008)

http://servaas.com.au/blog/index.php/aa-rechargeable-battery-test-in-a-nikon-sb-800-flash/

Okay to break it all down....


As of 2009 if you plan on using your device within a month of charging your batteries the high capacity non-low discharge battery is your best bet, resulting in more pictures/flashes ETC per charge.

If you plan on charging and letting it sit a long time (More than a month) then the Low Self Discharge NiMH batteries are your ticket. The Eneloop, Duracel Pre-charged, and Sony CycleEnergy all provide very similar results (You can check the rumors... all three batteries are rumored to be rebrands from the same manufacture) . The Hybrio rates slightly better than the Eneloop.

If you don't plan on using rechargeable batteries then Lithium batteries perform the best.

I am using both Camelio 2700 mAH
and
Uniross 2200 mAH

both are capable of bringing obove 200 snaps .(without CHDK)