topic Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture in EOS DSLR & Mirrorless Cameras

Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Veronica — Sun, 28 May 2017 06:47:43 GMT

This has been an ongoing and random problem. I contacted Canon last year and they suggested I reset to default settings which I did however the problem persists. I have tried different SD cards & different settings and there doesn't seem any one thing which causes the problem. After "Googling" it does seem that it is reasonably common amongst Canon cameras which is very frustrating. I did take the camera to my local Camera House and they advised that if they sent the camera away it could possibly cost several hundred dollars!

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Waddizzle — Sun, 28 May 2017 10:17:39 GMT

What capacity and type of memory card are you using? Did you format the memory card in the camera?

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Veronica — Sun, 28 May 2017 10:43:50 GMT

I have tried several different types of cards and no, I haven't formatted the card in the camera.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Waddizzle — Sun, 28 May 2017 11:13:47 GMT

@Veronica wrote:
I have tried several different types of cards and no, I haven't formatted the card in the camera.

Okay. That's a potential problem.

Rule #1, never use micro-SD cards with those adapters. The adapters are terribly unreliable. Only use micro-SD cards in devices that use them directly, without any adapter.

Rule #2, always format any new memory card in the camera. As a general rule, new cards are NOT pre-formatted. Any formatting that may seem to be on the card is residue from production testing, and needs to be completely erased.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Veronica — Tue, 30 May 2017 09:58:31 GMT

Thanks for your suggestion. I will reformat the cards on the weekend and let you know how it goes.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Veronica — Mon, 05 Jun 2017 09:34:47 GMT

I have reformatted the card in the camera and so far so good. Unfortunately the problem was always random so I am not completely sure that the problem has been rectified yet but I'm hopeful.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Veronica — Sat, 24 Jun 2017 03:03:33 GMT

I formatted the SD card and only really got to use my camera consistently last weekend. Unfortunately I still have an ongoing problem!

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Waddizzle — Sat, 24 Jun 2017 10:39:56 GMT

@Veronica wrote:
I formatted the SD card and only really got to use my camera consistently last weekend. Unfortunately I still have an ongoing problem!

There are some "noise reduction" settings that can cause symptoms of your issue. The "High ISO" and "Long Exposure" noise reduction settings can slow the camera down. Also, taking a long series of shots in continuous shooting mode can fill the camera buffer, requiring it to take a timeout and write to disk.

You can disable the noise reduction settings in Creative shooting modes, but you cannot in Basic shooting modes.

You may try resetting the camera back to factory defaults. You might try a new memory card. I recommend the full size, Lexar or Sandisk SD cards, that are 32GB, or smaller. Having a spare card can never hurt.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Stephen — Sat, 24 Jun 2017 13:38:45 GMT

I'd like to hop in and offer a suggestion, if I may?

Could it be lack of ability to auto focus? If your lens is in AF mode, or if you're in full auto (Green Box/A+) and the camera doesn't have sufficient light, your flash will pop up, and the lens will search, the flash will fire multiple times, and you'll see a green indicator light in the viewfinder that will blink multiple times. That is the camera letting you know "Hey, I tried, but I can't find anything to focus on, so I'm not going to let you take a bad picture on purpose."

You might try to put the camera in "P" mode on the top dial, ensure you've got plenty of light, and you're taking photos of "normal" things (not plain white walls, or objects that are super close, or overly dark rooms, or trying to use your pop-up flash in an auditorium).

If you try this, and that solves the problem, then you know it's not an issue of the camera malfunctioning, it's an issue of lack of lighting and focus.

If that doesn't work, you might try a different lens. If you don't have another one, see if you can borrow a friend's - they're all interchangeable! If that works, it's an issue with your lens, and it'll need to be worked on.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Veronica — Sun, 25 Jun 2017 02:00:21 GMT

I have tried several cards however the current one is SanDisk 16GB and yes, I did format the card in the camera.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Veronica — Sun, 25 Jun 2017 02:05:44 GMT

Thanks for your suggestion. I don't do continuous shooting so this is definitely not causing the problem. I think I will reset to factory settings again although I did do this last year before embarking on a trip to Africa. The majority of the time it was fine whilst over there however as you can imagine, it is VERY frustrating when you are ready to take an interesting shot and it locks up and shows "busy". I have tried several different cards and the current one is SanDisk 16GB.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Veronica — Sun, 25 Jun 2017 02:11:50 GMT

Thanks! The problem seems to happen completely randomly so it is hard to pin point why the problem happens. Thankfully I can turn it on and off several times and eventually it comes good. I am generally in "auto" mode because the camera takes a very good shot on auto and I am not an expert...lol. As mentioned to one of the other contributors, I think I will reset to factory settings again and see how that goes. I did do that last year and it seemed to be a lot better, although the problem definitely wasn't fixed completely. I have Googled and it does seem that quite a few people have this type of problem with Canon cameras.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Waddizzle — Sun, 25 Jun 2017 18:30:58 GMT

@Veronica wrote:
Thanks! The problem seems to happen completely randomly so it is hard to pin point why the problem happens. Thankfully I can turn it on and off several times and eventually it comes good. I am generally in "auto" mode because the camera takes a very good shot on auto and I am not an expert...lol. As mentioned to one of the other contributors, I think I will reset to factory settings again and see how that goes. I did do that last year and it seemed to be a lot better, although the problem definitely wasn't fixed completely. I have Googled and it does seem that quite a few people have this type of problem with Canon cameras.

Sounds like you might be shooting JPEGs, and not RAW files, where you have to post process the RAW files into JPEGs.

Try using P mode. It works just like Green [A] mode, except you are allowed to adjust more settings. You also need to manually raise the flash when, and if, you need to use it.

In P mode, you can disable all of the noise reduction settings, because they can and do slow down the camera. This is where shooting RAW and post processing has the advantage over shooting JPEGs in the camera. If you are shooting JEPGs, then you may want one of those settings enabled, if shoot with high ISO or use long exposures.

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

michfallon — Wed, 27 Sep 2017 06:51:29 GMT

I’ve had this problem. I’m still learning about my camera 700d but notice this happens with slow shutter speed.
Camera gets stuck on busy and can’t do a thing!
Have resolved to get working again by taking the battery out and put back in!

Re: Canon 700D often shows as "busy" and I can't take a picture

Veronica — Fri, 29 Sep 2017 10:19:53 GMT

Thanks for the suggestion and I will try it although it can be very frustrating if you only have seconds to take a shot. I can usually fix the problem by turning the camera on and off a few times and it mostly comes good eventually. I take a lot of shots on auto which is when it happens. I have also switched the camera to manual which sometimes fixes the problem.