60D turns itself on (even when switch is in the Off position)

[jjmarston]

My 60D keeps turning itself on. I turn it off and about two or three minutes later it's back on again all by itself -- with the physical power switch in the Off position. The result is that my batteries keep draining down. I thought perhaps it was related to the memory card but it does the same thing with no memory card in. Additionally, when I switched off and took the memory card out it then didn't turn back on. So, once I managed to get it back on, I tried removing the card (causing it to automatically turn off); then, after closing the door to the empty card bay, I flipped the power switch to Off and then back to On and it turned on. So I know none of this is because of the battery, which is charged. It's like the camera has a mind of its own - I keep finding it on with the power switch in the Off postion.

[jjmarston]

The plot thickens. I turned off "Auto Power Down" and the camera stopped turning itself back on. Just to confirm, I put Auto Power Down back on again set at 2 minutes. Turned off the camera. The camera turns back on 4 minutes later. I set Auto Power Down to 1 minute; it turned back on by itself after 2 minutes. I set Auto Power Down to 4 minutes; the camera turned itself back on after 8 minutes. It seems to be a crazy bug in Auto Power Down that the camera turns itself on at double the time Auto Power Down is set for. But am I the only one ever to have had this happen?? Is anyone from Canon reading this??

[William_N]

Hello jjmarston,

Welcome to the Canon Forums and thanks for your post!

This is definitely some unusual behavior as I have never heard of the Auto Power Off feature operating in this manor. 

This community is designed for your fellow Canon owners to help each other out with any problems they may encounter. We do hope someone is able to assist! However, if this is a time-sensitive matter, our US-based technical support team is standing by, ready to help via Email at http://Canon.us/SupportCF

One thing I would try is to remove any and all accessories from the camera (except a Canon brand battery) and testing the isolated camera body by itself to see if this unusual behavior continues.

Did this answer your question? Please click the Accept as Solution button so that others may find the answer as well.

[jjmarston]

Thanks for the quick reply. There are no accessories on the camera and the batteries are Canon. It's pretty clearly a software glitch. The time it takes to turn the camera back on is precisely double whatever the Auto Power Down is set to. I don't need Auto Power Down so the fix is simply to keep it Off. But if I were Canon I'd look into whether this is a software bug that can be fixed.

[Tronhard]

I personally have 3, EOS 60D's and have never experienced or heard of this issue.  Is it possible to refresh the firmware on your camera in case it has got corrupted?  If the system will let you that would be a simple, free and hopefully effective way to resolve your issue.

[jjmarston]

How can I re-fresh the firmware? Is there such a thing as updating the firmware (I'm thinking it's like the operating system on a computer but maybe that's not a good analogy)?

[jjmarston]

One further discovery: with Auto Power Down set to Off I removed a dead battery and installed a new one. With the camera switched Off. As soon as the battery was in - the camera still in the Off position - the red light started flashing as if the camera was accessing the memory card (like checking it out? organizing it?). This went on for some time. I took a photo, viewed it and then still the red light kept going. Even after I switched the camera back off again. I came back an hour later and it had stopped. This was my first suspicion of why my batteries were draining: that the camera - even while Off - accesses the memory card for long periods, doing what I have no idea.

[BurnUnit]

Well here's a question that hasn't been asked yet.

Are you using a full sized SD card or a micro SD card with an adapter?

[Waddizzle]

“hanks for the quick reply. There are no accessories on the camera and the batteries are Canon. It's pretty clearly a software glitch. The time it takes to turn the camera back on is precisely double whatever the Auto Power Down is set to. I don't need Auto Power Down so the fix is simply to keep it Off. But if I were Canon I'd look into whether this is a software bug that can be fixed.”

Software glitch? Maybe. I would suspect a bad card before I start pointing fingers at the firmware. Software tend to have very short gestation periods.

Have you tried a new memory card and resetting the camera?

[jrhoffman75]

Try this:"

https://seventrumpet.com/resetting-canon-eos-60d-digital-slr-camera/