SX280 - battery life shooting video

[factoryguy]

UPDATED May 5:

I apologize to the forum for mixing two different problems.  They are unrelated.

Problem #1:  User error.  I thought I was using a class 6 SD card but I was wrong. The yellow "!" indicates a pathologically slow card.  Upgrading to a class 10 resolved this problem.

Problem #2: UNRESOLVED.  Red battery indicator comes on prematurely.  On a fresh charge, it'll turn red after recording for a couple of minutes.  On a partially drained battery, it turns red immediately upon entering movie mode or pressing the record button.  Turn the camera off and then right back on in "still" mode and it shows full charge and works fine ... until trying to shoot video.  I have not precisely measured recording times but it'll record for at least 20 (maybe 30?) minutes while flashing red.

[astorki]

I don't know which brand is,but looks like original.

Here is link:

(MOD NOTE: Link removed per Forum Guidelines)

[Davy]

You need to remember one thing about 'rechargeables',  you will never get the full capacity out until it's been charged about three or four times... but I doubt this is not the problem in your case.

3 seconds I think you said, is bad very bad, something's gotta be drastically wrong, be it the camera, the battery, the charger or the user not charging it properly. The only thing I can ask is, is it a Li-on battery, is the charger suitable for the battery it's charging?

There  *could* be another problem... fake batteries, yes they are knocking about.

Dave

[bradmoss]

The original battery and charger won't allow me to make a video moving the zoom lever, something I can do with the original charger and the Vivitar battery.

[bkoldys]

you could hook up the SX270/280 directly to Hoover Dam and it still would need more power.....

[loveAZ]

Try the SONY HX50V with 30X (fits in your pocket).  Very good pics, amazing video(outstanding - check on youtube) and zoom(the best),  if you do not like all those MP's  you can take pics at only 10MP's (CANON's only goes up to 12 anyway  so that they can hide picture issues).  I had the CANON  SX280  20X ($185  US from Amazon)  and returned it (it did not bother me that much the video issue as I was able to keep recording with the well known battery trick - what I noticed though was that the camera was getting hotter and hotter). I was not totally impresed with the pic quality.  Also, the CANON's battery even if it were working ok could not even last half as long as the SONY's. 

For a camera overall comparison:
 http://snapsort.com/compare/Canon-PowerShot-SX280-HS-vs-Sony-Cyber-shot-DSC-HX50V


For image quality take a look here:
http://www.imaging-resource.com/IMCOMP/COMPS01.HTM

[nserrano]

I just sent my camera to Canon because of the battery life and now they are saying it will cost me $180 to replace it...even though it is still under warranty!

[bradmoss]

That's te cost of a new one in Amazon!

[Davy]

Legal advice, thats what you want.

Under warranty the balls in Canons court, you smash it up then it's your problem - but  you didn't do anything like that to cause this fault so it's clearly  a Canon problem.

Point them to ALL the pages you can find on ALL the forums, reviews etc., relating to this and you oughta have a clear case, that is taking the 'water'..... Canon must be in a pretty bad way!

What a turn up is Canon really that bad?

Dave

[UnionStation]

I'll give some legal advice. Don't waste your time. Canon knows you're not willing to spend $200+ an hour to pursue a claim on a $200 camera. The Canon people know that they'll take a hit from some people returning their cameras and griping, but they know others will try to use tape or buy after-market batteries to try to make a brand new camera work. They assume that their name and reputation are so great that they can just ignore a debacle like this just long enough to put out a new model and hope we'll all forget this ever happened. Yes, Canon really is that bad. 

[ruko]

I'm shopping for a new video camera and found myself looking at Canon's offerings. It's almost automatic based on all my other Canon purchases. But that won't happen now with this camera fiasco going on. I will probably buy Sony or JVC.