R-D1 shutter/meter battery problem?

kunger

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I hope someone here will have some good news for me!

I very recently purchased an R-D1 "new" from a seller on ebay.co.uk. When it arrived, it looked like it had never been touched, nor the box ever opened. All seals/protective plastics were in place, no marks whatsoever... It was gorgeous! So, the first thing I did was charge up the Epson EU-85 battery that came with it.

The following morning, I placed the fully charged battery in the camera, glimpsed through the manual, did what had to be done to the settings, etc., put in a new memory card, and now I'm ready to test out this "new" baby.

I'm walking around, shooting anything that moves. After about 30 or so frames, I notice that my camera is starting to do something a little strange... I cock the shutter, aim and no meter reading, and the shutter won't release. I turn it off, then on again and I hear a "click." Still no meter or shutter release. Then to my surprise, I see that I have to cock the shutter lever again. Now, I get a meter reading and the shutter releases. Great! A small glitch! Nope! Two seconds later, it happens again. Going through the same process, off then on... listen for the "click," cock the shutter lever again, still no meter, no shutter release. Do it again, and again then it works.

I did a search through the RFF Forums and found one that said to try upgrading the firmware as there is a fix for a hibernating shutter... Okay, did that, no luck! It's getting a bit irratating, since I was shooting with it today covering a feature story that I'm working on and this was continuously happening.

I phoned Epson UK and went through the whole story with them, then technician asks if the camera is under warranty. I have no idea. I give him the serial number, he looks it up and see's that it was shipped from one of their warehouses in Finland, in October of 2004. Odds of it being under warranty now look very slim. He then tells me that he's only ever heard of this happening with 3rd party batteries not chargin correctly. Now I begin to think... If the battery was stored in the box for 2 years, not used, could it be that there's a problem with this Epson battery? I run it by the tech and he seems to think that it could. I've charged the battery twice since I've had the camera, and each time I had no problems with the shutter/meter until after about 30 or so frames. Could make some sense, no?

So, after this long-winded story, has anyone else had this type of experience? I certainly hope that it's the battery, as I really don't want to have to pay for servicing.

Thanks in advance,

Kevin
 
did you upgrade the software? I had that happen intermittantly but thought it was me not cocking the lever far enough. It worked after I pressed the lever a second time but do seem to recall it was not happening after the firmware upgrade. Also, I never had to turn it on and off to get it to work again so if you do it may be a different issue.
 
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iml said:
As above, do the firmware upgrade, it fixes this issue.

Ian

As I mentioned, I did the firmware upgrade... Didn't help!

Is this the typical issue that was happening with 3rd party batteries? Like I said, it could be that I have a dud battery. If the battery has been sitting in a box for two years unused, it may not hold a good/full charge. We all know what happens to laptop batteries when they're not used for a couple of years. Could this be the same?

As I said, after the battery has been "fully" charged, I get about a good solid 30ish frames before this problem kicks in. Then I'm fighting just to get one frame.

Anyone have any ideas?

Your help with this is most welcome.

Thanks again,

Kevin
 
Try reinstalling the firmware, might help.
Otherwise buy another battery [Robert White wiil get an Epson one to you in a couple of days] or if you are in a real hurry a decent camera shop should have a Fuji NP-80 which is the closest, ask them to charge it and try that [might be your charger?] If is OK then ask them to charge your original battery and try that.
Best
Clive
 
I noticed that my brand new R-D1`s Epson battery doesn`t last as long as the Jessops 1500ma one I bought immedietly afterwards, it doesn`t take anywhere near as long to charge which is an indication .. Li-Ions are timebombs rather than die due to usage so my guess is that most R-D1s have ageing batts . when the battery is flat, it fails to release the shutter . the Jessops 1500Ma batts are superb and cost £22.95 BTW
 
kunger said:
As I mentioned, I did the firmware upgrade... Didn't help!

Ah sorry, serves me right for not paying attention :)

Sounds like it may be a dud battery, or even a dud charger. I bought a couple of spare batteries with my camera from Robert White, I get a about 200 shots out of each on average and they take a good while to charge. They're not over expensive, I'd try a new battery first.

Ian
 
Okay, it seems that the consensus is in, and that everyone seems to think it's the battery. Well, that's a releaf.

I'll send the battery off to Epson UK and have them test it out. Unless someone here knows how to test these rechargeable batteries and what I should be looking for. I'll see if I can get an Epson battery on this end. If not, I'll have to order it from Robert White.

Is it crucial that I get an Epson battery? I've heard/read horror stories about 3rd party batteries.

Thanks very much to all that have replied and also to those who will reply.

Kevin
 
Jessops have 1500Ma ones on the shelf - they`re more powerful than the hahnel or Fuji NP80s . Work just fine in the RD1
 
Adam-T said:
I noticed that my brand new R-D1`s Epson battery doesn`t last as long as the Jessops 1500ma one I bought immedietly afterwards, it doesn`t take anywhere near as long to charge which is an indication .. Li-Ions are timebombs rather than die due to usage so my guess is that most R-D1s have ageing batts . when the battery is flat, it fails to release the shutter . the Jessops 1500Ma batts are superb and cost £22.95 BTW


Adam,

I'll take your word for it that the Jessops battery is better than the Epson. Would you kindly supply me with the model number of the battery and all the specs (eg. 1500ma 3.7V). Though I myself am not in the UK, my mother in-law is and I'll ask her to pick one up and have it brought over here.

It's worth a try!

Kevin
 
The Jessops battery is better than **MY** Epson but then Lithium Ions are Time bombs rather than charge/charge life dependant and my RD1 was an Old Stock new camera which could be 2 years old to start with .. The battery was plucked off the shelf in a local branch and was £22.95 .. JEDSHLNP80 3.6V 1500Ma - I`ve run it to Zero on the gauge and no issues
 
It might be the batt dropping below the voltage set for sleep, however I doubt it. It’s more lightly to be a voltage leak on the main board.
I’d buy a new batt anyway and try it out.
 
Kevin,

I hope the battery change has sorted your problem - but this sounds exactly like what happened with two of my RD1s and it was not the battery unfortunately. In my case I ended up getting a refund. I hope you don't need to.!!Good luck.
 
Keith Cocker said:
Kevin,

I hope the battery change has sorted your problem - but this sounds exactly like what happened with two of my RD1s and it was not the battery unfortunately. In my case I ended up getting a refund. I hope you don't need to.!!Good luck.

Hi Keith,

Trying to acquire a battery now to see if that's what the problem truly is.

I tried an experiment... When these problems started to occur, I took out the battery and recharged it. When the battery was charged up, everything started to work fine for about an hour or so.

I tried this two or three times just to make sure that's what was happening. Sure enough, each time the battery was charged the camera would work okay.

I discussed this with Epson each time this occurred and they also seem to be convinced that it's a battery problem. As a matter of fact, they compared my situation to that of other R-D1's have been returned with the same problems, due to using poor quality 3rd party batteries. I'm sending the battery back to them for testing etc.

It turns out that according to the s/n of my camera, the camera shipped out from their Finland warehouse in Oct. 2004.

Though I'm quite sure the camera was new when I received it about a week or so ago, I would think that a battery sitting in a box for 2 years without any use might just go somewhat flat. We all know what happens to computer laptop batteries when they're not in use for a while. Could the same not be true in this case?

I think it might be worth a try.

Thanks for your help,

Kevin
 
Well, I got the new battery to try with the camera. Still having the same problems.

I guess the camera is going back to Epson.

Thanks to all, for replies and advice,

Kevin
 
I think it's a sleep related issue, or is it something crazy as the self-timer being on?

Reset the menu in set-up.

Let the camera sit a little while with no battery.

Put battery back in and reset menu again. (basically, reboot the camera).

Try it again. Try different settings on the "sleep" menu.
 
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Guess What Epson Did!

Guess What Epson Did!

Time to bring everyone up to speed!

After going back and forth with Epson UK and really not getting anywhere I decided to move along (for more info, refer to 1st post in this thread).

With much thanks to Adam-T, I was able to establish that the problem was not a battery problem. I did however in the process gain a new battery, Jessops 1500mah 3.6v, which in my opinion works far better than the Epson battery (160 RAW images over a period of a day).

Once I realised that the problem was hardware and not a battery I called Epson US, where I received fantastic Customer Service. I explained that the camera was purchased from a private individual on e-bay as "brand new" and then proceeded to tell them my sad story.

Epson US got back to me within a few hours and gave me a special warranty exception approval for repair. They also gave me their FedEx account so that I could ship the camera back to them at their expense (let it be known that Epson UK wanted to charge me about £200, for what Epson US deemed a camera fault!).

It took Epson US about 2 weeks to repair (not replace), the camera, and shipped it to my New York address. From there a friend had it sent over to me here in Jerusalem (where I'm based).

I've worked with the camera now for about 4 days and it's working great. Now I can finally appreciate it, with kudos to Epson US!

Kevin
 
kunger said:
Is this the typical issue that was happening with 3rd party batteries? Like I said, it could be that I have a dud battery. If the battery has been sitting in a box for two years unused, it may not hold a good/full charge. We all know what happens to laptop batteries when they're not used for a couple of years. Could this be the same?

As I said, after the battery has been "fully" charged, I get about a good solid 30ish frames before this problem kicks in. Then I'm fighting just to get one frame.



Kevin


My R-D1s has three batteries: only one is 'real' Epson and the two others are cheap China-made generics. Cheap because I got them from eBay for only US$6.00 - not each, but for the two. A lot has been said about cheap batteries, but the ones I got seem to be working fine. I don't know if I could say the same about them a few months from now, but as they are, they work almost as good as the Epson-marked battery. The only thing different is capacity- they seem to have about only 80 to 75 % of the OEM battery's endurance.

Have you tried charging the battery for at least 12 hours before using it first?
Lithium batteries usually need a lengthy initial charge.

Jay
 
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