Battery Life when shooting Tethered

Anyone doing any serious tethered shooting?

Shooting normally I get about 1000+ photos out of a battery in my 5D2.

I've recently started shooting tethered, only taking about 160 photos per day, but the set up is on for about 4-5 hours.

I'm finding the battery that used to last a week of shooting is now only lasting a day in the camera, and the only thing that has changed is shooting connected via USB cable and tethering to Light Room.

suggest using AC power supply when tethered to a computer that is also on the power grid. Use the batteries for field work.

MCAsan wrote in post #13101225
suggest using AC power supply when tethered to a computer that is also on the power grid. Use the batteries for field work.

We have 7 other cameras that all run on AC adapters, I'm just wondering if anyone else has encountered this level of battery drain working tethered?

It's clearly the tethering process that is putting extra drain on the battery.

I haven't done much tethered shooting. But USB does use some power -- I figure from the computer as well as the device. It has to keep that communication going, and I imagine that's what you're seeing.

I was shooting some interior shots for my office, and decided to tether my 7D to my Xoom Tablet to try out the new tethering program I bought. The Battery in my camera didn't last very long ~2-3 hours before it went down to a single bar. the live view tethering over usb really sucks a lot of battery, which makes sense.

The sensor is on for long periods of time, and streaming video over usb to a computer or tablet when tethering... Which is a big difference from taking a photo through the view finder (the sensor being active for a fraction of a second when you're using the viewfinder, and no data streaming except when recording an image to the card).

tonylong wrote in post #13103689
I haven't done much tethered shooting. But USB does use some power -- I figure from the computer as well as the device. It has to keep that communication going, and I imagine that's what you're seeing.

That's what I was thinking, just didn't realize how much power it used.
Interestingly, the laptop lasted about 4 hours on its 6 cell battery today, while the Camera about 3/4 of a charge in about 5 hours of shooting.

The camera has a much smaller battery obviously, but I wonder if the USB controller in the camera is not very good at power management.

cisobe wrote in post #13104827
I was shooting some interior shots for my office, and decided to tether my 7D to my Xoom Tablet to try out the new tethering program I bought. The Battery in my camera didn't last very long ~2-3 hours before it went down to a single bar. the live view tethering over usb really sucks a lot of battery, which makes sense.

Live View is a massive killer.
I'm shooting into LR, so no Live View to the laptop

Moppie wrote in post #13106081
That's what I was thinking, just didn't realize how much power it used.
Interestingly, the laptop lasted about 4 hours on its 6 cell battery today, while the Camera about 3/4 of a charge in about 5 hours of shooting.

The camera has a much smaller battery obviously, but I wonder if the USB controller in the camera is not very good at power management.

Well, I dunno...it would be interesting to compare the 5D2 battery life to a 1D series -- at least my 1D3 has a very nice battery life, but like I said, I've never pushed things with tethered shooting.

I just wanted to chime in on this thread now that I do extensive tethered shooting.

Battery life is abysmal when shooting tethered.Camera brand and model don't matter.

The only way to deal with it is to use an AC adapter.

Yep, my 7d is normally good on battery life,but not when tethered. It canes the battery

I get phenomenal battery life on my Nikon D700 when not tethered. Tethered is a death sentence.

It's commonly known that Tethered Shooting sucks so much power so fast from a battery it is insane.

It's been recommended to use an AC Adapter when tethered for as far back as I can recall.

Most of my shooting is done tethered I can't say that battery life has ever been a problem that said I use gripped bodies with 2 batteries and always start with freshly charged batteries. Even after a shoot that was almost 8 hours, probably 4 hours of real shooting time there wasn't even a dent in the battery indicator. I am using a proper USB extension cable with inline amplifier don't know if that makes any difference with battery drain. I have been contemplating trying the USB to CAT5e/6 adaptors, has anyone tried these.
http://www.shop.tether​tools.com …-Cat6-Extender-CATEXT.htm

Damian75 wrote in post #13428026
Most of my shooting is done tethered I can't say that battery life has ever been a problem that said I use gripped bodies with 2 batteries and always start with freshly charged batteries. Even after a shoot that was almost 8 hours, probably 4 hours of real shooting time there wasn't even a dent in the battery indicator. I am using a proper USB extension cable with inline amplifier don't know if that makes any difference with battery drain. I have been contemplating trying the USB to CAT5e/6 adaptors, has anyone tried these.
http://www.shop.tether​tools.com …-Cat6-Extender-CATEXT.htm

You're definitely in the minority. I've never seen anyone report excellent battery life or battery life even close to non-tethered shooting. Interesting.

TMR Design wrote in post #13428040
You're definitely in the minority. I've never seen anyone report excellent battery life or battery life even close to non-tethered shooting. Interesting.

I don't know that I would say excellent as I don't know exactly what the non tethered life would be all I know is that running with 2 batteries in the grip battery life during a shoot has never been an issue. I tend to always start a shoot with freshly charged batteries, I have never trusted the battery indicator on cameras, it may be from shooting all the years with film cameras that ran on lithium non rechargeables that would show good for a long while then die very quickly.