60D date-time dedicated battery

The 60D does not have a user accessible dedicated date-time battery, unlike many other cameras. Apparently the camera uses a cell permanently embedded on the circuit board that recharges from the main battery. If the main battery is removed or becomes totally discharged, then you may have to reset the date/time, langauge functions, etc. Very limited discussion on this is at the bottom of page 30 of the English version manual. Two questions:

1. Are any user defined custom functions/settings also lost if the main battery is removed for an extended period of time?

2. How long are the settings retained if the main battery is removed? Are we talking about minutes, several hours, days, weeks, etc. If it takes 2.5 hours (from manual, page 24) to recharge an exhausted battery, and the battery is charged external to the camera, I assume the settings are retained for at least that long, but does anyone have a good feel for just how long these settings are retained?

A related comment; I have an Canon Elan IIe that had to come out of retirement this past summer as my digital crapped out a week before vacation. It had been stored for about 8-9 years without any battery, and I was quite surprised to see all my custom settings had been retained! I have to investigate if it has a date-time battery. The Elan IIe bailed me out and delivered quite stunning photographs of the Grand Tetons although a humorous event occured at 5 AM one morning while taking a sunrise photograph with about a dozen people, all of whom were shooting digital. It was of course very quiet, nothing but some noise from a nearby stream. About half the crowd literally jumped and turned around when my mechanical shutter went off!

John from PA

John from PA wrote in post #13159679
The 60D does not have a user accessible dedicated date-time battery, unlike many other cameras. Apparently the camera uses a cell permanently embedded on the circuit board that recharges from the main battery. If the main battery is removed or becomes totally discharged, then you may have to reset the date/time,

I think the newer models use a capacitor instead of a second battery which is good because then you don't have to worry about two batteries.
Or it could be bad if it discharges and you have to reset the time/date but I've not actually seen the circuit board nor left my camera without a battery for an extended period of time

I also wonder if it's possible to "reboot" a 60D, the way you can the other Canon models by removing all the batteries for a while.

I don't have 60D, but other models retain custom functions etc. even after batteries are removed... I think because while some things such as date/time are stored and controlled by "volatile memory" that requires a small power source, other things such as menu settings and custom functions might be retained in "non-volatile memory", much the same as your images are stored on a memory card and will remain there regardless of whether there is power applied to the card or not.

I'm the original poster of the question. Having given more thought to this my 60D is a refurb and I believe the time is no less than a few days. I only say that because there were 2 days ship time to me, the battery was out of the camera and fully discharged on receipt, but once the battery was fully charged and installed, the camera showed the correct date and a time that was "near" but was one-hour off. A check of shutter count indicated slightly over 100 clicks.

I raised the question because I'm known to not use my equip[ment for several months and in those circumstances I remove the battery. Once I establish my "custom" setting I guess I best write them down.

John from PA

Has anyone established or refuted whether or not there is a button cell for time/date? If so, how Long should they be expected to last?

Frodge wrote in post #16471454
Has anyone established or refuted whether or not there is a button cell for time/date? If so, how Long should they be expected to last?

In other cameras that do have a second battery it is mentioned in the manual. The 60D's manual doesn't mention it, therefore it's a good guess that it doesn't have one.

There's none in the 60D - I've looked. It may be built-in, or perhaps more probably been replaced with a supercap.

My original post about this question was about a month after getting my refurb 60D. I since have left the main (and only) battery out for a period just short of three weeks. All my settings were retained.

There is no battery in the 60D. I think it has some built-in rechargeable brom the main battery that takes some time to drain

I have had computers that have sat around for many years (8-9) and when I bring them up the date battery is still good. I would have to think that if your camera (elan) still has the date and time more or less correct then there is a battery somewhere.

The 60D could be like the 6D which has a ms614se battery (3.1v lithium) for date and time, but it can only be accessed by taking the camera apart as it is on one of the circuit boards.

Ron

mainbyte wrote in post #16471619
I have had computers that have sat around for many years (8-9) and when I bring them up the date battery is still good. I would have to think that if your camera (elan) still has the date and time more or less correct then there is a battery somewhere.

The 60D could be like the 6D which has a ms614se battery (3.1v lithium) for date and time, but it can only be accessed by taking the camera apart as it is on one of the circuit boards.

Ron

That's what I was trying to figure out. Computer motherboard batteries definitely go bad, I've changed hundreds of them. I wonder if the 60d does have a ms614se, and if it does, is this a similiar battery that the Citizen Eco-drive watches use....
Here are the specs on the battery:
http://www.sii.co.jp …SpecBatEN.jsp?r​ecordID=74
Anyone that knows the tech on this? And how many charge/discharge cycles this has, and what type of life span?

What we do know: A battery is needed to keep the realtime clock circuit operating...the purpose of the removeable button cell in prior cameras, and the purpose of the rechargeable battery in the 60D (similar to the battery on the motherboard for realtime clock in PCs).

What we can reasonably speculate: The CFn and user settings (like the camera firmware) are embedded in EEPROMs...Electrically Erasable Programmable ROMs...electricity is needed to CHANGE values, not to keep values stored.

Wilt wrote in post #16471950
What we do know: A battery is needed to keep the realtime clock circuit operating...the purpose of the removeable button cell in prior cameras, and the purpose of the rechargeable battery in the 60D (similar to the battery on the motherboard for realtime clock in PCs).

Battery, maybe...however it could be a capacitor (supercap as apersson850 stated). Personally I would think if Canon utilized battery technology, they would make it user replaceable. This isn't a difficult task, as demonstrated in past models. The flash capacitor could even be utilized as the backup with some innovative circuitry design. If you look over the internals of the 60D, many photos available on the web, it is hard to see anything that resembles a battery. One does find numerous devices that are capacitors. In reality it doesn't matter much, through some method settings are retained is what matters, but if one goes and cracks open a 60D don't necessarily look for a battery.

John from PA wrote in post #16471990
Personally I would think if Canon utilized battery technology, they would make it user replaceable. This isn't a difficult task, as demonstrated in past models.

The 6D uses a removable battery that is NOT user replaceable. At least not without a lot of effort :>

Ron

mainbyte wrote in post #16472154
The 6D uses a removable battery that is NOT user replaceable. At least not without a lot of effort :>

Ron

I believe thy is one of those rechargeable cells. The question becomes how many recharges can it sustain? Also, why would canon move it to a place that is inaccessible to the user?