60D says External Flash Attached...but its not.

My 60D will not allow me to activate my on camera flash. I wanted to try and get my two 430 EX II's running wireless so I could get a feel for the mneu's when I purchase Pixel King triggers. Unfortunately, I can't get the external flash to pop up.

External flash firing is enabled, and I've attempted to reset the Cfn settings to possibly clear something I might have screwed up. No luck. Removed the battery, no luck.

I cannot get to any menus without my 430 EX II attached. And when that is attached, I can only get to single flash options (although, I've yet to try and turn on my other 430 EXII.

Is there something I'm missing here. Going to download the manual tonight and see if there is something else, but wanted to get feelers out and see if this is something I need to be concerned about or something simple.

I've tried the camera in all the modes without a flash mounted, including green box, and regardless of what I do, I cannot get the on camera flash to pop up...

There is a tiny microswitch under one of the rails of the flash shoe on the top of your 60D. Look under the rails and you'll see a thin leaf spring that pushes down on that microswitch.

It's very common for the leaf to get stuck down, leading the camera to think there's a flash in the shoe. You can gently pry it up with a thin blade or needle.

-js

I will certainly give that a try! Things you never know!

Yup, that was it! I would have beat my head off the wall with that one!

This happened to me yesterday; for such an sturdy camera you'd think there would be a less finicky way to detect if there was a flash in the shoe.

Like, oh I don't know, the multiple electrical contacts that are on the flash and shoe already...

All of Canon's hot shoes have this problem (unless the 1D X and/or the 5D3 have fixed it), and yes I agree with you completely that it is a silly design.