LP-E6 Battery Life

I have a 7D, which has taken about 950 images from new. However, the information in the manual claims that I should be able to achieve between 900 and a 1000 actuations between charges, depending on usage, IE: live view, flash etc.

I am at the time of posting charging my battery for the fourth time, which equates to about 300 shots per charge. I have only used live view for approximately 5% of the time and on camera flash for no more than a dozen shots in total.

Is anyone else getting better results, or am I doing something wrong and charging the battery incorrect? I always wait until the green light indicates that the battery is fully charged and showing 100%.

I should also add that the camera, battery and charger were all purchased new.

Any comments would be very much appreciated.

Something is definitely wrong, you should be getting way more life out of your LP-E6's than 300 shots. 1300 shouldn't be out of the question.

I have a grip and 2 batteries in it. (Grip and both batteries are Canon brand) WITHOUT any IS I was able to achive 4900 RAW images from both batteries in bright day light situation.

Edit: Not 8900! 4900

Its hard to say given i assume your shots were taken over an extender period of time.

Id expect you would get close enough to the specified number of shots (or even many more) from the fully charged battery if you took all of them within a few days to a couple of weeks maybe?

Over time the battery will self discharge a little and for what its worth, from new... the battery needs to be cycled a few times before it will achieve its maximum capacity anyways. So id say your battery is only just 'breaking in' now.

In your 7D's menu there is a screen called Battery INFO; in there it shows the remaining life as a % and also the number of shots taken since changing the battery and a recharge performance scale. What does it show?

Perhaps keep an eye on that and also look at how often you are using the camera between charges. I tend to take a lot of time composing the shot i want and only take one frame, i dont go click click click click click etc. So even on trips away im sure i could easily take thousands of photos with many repeats but i usually take about 300-400 photos (max, on a big trip).

By that stage my battery would be showing 1/4 or so left. (My battery info screen has pretty much always shown 3 green bars for the recharge performance...) No idea what that means really but again i assume it has something to do with my lack of volume of photos taken over the period of time since the battery was recharged.

Travis.

I think a lot of that has to do with how you shoot. The 900~1000 number seems to be targeted towards an event type shooting style where all the photos are taken at once. I'm probably at the 300 range as well between charges but I shoot in small batches, use flash, lots of live view and parameter adjustments so the LCD is on a lot.

Thanks for the prompt replies guys. I bought my camera in December, so, the 950 images have been taken over the past four months. When I put it on charge earlier today the battery info on the camera was showing 9% remaining and 205 shots taken.

Perhaps I should wait a bit longer and see if the time between charges improves. Not sure whether Canon would consider this as a problem. If I don't see an improvement over the next couple of charges, I think I shall do do them a quick email and see what they say.

Addendum to my previous post.

The battery has now been charged and is showing the following:-

1. Remaining cap = 100%

2. Shutter count = 0

3. Recharge performance = 3 green bars.

I do 4 hour shoots.
Sometimes will take 400 per shoot and then recharge that battery and unse the other. Once I took 400 + 450 = 950 before swapping battery and there was plenty of charge left.
Recon could do another 400 = 1,200

Once they are fully charged that day may not use that bttery for 2 or 3 weeks and it may then say 96%.

Not the same as leaving for weeks between charging. Personally Id ask them to check out the battery.
My Sony A77 would do circa 300-350 shots bewteen charges - but then it had an EVF.