rechargeable batteries

can anyone in the UK recommend a good charger/battery combination for 430ex / MR14 EX - Duracells dont seem to last long at all and its hardly very eco friendly of me to keep buying them.

Energiser is widely recommended, I use Power-2000 cells from B&H which are great and last far longer than I expect. I did a wedding on eight 2800mah cells between two flashes last weekend!I did use a battery pack for the formals but not for anything else.

thanks

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I've had good results with Duracell NiMH batteries. They're only up to 2500mAh so far that I've found but they're reasonably priced (at least around here).

I think it's just alkalines (non-rechargeables) in general you'd have trouble with, regardless of brand.

cdi-ink is spot on there, alkalines just don't have sufficient power output required by flash units. They might be OK for mp3 players or similar, as the drain is constant, but they have trouble with the demands of flash. On the other hand NiMH were almost designed for the job. I use just two sets (one 2500 and the other 2200) for each of my two EX flash units (4 in all). It's a good idea to get a decent charger that matches the output of the batteries, and is reasonably fast. As and when you need to charge them, you don't want to be waiting overnight!

I ordered saturday the Sony 2500mah batteries w/charger from Amazon(Adorama) for $28. It charges in 15mins.

Just seen your duplicate post over in the Macro section (?) - I forgot to mention that I use UNIROSS 2500 mAh. You can get these complete with various chargers - that either perform a "fast" charge - that takes a lifetime, or a "SuperFast" charger that is reasonably quick. Although the faster the charger the more expensive the product, I would go for a quicker one myself - just in case you need them!

FWIW, I think my Duracell 2500mAh batteries in the Duracell Charger (it looks like the Powercell one at B&H might be a clone) takes about 20 minutes. I've never timed it though since I have 5 sets of batteries and I'm never hopping down impatiently waiting for batteries to be juiced back up.

Slow chargers are better for the batteries, i'm told. There's probably not a lot of real difference in capacity between 2500 and 2800mah cells.

This is an excellent place for battery information. Battery University

Yeah supposedly the quick chargers really hurt the useful life of a set of batts. But if I get a years' service out of 5 sets using the 20 minute charger, that'll be alright with me. If they keel over before then I'll invest in a slow cooker.

I did mark all my battiers as I bought them Set 1, Set 2, Set 3, Set 4, Set 5...so they all charge the same and die the same. I don't like the idea of mixing and matching, especially since I didn't buy them all at the same time. Since they're marked I don't have to keep them in sets of 4 as I use 'em up...I can toss 'em loose in my bag and retrieve & match them up later. Especially handy at a wedding or other fast paced or dangerous event (like the auto racing where if I don't keep an eye out, I could get an eye poked out or worse).

I do the same, I keep bats in sets of 4 in their little plastic cases, and if they fail after a year I don't care. My chargers are one hour or so, I bought two of them to charge my 36 or so batteries - I don't need that many i've just accumulated them over the past year or so.

Hey I lied. My charger is a 1 hour jobby too. Says right on the front! :doh!:

I guess it just doesn't seem like an hour since I'm never actually waiting on batts to charge.

I have 5 sets just in case. I was shooting heavy flash at the race track so I figured I should stock up. Retards decided that racing under the worse-than-a-high-school-stadium lights was more fun than being able to actually see. The lights were little more than the old square style halogen headlights on poles.

Uniross 2500 from "www.picstop.co.uk" is a good offer right now.

I use them and also "GP" you can get them from "www.budgetbatteries.c​o.uk"

I also use an imported charger from le-cross which is very good.

R