batteries and 430ex

does anyone knows how long will a 430ex with full charged battery lasts?

depends what batteries you put in it, i've just drained a set of 2300 Mah after 2 months of light to moderte use. I'm guessing 500 frames flash usage. Depends what settings you have it on, full power manual will drain quicker than ETTL in fill flash conditions i would've thought.

I'm sure someone will come up with a precise figure (hey, Canon may put up a figure somewhere, haven't looked) but it really depends on the usage and which batteries you're using - firing off full-power blasts regularly will drain it a heck of a lot quicker than using it lightly will. I've gone a couple of days on one set of 2500mah rechargeables just using my 580EX as fill flash for many hundreds of shots and the batteries seemed to have quite a bit of juice left in 'em.

i am just planning to take pictures as a hobby. a couple of pictures everyday. 10 most maybe. hmmmm.

so one month.

If you are concerned about having it there when you need it, keep a fully charged set in the flash and a spare set fully charged. Otherwise, no big deal. I don't think you can get an accurate count of the number of flashes because of the variablility of power output under different conditions.

It really depends on flash output. I get a lot more shots at ISO 400 than I do at 100.

Also, NiMH batteries lose 1-2% of their charge per day even when not used, so expect batteries that have been left in the flash for several months to be short lived.

I tend to crank it up to +2 or higher for bounced 50 ISO shots on my G3. I can kill a set of Duracells in a under a hundred shots. There are too many variables to put a number to this. I just bought a set of Energizer 2500 rechargeables. We'll see how that goes.