Battery Life - Leave camera on?

Say Im going to be shooting for a few hours. Is it better to leave my camera on the whole time or only turn it on when needed? I guess I also want to know if it takes a lot of batter power to turn the camera.

A scenario might be a parade. You might be taking pics for an hour or more but your not going to be shooting every min of the parade.

can you set the camera to turn off if no activity for x minutes? Can't remember on the rebels.

you should always have an extra batery though.

There is essentially no difference in power usage between "off" and "timed out". Of course the camera uses a bit more juice during the minute or so that it's waiting to time out, but that's not really all that much.

I rarely shut off my XT during the day. I just let it time out and shut itself off, then tap the shutter button to wake it up. Sometimes I'll forget to shut it off at the end of the day, and it'll sit for a few weeks "timed out". I don't notice any difference between that and having shut the camera off.

I always leave my xt(350d) Timed out! Doesnt effect battery life IMO!

timer always worked well for me... but I usually do shut it off when placing it in camera bag.

Only time ever had a problem was my initial XT (which ended up being replaced by Canon.) Even with timer set, and apparently turning off, it would still drain the battery... but that was because of camera problems... haven't had that problem at all with my new XT.

my XTi is set to turn off after 8 minutes... i have used anywhere from 1 minute to 8, and found that battery life isnt really affected (i have never run out of juice). but when i know i will not be shooting i do turn it all the way off.

Chuck Westfall answered (for the 1D series) at one point that turning it off didn't make any noticeable difference in battery life. I can't remember the exact article, but it's been referred to a few times around here. Frankly, I never turn any of my 3 DSLRs off.

Jon wrote in post #3035382
Chuck Westfall answered (for the 1D series) at one point that turning it off didn't make any noticeable difference in battery life. I can't remember the exact article, but it's been referred to a few times around here. Frankly, I never turn any of my 3 DSLRs off.

I had over 1800 shots at my last wedding on a 1d battery, and it still showed full charge (obviously it isn't so can't wait for the 1d3 with a bettery battery and meter)

davidcrebelxt wrote in post #3035262
Only time ever had a problem was my initial XT (which ended up being replaced by Canon.) Even with timer set, and apparently turning off, it would still drain the battery... but that was because of camera problems... haven't had that problem at all with my new XT.

Just an FYI (it obviously doesn't matter since the original camera is long gone)—the original XT/350D firmware had a bug in the auto shut-off feature where it wouldn't shut off when set longer than 2 minutes. This was fixed in firmware version 1.0.2.

I'm with Jon, I never turn mine off. If I do it is by accident.

I just about never shut my 1D2N off. And I have a relatively long timeout/sleep value as well with an 8s review.

If anything, it depends on the camera. On my XTi, if the camera times out, it doesn't auto-clean the sensor; when you switch it off, it does (and then again when you switch it back on). I'd think shaking the sensor takes more power (since it's physical motion) than the circuitry idling does, so if you're trying to squeeze every last joule out of your battery, you're probably better off letting the camera time out.

Or, of course, turning off autoclean.

Jon wrote in post #3035382
Chuck Westfall answered (for the 1D series) at one point that turning it off didn't make any noticeable difference in battery life. I can't remember the exact article, but it's been referred to a few times around here. Frankly, I never turn any of my 3 DSLRs off.

That hasn't been my experience at all w/my 5D. If I don't turn it off at night the next morning the batteries will have drained. It doesn't help that the on/off switch is on the back at the bottom rather than on top. Any info you can give me would be appreciated.

Oh, I will be going to Irvine for a free cleaning next week so I will ask there too.

I have the XT with the latest firmware update and my time out is set to either 6 or 8 min. I forget. It sounds like that is good enough then. Ill most power down at the end of the day when it goes back in the case but it seems like its ok to just leave it on while using it. Thanks everyone!

I don't normally turn mine off whilst they are out of the bag, they are left on and ready for use at all times whilst I am shooting, walking around, whatever. They are set to never auto shutdown and only get turned off when put back in the bag at the end of the day, unless I feel the need whilst changing a card or lens (and I don't always bother then).

I don't have a problem with battery life, if I put a fresh one in at the start of the day it will frequently still be going at the end of the day, even after a couple of thousand shots taken. I do use the higher capacity aftermarket batteries though and always have spares handy, just in case. If I just had the one battery to last me all day, with no reserve, I would probably be more careful about saving juice.