Cheap Chinese Batteries

I've a 350D with grip and a 5D with grip and which arrived from Hong Kong with those cheap batteries.

One may recognise them as a lighter colour grey than the deeper grey or black of other brands.

The attraction of course, is the price, typically €10 against the €40 or more in my local shop. Sometimes they are even thrown in free, but I've had two DOAs which was not worth the bother of replacing.

For the price the service is OK but I've found one needs to be recharging then quite often. My 5D would hardly go a week on them and with the recent cold spells I've been caught out with flat batteries.

I've recently purchased new batteries from the UK at a very reasonable €15 and I'm enjoying a good increase in my shots per charge.

my experiance has been a little different. I own 6 cheap chinese batteries. 2 with no brand name at all and and 4 photix (or something to that effect) I bought the two no names about 3 years ago for about $20 can. and then the 4 other about 6 monthes ago for about €20. at this point the two no names are not much use as the no longer hold a charge for very long. But I definetly got my money's worth for a couple of years. and the four other right now I would say the difference between them and the canon batteries is too small to matter.

Of course I have 30d and 300d so I have a different battery then 350d. (not sure if the
5d has the same battery as me or not). But I know when I bought the first 2 they were charging nearly $90 can in stores for a canon battery so buying chinese no names was definetly the way to go.

GerBee wrote in post #6823522
I've a 350D with grip and a 5D with grip and which arrived from Hong Kong with those cheap batteries.

One may recognise them as a lighter colour grey than the deeper grey or black of other brands.

The attraction of course, is the price, typically €10 against the €40 or more in my local shop. Sometimes they are even thrown in free, but I've had two DOAs which was not worth the bother of replacing.

For the price the service is OK but I've found one needs to be recharging then quite often. My 5D would hardly go a week on them and with the recent cold spells I've been caught out with flat batteries.

I've recently purchased new batteries from the UK at a very reasonable €15 and I'm enjoying a good increase in my shots per charge.

What one did you eventually buy? i have been looking at some on ebay. theirs a lot of fakes on there though.

I bought the generics off eBay... 8 of them so far. No problems at all, they get used hard in my work and some are about three years old now, plus shipped to my doorstep, they averaged about 1/6 the price of Canon OEM batts. In fact, they are higher power capacity than Canon's BP511A. (I have two OEM BP511 and two BP511A, too. Also working fine.)

Nervous about generics? Try Sterlingtek or the third party but name brand Adorama, B&H and others sell. You'll save about half compared to Canon, and have an actual warranty and place to return them if they don't work for some reason.

Hint: look at the back of an OEM Canon battery... It says "Made in China".

[QUOTE=amfoto1;6830126​]I bought the generics off eBay... 8 of them so far. No problems at all, they get used hard in my work and some are about three years old now, plus shipped to my doorstep, they averaged about 1/6 the price of Canon OEM batts. In fact, they are higher power capacity than Canon's BP511A. (I have two OEM BP511 and two BP511A, too. Also working fine.)

Nervous about generics? Try Sterlingtek or the third party but name brand Adorama, B&H and others sell. You'll save about half compared to Canon, and have an actual warranty and place to return them if they don't work for some reason.

Hint: look at the back of an OEM Canon battery... It says "Made in China".[/quote


Just had a look at the two that came with the 5 d. BP511A. They are made in japan.
Thanks for the link. il have a looksee.

I just bought two gerneric ones from Sterlingtek. Working great so far. Haven't really put them through the paces, but I will sooner or later.

I've had great luck with Sterlingtek batteries. They actually have more available power than the OEM Canon batteries.