Tuesday, May 14, 2024

Question For Fujifilm Camera Owners

I have a question for Fujifilm camera owners who own and use Fujifilm cameras which use the newer NP-W235 battery.

I have three NP-W235 official Fujifilm batteries—one that stays in the camera and two spares.  Also, I rotate the batteries so one doesn't get used and the other two never get used unless needed.  Even if I don't use the spare batteries, they will discharge over time.  For example, over the period of a month or two, the two spare batteries may discharge 25% or more of their full power.  In my experience with other camera batteries that shouldn't happen.  They (lithium batteries) should pretty much stay fully charged for a lot longer time than that.  My three batteries have been spontaneously discharging like this since I received one with my X-T5 and bought the other two, less than two years ago.  

After buying these NP-W235 batteries and before using them, I followed my normal routine in that I fully charged them before use then put them in either my camera or a specially made nylon battery pouch (Think Tank Photo).  The first time I checked the spare batteries a month or so later, I found them discharged about 25%.  I was surprised.  

To my recollection, this doesn't happen with any other lithium-ion batteries I've owned and used in any type of device.  Since my Nikon and OM cameras use similar batteries, I’ve taken notice that those batteries don’t discharge that much that quickly. Very little, in fact.  Lithium batteries tend to stay fully charged for a long, long time.

Additionally, because I've read that the electronics in some third party battery chargers may not fully match Fujifilm's electronics, I bought and charge my batteries in Fujifilm's official Dual Battery Charger.  Some third party chargers may indicate the batteries are fully charged but they may actually not be fully charged.  My procedure is I leave the batteries in the Fujifilm charger even after the charger reads 100% charge and until the LCD screens turn off.  To me, that indicates they are at their maximum charge.  If I charged them in a third party charger, I would be suspicious the charger is not fully charging the batteries—a variable I wouldn't be able to control.  But, as I said, I use the Fujifilm charger.

Also, I understand a battery in a camera utilizes some of its charge to keep the camera's internal battery charged, camera settings and clock from resetting, but not ones stored in a pouch in my camera bag in the house at 73F (23 C).

So, my question to you Fujifilm user's whose cameras use the NP-W235 battery, do your spare batteries hold their charge at or near 100% for a significant length of time?  I would like to know if mine have been defective from the start?

If this is normal for these Fujifilm batteries, I may have to consider third party batteries as replacements, especially those new ones that have a built-in charging mechanism.  They may hold a charge longer and provide better performance.  I certainly don’t plan on spending the money required to buy three new Fujifilm batteries.

Your thoughts?  Thanks in advance.

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Thanks for looking. Enjoy!  

Dennis A. Mook  

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4 comments:

  1. Good Afternoon Dennis. All batteries self discharge over time, these more so since they have monitoring electronics built into the battery. Mine do the same thing yours are doing as well as my spare battery discharges just sitting on my desk. I make it a point to make sure all batteries are fully charged the night before I take my camera's out on a shoot. Cheers.

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    1. Thank you for your comment. I understand that batteries self-discharge, however, the Fujifilm batteries seem to do this excessively. My Nikon, Olympus, flashlight and other lithium-ion batteries don’t exhibit this behavior. I’m glad to know that evidently your batteries’ discharge rate is similar to mine and I’m not the only one experiencing this anomaly. Again, thank you. ~Dennis

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  2. When I got my X-H1, that was my first observation about Fuji batteries... that they seemed to discharge a lot more – either sitting in an off camera or just spares in a pouch - than my Canon batteries ever did. Kinda surprised you are just noticing this now! I'm not really sure what the tech in them is that would make them behave differently than another manufacturer's lithium batteries.

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    1. Erin, thank you for your comment. I noticed this a couple of years ago but never wrote about it. Recently, I was reminded of the phenomenon and thought I would throw the question out there for comment to see if others experienced the same thing with their batteries. ~Dennis

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