Batteries, once again

A while ago, I wrote about third-party batteries. I mentioned how unreliable third-party batteries have been. In particular, an EN-EL3e battery I bought worked for only a few rechargeable cycles. What a waste of money. In photography, you get what you pay for. That statement is very true but I wonder if I had not given those batteries their proper dues.

I just found out that Nikon released a new firmware for the D80. I had the original firmware 1.01 on. The latest firmware, version 1.11, was supposed to fix a problem with the battery indicator (see below). I wonder now if my battery problem had not been related to this bug, where even though the third-party battery was full, the D80 thought the battery was drained. My conclusion at the time was, faulty battery. I am not so sure after seeing this firmware update. So, I will recant for now as it might just be a firmware bug. Well, my D80's firmware is up-to-date now. It is unfortunately I cannot test that third-party battery anymore as I had completely dissected it already.

From Nikon's description of the firmware update:

Modifications enabled with upgrade of A and B firmware to 1.11

• An issue that, in some rare circumstances, caused the battery indicator to blink, regardless of actual battery charge, has been resolved.