Proprietary Batteries

[imaginary_number]

It seems that many cameras on the market are using proprietary batteries. While it is advantageous in the area of size and battery life, what happens when these batteries get phased out?

Would the camera which depends on the proprietary battery be useless then?

Any comments?

 

[Ian]

There's a couple of alternatives when an OEM stops making a battery for a camera.

Battery packs however should be avialable for 10 years after the discontinuation of a model by the manufacturer in order to comply with many countries laws regarding supply of spare parts.

Otherwise there are two alternatives.

1) Rebuilt/repack the existing battery pack. This is already done with cellphones, laptop and certain camera battery packs.

2) 3rd party manufacturers will produce equivalents as long as there's a demand.

 

[imaginary_number]

Thanks for the info.

Hmm... I guess the safest bet is to get a camera which uses AA batteries.

 

[Ian]

Originally posted by imaginary_number
Thanks for the info.

Hmm... I guess the safest bet is to get a camera which uses AA batteries.

It's not really necessary, what I didn't mention is that 99.99% of OEM proprietary batteries use industry standard cells internally, so repacking is seldom a problem.