Best practice for using old, long un-used proprietary battery

July 3, 2023 8:19 PM

If you're following my roadtrip plans, you know I got out my old point and shoot camera to give to my 6 year old. The camera has been unused for maybe 10 years. the battery was in there and appears undamaged. I have the charger. Will the battery still be good or will it not hold a charge. How can I confirm. If it's not good, [how] can I buy a replacement if the camera was last sold years ago presumably any batteries sold for it have also been unused for years. Also, this makes me want to take out my old DSLR. So same question about those batteries.
posted by If only I had a penguin... to Technology (8 answers total)

The best and easiest way to see if the battery still works is to charge it and see if it takes a charge at all then, if so, run the camera and see how long it lasts. After ten years, it's not likely, but stranger things have happened. Assuming it's a removable battery and the camera was a popular one, it's reasonably possible that an aftermarket battery is available, but 10 years is a long time in technology. The battery may have been used in multiple different devices, so searching for the battery part number if you can find one might work better than searching for a battery for that camera.

Same advice applies to both cameras.
posted by dg at 8:52 PM on July 3, 2023 [1 favorite]

Given its age, if it is a lithium ion battery, I would babysit it while it charged. Lithium ion battery fires, which can occur when a damaged battery is charging, are especially difficult to extinguish, toxic, and leave a smell that lasts years. (Source: At the makerspace I used to work at, someone left a probably damaged Li-ion battery charging unattended. Fire resulted.)
posted by pickles_have_souls at 10:01 PM on July 3, 2023

I find eBay is a great resource for finding old technology. I recently bought a replacement battery for a Treo 650 (14 years old), and there were multiple vendors selling new ones. Perhaps replacement batteries for your camera can be found there.
posted by StrawberryPie at 10:47 PM on July 3, 2023 [2 favorites]

Unless testing it shows the battery still holds up well, I would consider just getting a different old camera, used, that takes standard batteries, and get some new rechargeables for it. Mine from that era used AAs, and went through them fairly quickly until I got rechargeables. Especially on a road trip, I’d worry that old and/or possibly not great quality batteries will drain frustratingly quickly.
posted by needs more cowbell at 2:16 AM on July 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

I'd at least look at a couple sites like1800battery.com and batteriesplus.com.
posted by SemiSalt at 4:50 AM on July 4, 2023

We have similar era Canon cameras (S95/S100), and haven't had difficulty getting replacement batteries from eBay or Amazon. Your battery might have got a bit puffy: if it doesn't sit flat on a table, you should replace it. Note that Canon (almost as a Sony-LITE) delight in having very slightly different batteries for same model years.

I also had a D70. Its 6 MP sensor and relatively slow focusing will make it below phone camera quality, but there are nice lenses for it. Replacement batteries are fairly easy to get, and don't seem to have the chubbiness problem that Canon P&S batteries have.
posted by scruss at 6:22 AM on July 4, 2023

Powershot D10 batteries (type NB-6L) are all over Amazon, from $5-$24 each. I'd just get one or two new ones and forget about the old one. But, maybe, don't buy the very cheapest one...
posted by JoeZydeco at 11:50 AM on July 4, 2023

Mine from that era used AAs, and went through them fairly quickly until I got rechargeables.

The point and shoot (Nikon L21, and the CP3100 before that) which lives in my laptop bag uses two AA batteries, and was selected primarily for that feature. Usually they're rechargeables (Eneloop or similar low-discharge NiMH), but two alkalines will do in a pinch. And every supermarket, hardware store, petrol station and general store will have AAs for sale. Also, no dedicated batteries, no dedicated charger.
posted by Stoneshop at 9:26 AM on July 5, 2023