GH3 And Battery Clones

[Ronald Jackson]

Has anybody out there successfully used/purchased battery clones? £50/60 a bit steep for Panasonics, for what they are, and the camera's juicy at least in video mode.
Quite a lot of opinion against on the web which seems to be from people who haven't actually tried clones themselves.
Along with lots of others I never thought twice about using decent clones, like Swits, for my XLH1 and EX3.
Nice to find something similar for the GH3.

Ron

[William Hohauser]

The problem is that nobody with a decent track record in making clone batteries has produced a GH3 battery yet. A new Panasonic GH3 battery costs around $70 here but the clone batteries are selling two for $35. There is something odd about that price discrepancy. Also the Amazon reviews are hard to make sense of, one writes that the batteries are as good as the Panasonic batteries while making claims of six hours of filming on one battery. Others admit that the clones are weaker than the originals.

[Bruce Foreman]

Originally Posted by Ronald Jackson

Quite a lot of opinion against on the web which seems to be from people who haven't actually tried clones themselves.

I tried clones for the Olympus E-P3 and for the Lumix Gh2 and definitely did NOT have good luck. Of the pair ordered for the E-P3 one died totally on the 4th use cycle (as in would not take a charge at all) and at the same time the other swelled up inside the camera so bad it took me two hours to "pry" it out (that came close to ruining an $800 camera body.

Of the two I had for the GH2 neither one ever gave but about half of the run time the Lumix batteries did.

So when I spend $1298 each on a pair of GH3's, there is NO WAY I'll take a chance on third party batteries. If a Lumix battery should swell up and ruin a body, Panasonic is going to repair or replace the body, recourse I won't have if it's a third party battery.

I pay the Lumix price, bite my lip, and move on.

[Ronald Jackson]

Bugger it I'm convinced! I know very little about DSLRs but there does seem to be a plethora of different battery types for Panasonic cameras. Perhaps this lack of standardisation puts off the better clone makers.

Ron

[Paul Doherty]

I've got a couple of clones which I bought in June for £8 each. They've had moderate use and haven't given me any problems, so I just use them interchangeably with the Panasonic one which came with my GH3. I haven't done any comparison of how long they power the camera for, but my impression is that they are similar to the Panasonic original in that respect.

[Nigel Barker]

Originally Posted by William Hohauser

The problem is that nobody with a decent track record in making clone batteries has produced a GH3 battery yet. A new Panasonic GH3 battery costs around $70 here but the clone batteries are selling two for $35. There is something odd about that price discrepancy.

Just because they are so much cheaper doesn' necessarily mean they are crap. You can buy decent cheap BP-E6 batteries for the Canon 5D for about 20% of the cost of the Canon ones although the GH3 batteries are a new design & the 5D batteries have been on the market for at least 3-4 years.

[Ronald Jackson]

I think I'll buy some clones and use them in my battery holder which came "free" with my GH3 and is hopefully en route from Panasonic UK.


Ron

[Noa Put]

Originally Posted by Bruce Foreman

there is NO WAY I'll take a chance on third party batteries. If a Lumix battery should swell up and ruin a body, Panasonic is going to repair or replace the body, recourse I won't have if it's a third party battery. I pay the Lumix price, bite my lip, and move on.

I got a very cheap gh3 batterygrip that included 2 batteries and a charger, paid 1/7th of the original price, I also don't like to use third party batteries inside the camera, that's why I plan to leave the original one in the camera and the third party ones in the grip.

[Leon Kolenda]

Well I have purchased and used the following clone batteries from Wasabi, a Japanese product that I have got for 2 different camera systems. I have used 2 batteries for the GH3 and have depleted them 4 times along with the OEM battery, and they have been great! No issues at all, I got a 2 battery pack and AC/DC Charger for $35.00. very good deal. Also, they are 2000mAh vs the OEM at 1860mAh.

Here is where I got them:Amazon.com: wasabi batteries for gh3 - Camera & Photo: Electronics

Leon

[William Hohauser]

This is a review I trust.

While I haven't had the need for extra batteries due to what I usually film (interviews), the cheap external battery grip seems the most sensible for me.