Electricity for GoPro, anyone?

[_Paz_]

On GoPro's website they say you can charge your battery while videoing by using a USB wall charger that is 5V, 1A - and use the USB cable that came with the camera.

I bought this charger:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00LTO ... UTF8&psc=1

Plugged in the charger, a little blue light came on on the plug in head. Took the battery out of the GoPro, plugged in via the GoPro USB cable. Nothing happened. Tried to push the button to turn on the GP. Nothing happened. The blue light stayed on, but nothing else.

Put the battery back in the GP. Tried to turn the GP on. Nothing happened. Tried plugging into the wall charger, tried with camera off and on. Nothing happened.

Got a fully charged battery. GP will turn on now. Tried using the wall charger. Its light came on but no charging symbol, like I get if it is plugged into the laptop when I'm transferring videos.

So... is this charger likely to be defective?

There are other chargers available that have the same specs.

======================================

Also, I have a charger for my smart phone that says:

input: 100 - 240 V

output: 5.0V 550Ma 14181- AB 1116497 - N - 02B


Would it hurt to try the smart phone charger?

It is 5V but it doesn't mention amps, unless 550Ma is some way of stating amps.

==========================================

I'm pretty sure I remember reading that someone was using a wall charger with a GoPro and they said no internal battery was required. That's the reason I hooked it up first without a battery. To be sure it was working. Anyone have any experience plugging a GP into the wall with a charger?

Anyone know of a particular brand of charger that works?

thanks,

Paz

[Peru]

So... is this charger likely to be defective?

There are other chargers available that have the same specs.

======================================

Also, I have a charger for my smart phone that says:

input: 100 - 240 V

output: 5.0V 550Ma 14181- AB 1116497 - N - 02B

Would it hurt to try the smart phone charger?

It is 5V but it doesn't mention amps, unless 550Ma is some way of stating amps.


Paz

550 ma = 0.550 amps

What is the rating for the GoPro charger?

[_Paz_]

1 amp

On GoPro's website they say you can charge your battery while videoing by using a USB wall charger that is 5V, 1A - and use the USB cable that came with the camera.

That means the GoPro needs more than my smart phone charger can supply, right?

Would it damage either GP or the smart phone charger to plug it up and see what happens?

I can return the purchased charger if it is defective. But, if it is not, then shipping charges to go back make it not worth sending back.

[_Paz_]

Still hunting... just found this on GoPro's site:

Recommended Chargers for GoPros:

If you plan to use a USB charger to charge your camera or Battery BacPac, be sure to research the volts (V) and amps (A) that the charger outputs before you connect your camera or Battery BacPac to it.

Our cameras and Battery BacPacs require USB chargers that output 5V and 1A. Using chargers that do not meet this requirement can potentially break your camera or Battery BacPac.

To properly charge your camera, first power it off and disconnect the BacPac if one is attached. Next, connect the camera to a USB port directly on the computer, preferably on the back of the computer if possible. Alternatively, you can connect it to a USB wall charger that outputs 5V and 1A. The front red LED should turn on to indicate charging.

Leave the camera powered off and charging until the front red LED turns off. Once the LED turns off, the camera is fully charged. This can take up to 4 hours if the computer is used and up to 2 hours if a USB wall charger is used.

If the camera doesn't power on or the red LED doesn't light up, check out our Camera Will Not Power On troubleshooting instructions.

Since my red LED on the camera did not come on, I'm guessing the charger I bought via Amazon is defective since the specs were right.

As quickly as the GP battery runs down there's going to have to be a better way for time lapse.

[Bob]

The USB power option is for charging the battery, not running the camera. You can operate the camera while charging, but the camera isn't designed to run off the charger without the battery.

It sounds like what you want is a battery eliminator. There are a few companies that have designed battery eliminators for the GoPro. The least expensive ones I've seen are from Cam-Do. I don't recall which GoPro model you have. Here are the links to the GoPro 4 battery eliminator and the GoPro 3 battery eliminator (the ac version is midway down the page). The GoPro 4 version plugs into the Hero port on the camera and requires a separate usb charger (5v and a minimum of 1 amp). The GoPro 3 version has an adaptor that replaces the battery; If you get that one, get the ac package that comes with the power supply. The voltage regulator is in the power supply -- if you hook up the battery adaptor to a normal 5v charger you'll damage the camera.

[_Paz_]

Bob, you're my HERO, once again!

Those are some great products for the GoPro. Too bad the motion activation product they offer won't work with the Hero4 battery eliminator.

I'd love the solar powered version! If only it wasn't so expensive....

Thank you so much. I'll order the battery eliminator and see if it works with the 5V 1A wall charger I've already bought. If so, I'll be good to go!

[rschildt]

I'm also looking at the CamDo Eliminator, but first tried out my home brew solution. I bought a 10000 mAh PNY battery PowerPack for $19.99. With that fully charged, I've done time lapse for 24+ hrs and 1080p/30fps HD video for about 4.5 hrs, until the 64GB memory card was filled.

I wish I could fix a video setting that would allow me to record until the battery gave out. I was hoping some of the WVGA would be good, but according to the GoPro site, all video takes up about the same amount of space. Best I can do (with a Hero 4) is 5hr 53min on a 64GB card. I see a Hero 3 Silver can record 9.5 hrs on a 64GB card. Maybe I'll have to look for one of those too.

[Chris B]

Perhaps the next gopro version will support one of these
http://www.sandisk.com/products/memory- ... m-edition/

Aside - I'm a techie - but I look at some stuff and it just amazes me... 200GB in something smaller than my little fingernail...

[_Paz_]

rschildt,

The homemade battery pack sounds interesting. I'm afraid my knowledge of electronics puts it beyond me though.

I'd love to have the solar powered gadget set up for motion activation and/or time lapse and be able to wifi the info on the card back to my computer without having to move the camera. For example, my cousin raises bees. I'd like to set up a GoPro inside one of the hives and get footage of the wax sections being made. But I don't want to mess with bees. Especially not every day.

Chris,

200 GB??? My first hard drive held 5!

I wish a couple of my cameras could hold more than 64GB. I fill about 50GB every day and get in trouble if I start work without remembering to do it. The screen on my camcorder warns that space is getting low... but the HDMI cable does not transfer that info to the monitor I can see. I've run out more than once and painted sections that simply don't get filmed so I recently bought the max size card my working camcorder can use.

[Dave McElderry]

200 GB??? My first hard drive held 5!

My first computer's hard drive's capacity was 20 MB.
Of course that was after the computers that didn't have a hard drive at all.

[Peru]

My first computer's hard drive's capacity was 20 MB.

Mine, too. And a 5 1/4 floppy drive. And no mouse.

[_Paz_]

Thanks guys! It's been a while since I've felt like a spring chicken!

[John 'twosheds' McDonald]

You mean that none of you can remember the early IBM 360 series mainframes?

If memory serves (and I often have doubts about that ) the IBM 360/30 started with a minimum core size (think modern RAM) of 64K.

Hard discs were 5Mb (or was it 7Mb? Can't remember) and head crashes more frequent than we would have liked. Prior to the 360 range the IBM 1401, for example, had a tape based OS!

[Chris B]

If the topic is going this way I came across this recently:
http://www.righto.com/2015/03/12-minute ... on-50.html

[_Paz_]

50 years already!

I've known people whose job was keypunching. Wonder what they do for a living now!