To my eye John, the light is flickering quite fast rather than on, so I would suspect it is actually reading something on the card.

The question is where is it getting the power to put the light on from.

Indeed so George, but the camera had not been used since yesterday (:blush, so it would have been fully in whatever state "off" is.

After thirty years in electronics I can generally tell the feel of a proper voltage isolating switch, but this one might have beaten me.

Is it?

I had always assumed that the on/off switch was just that: that it disconnected the battery from the camera.

That was until this evening when I had reason to look at the card. As I pushed it back in, the disc access light lit up. I kicked myself for pulling the card out with the switch on, but when I looked, it was off.

This leaves three possibilities-

There is another power source within the camera which lit the light.

There is a second power switch which is activated when the card is pushed in and subsequently turns off after a period of time.

The "Off" switch is actually a "standby" switch and there is still something running in the camera when it is switched off.

If the last one is the case (and I would guess it is) then people's assumption that batteries loose their charge over time may be slightly off the mark.

Looking at Shaky's link, it's going to give the K20 a run for it's money.

Thanks Rob

I have the newer ones and I would like to keep them all the same type.

Do this carefully folks. Some flashes have very high voltage and it's DC so can give a very nasty bight.

Make sure the meter and leads are up to the job and your fingers are nowhere near the metal bits.

Probably out having fun somewhere. The ones I have met have a commendable knack of doing so.

Hi Rob

Slightly confused here as I didn't realise there were new and old Extreme 3s. If they are similar to mine, I would be interested. Any chance of a photo?

Only the cheaper brands.

I share John's reservations.

The 50-135 is my favourite lenses and threads like this depress me.


One thought though - disconnecting electrical contacts can have bad consequences.