Canon Shutter Count Software

[David]

Hi Guys - I came across this useful software that will retrieve the shutter count from most Canon DSLR's.

EOSInfo from Astrojargon. Download, install, connect camera to computer, switch it on and run software. Seems to work. Here's the link:

http://astrojargon.net/EOSInfo.aspx

Cheers

David

[Colin Southern]

Doesn't work with a 1Ds3

[carregwen]

That's a pity - the blurb on the website says...

The shutter count information is available *only* on Canon DIGIC III/IV DSLRs *except* the 1D* series. This means that EOSInfo will display the shutter counter for the 40D, the 50D, the 450D, 500D, and the 1000D. It will also show the shutter counter for the 5DMkII, but the camera must be power-cycled before the value is updated. The shutter counter will not be displayed (or will be displayed as "0") on the 1D*, 5D, 10D, 20D, 30D, 300D, 350D, and 400D. It's not that I have anything against the owners of those cameras, but simply that the Canon SDK does not support retrieving the shutter count for them. UPDATE (08/06/2009): Apparently, Canon has removed the facility for checking the shutter count on the 500D. More news when I learn something.

So it won't work on the 5D. Drat!

[arith]

That's interesting because I'm looking for a 5D and they mostly make bazaar claims that the shutter has only fired a couple of thousand times. One gave a link to his professional website so that I could check out the quality of the camera and there was thousands of pics all by the sea, so I won't bother with that then.

[Colin Southern]

Personally, I really Really REALLY wish Canon would just put the shutter count on an "about" screen, along with the firmware revision. I'm dumb-founded to know why they almost seem to go to great lengths to make in inaccessable to owners, but will happily tell you what it is at a service centre.

[carregwen]

Personally, I really Really REALLY wish Canon would just put the shutter count on an "about" screen, along with the firmware revision. I'm dumb-founded to know why they almost seem to go to great lengths to make in inaccessable to owners, but will happily tell you what it is at a service centre.

I'm guessing here, but it might be in their interests not to tell us. If it turned out (and became generally known) that ,let's say, Nikons lasted 20% longer on shutter count, it might influence sales. Can't think why else they don't let us know. There seems to be a lot of people interested in finding out.

[Colin Southern]

I'm guessing here, but it might be in their interests not to tell us. If it turned out (and became generally known) that ,let's say, Nikons lasted 20% longer on shutter count, it might influence sales. Can't think why else they don't let us know. There seems to be a lot of people interested in finding out.

Yeah - I guess. If anything though, people probably under-estimate the number of actuations - so they're more likely to say "it failed at 60,000" when in reality it may have been closer to 100,000.

[carregwen]

Yeah - I guess. If anything though, people probably under-estimate the number of actuations - so they're more likely to say "it failed at 60,000" when in reality it may have been closer to 100,000.

Rule #1! Never buy a used camera from someone who shoots water droplet collisions... click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click

[arith]

I thought the 100,000 actuations was a guarantee only and if it failed canon would replace the shutter free, but in actual fact they can fail anytime. Don't buy a camera off me because I took two photo's the other day, several to find exposure and 63 frames on one and over 40 on the other.

In fact it is easy to do 100 photo's a day, even when I don't take my equipment and are not serious I end up taking over 30 pics. I transfer 2 GB of files to DVD a month until recently. Oh well.

[Colin Southern]

Rule #1! Never buy a used camera from someone who shoots water droplet collisions... click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click

Ahh ... is that what they mean when they say "when shooting water droplets, after a while everything just clicks into place!"

[rick55]

Rule #1! Never buy a used camera from someone who shoots water droplet collisions... click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click click... click... click

What makes it worse is that I've started shooting tethered for the water drop stuff. I have my camera set for continuous numbering so that I can have some idea of how many shutter releases I have, but when it's tethered and copying directly to disk, it uses a separate numbering scheme. I thought about having it also store on chip, but then I just have to delete them all, and it slows things down.

Oh, well. The bottom line remains the same: Canon is treating their customers badly on this front.

Cheers,
Rick

[Colin Southern]

Oh, well. The bottom line remains the same: Canon is treating their customers badly on this front.

I could be wrong, but I think Nikon are the same.

In all honesty though, it's probably not a big deal ... in most cases the shutters outlast the camera - and if the "unthinkable" does happen then they're only a few hundred dollars to replace. I'd equate it more to being like the life of a car engine than the life of a set of tyres.

[benm]

I thought the 100,000 actuations was a guarantee

If the published shutter actuation figure is anything like light bulb life then you can expect HALF of all camera shutters to fail before reaching that figure. I think an extremely large percent of people upgrade to a new camera well before they get anywhere near 100,000 actuations. After all, even if you shoot 10,000 photos per year (a lot for the casual photographer) it would take 10 years. The only person I personally know that keeps a camera more than 3 years is me.

[Dave Humphries]

I could be wrong, but I think Nikon are the same.

Hi Colin,

Ooops

For my Nikon D5000, if I view the image EXIF with Jeffrey's EXIF Viewer, there is an attribute called Image Number, which for a recent beetle image is 20,019, where as the camera's counter has it at 18437, but the discrepancy is explained because I did the first few downloads without consecutive numbering applied.



Therefore I think that is a valid shutter count for me (Gulp)

I wonder if it is there on Nikon models earlier than the D3000 and D5000??

I looked at one of your Canon shots with the same EXIF viewer, the attribute is present, but the value is "0", so they (Canon) do seem to be keeping it hidden.

Anyone wanting to check their own shots, be advised that the attributes are listed in alphabetical order in the XMP group, so although there's a lot to look at, it is fairly easy to find. I bet not many people know that's there!

[Colin Southern]

I looked at one of your Canon shots with the same EXIF viewer, the attribute is present, but the value is "0", so they (Canon) do seem to be keeping it hidden.

Hi Dave,

I vaguely recall someone finding something similar with Canon models, but again, it didn't work for the 1D series (and I think that even the lesser models still needed the field to be manually decoded). Sounds like it's probably easier on Nikons though.

[rick55]

Yep, "ImageNumber" for my 500D is also 0.

But I don't understand what Colin means by "lesser models." It's a feature that the 500D doesn't have all those confusing controls and stuff that get in the way when trying to use the 1D. Maybe someday he'll upgrade.

Cheers,
Rick

[SteveK]

Hi All,

I just tried this with my 450D and it works fine showed an count of 5031 and disconnected fired the shutter then it showed 5032.
The serial number that it showed was also correct.

Steve

[Dave Humphries]

Hi All,

I just tried this with my 450D and it works fine showed an count of 5031 and disconnected fired the shutter then it showed 5032.
The serial number that it showed was also correct.

Steve

Thanks Steve and Rick,

Looks like we found where Canon changed their policy for the XXXD range; between the 450D and the 500D

I wonder what happens within the XXD range; 10D, 20D, 30D, 40D and 50D?

Cheers,

[pac72]

gphoto2, a command line utility for Linux and Mac OS X, can display shutter counter of Canon 500D
The command to use is:
gphoto2 --get-config /main/status/shuttercounter

The output is something like:
Label: Shutter Counter
Type: TEXT
Current: 85

(yes, she is really young )

In case you incur in an error like:
*** Error ***
An error occurred in the io-library ('Could not lock the device'): Camera is already in use.
*** Error (-60: 'Could not lock the device') ***

the simplest workaround I found under Linux is to extract the SD card before connecting the camera and running the command.

[Derek G]

Hi, I have just tried this program and it gives me a shutter count of 655? can I take this as Gospel since I bought this camera second hand from a store a couple of months ago ,must admit it was in very good condition, or is there a way in which the count can be erased and started again so to speak?