"Olympus batt. recommended" with Olympus battery in camera

[IvanTheT3rribl3]

Just got a new E-M1 Mark III yesterday and love it, but one small issue is that even with the official Olympus battery installed in the camera, I get a "Olympus batt. recommended" message at the top of the screen, and I can't see any information on the battery status page in settings.

Has anyone else experienced this? Is there something wrong with my camera?

 

[PakkyT]

Is this the battery that came with the camera or is this a 2nd one you bought separately not from Olympus directly? If that latter, you may have got a counterfeit. If the former, I would return the whole thing and try again. Either the camera or the battery is a dud and if you bought this brand new it shouldn't be up to you to determine which. Pack it up, return it, then get a new box.

 

[IvanTheT3rribl3]

Is this the battery that came with the camera or is this a 2nd one you bought separately not from Olympus directly? If that latter, you may have got a counterfeit. If the former, I would return the whole thing and try again. Either the camera or the battery is a dud and if you bought this brand new it shouldn't be up to you to determine which. Pack it up, return it, then get a new box.

This is the battery which came with the camera. Bought new on Amazon. Ugh, that's annoying, but I imagine this is going to be the way to go. Thanks.

 

[PakkyT]

This is the battery which came with the camera. Bought new on Amazon. Ugh, that's annoying, but I imagine this is going to be the way to go. Thanks.

At least Amazon has a good return policy. I am sure it sucks thought that you were looking forward to getting out and playing with it and now have to wait again.

 

[IvanTheT3rribl3]

At least Amazon has a good return policy. I am sure it sucks thought that you were looking forward to getting out and playing with it and now have to wait again.

Definitely. I took it out briefly last night; but at least I still have my E-M5ii until I get the replacement. Thanks for your insight!

 

[IvanTheT3rribl3]

At least Amazon has a good return policy. I am sure it sucks thought that you were looking forward to getting out and playing with it and now have to wait again.

On reflection, I was going to order a second genuine Olympus battery anyway; so I'll try that in the camera when it comes tomorrow. If it works, I'll do the ol switcheroo with the battery that came with the camera and get a replacement on just that rather than the whole lens/camera combo. If it doesn't work, then I'll know it is the camera and go through that process.

Thanks again for your quick input, big dose of anxiety about this given the camera is brand new.

 

[ac12]

On reflection, I was going to order a second genuine Olympus battery anyway; so I'll try that in the camera when it comes tomorrow. If it works, I'll do the ol switcheroo with the battery that came with the camera and get a replacement on just that rather than the whole lens/camera combo. If it doesn't work, then I'll know it is the camera and go through that process.

Thanks again for your quick input, big dose of anxiety about this given the camera is brand new.

But then you stick the good seller with the bad battery, rather than the seller that sent you the bad battery.

 

[IvanTheT3rribl3]

But then you stick the good seller with the bad battery, rather than the seller that sent you the bad battery.

It all came direct from Amazon as the seller, no private or third party sellers for any of it. I Imagine they'd rather have a battery they can't resell as brand new than an entire camera/lens combo that they can't resell as new.

 

[Sleepy Capybara]

I think it's a counterfeit body that's not liking the genuine, OEM battery.

Jokes aside, did you check the shutter count?

 

[Deleted member 29285]

I was saving for a new E-M1 III but now I've gone off that idea. Especially if you can't turn off that message.
Recent past experience with buying original Oly batteries is that I'm supplied with old stock that doesn't have the life of a clone battery.

 

[Reflector]

I was saving for a new E-M1 III but now I've gone off that idea. Especially if you can't turn off that message.
Recent past experience with buying original Oly batteries is that I'm supplied with old stock that doesn't have the life of a clone battery.

Not sure about the E-M1III's behavior but on the II it disappears after a few seconds. Some of the clone batteries have more electronics that are able to tell the camera the % charge and cycles and otherwise act like an OEM one. It sounds like someone slipped a bad battery into the E-M1III...

@IvanTheT3rribl3 Did the battery come in a little plastic case? That should be the way Olympus batteries come but this sounds like a case of some kind of contaminated supply. You might want to write to Olympus about this.

 

[Bushboy]

That is just awful. Olympus batteries?? Since when do Olympus make their own batteries???

 

[IvanTheT3rribl3]

I was saving for a new E-M1 III but now I've gone off that idea. Especially if you can't turn off that message.
Recent past experience with buying original Oly batteries is that I'm supplied with old stock that doesn't have the life of a clone battery.

The message goes away after a few moments; but it shouldn't be happening at all with the genuine Olympus batteries.

 

[IvanTheT3rribl3]

Not sure about the E-M1III's behavior but on the II it disappears after a few seconds. Some of the clone batteries have more electronics that are able to tell the camera the % charge and cycles and otherwise act like an OEM one. It sounds like someone slipped a bad battery into the E-M1III...

@IvanTheT3rribl3 Did the battery come in a little plastic case? That should be the way Olympus batteries come but this sounds like a case of some kind of contaminated supply. You might want to write to Olympus about this.

It did not, but the packaging might be different for the kit with the 12-40mm PRO that I got.

 

[Reflector]

That sounds very odd, Nikon recently had a problem where counterfeit batteries made it into the retail stream somehow. You really should write to Olympus about this.

Does the battery have the Olympus logo and serial number on it? Usually the clones are smooth on the side the logo is on.

 

[IvanTheT3rribl3]

That sounds very odd, Nikon recently had a problem where counterfeit batteries made it into the retail stream somehow. You really should write to Olympus about this.

Does the battery have the Olympus logo and serial number on it? Usually the clones are smooth on the side the logo is on.

Yes it does; looks very much official, logo on the "flat" side, and all the labels on the other side look correct.

 

[retiredfromlife]

It did not, but the packaging might be different for the kit with the 12-40mm PRO that I got.

The plastic box/case only came with the replacement battery I purchased for My EM1.3. The one that came with the camera was in a plastic bag,

 

[b_rubenstein]

That is just awful. Olympus batteries?? Since when do Olympus make their own batteries???

They probably don't, but almost certainly buy them from a high quality battery mfg. that are made to a set of Olympus requirements. Selling expensive cameras with cheap, crappy batteries is a rather stupid thing to do; even for Olympus.

 

[Reflector]

Does your battery closer to this or does it look like the one over on DPR?

 

[Replytoken]

Does your battery closer to this or does it look like the one over on DPR?

That was an interesting thread. Makes me think twice about using Amazon when I want to avoid the possibility of counterfeit electronics, and I almost always select Amazon as the merchant unless it is a company I know well.

--Ken

P.S. I have two of these batteries and both look like the one you posted above. One came from Olympus and the other from Amazon.