Canon 7D Battery Grip?

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Cpinch73

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Chris
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Hi guys,

I'm looking to get a battery grip for my 7D, so I need your advice.

Do I buy an original canon battery grip or should I buy an after Market one for say £60 on eBay?

Have any of you had any experience with a free Market one or should I bite the bullet, save a little longer and get the canon original?

Thanks

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Hi Chris

I bit the bullet and bought the genuine grip for my body, having not had much experience with third party ones and was a bit worried over build quality etc, thought it was worth the extra - however, I hardly used it, think I preferred the body on it's own and I've had no issues with needing extra battery life (carry a spare in my pocket if needed) and decided after a period of several months just sat there in the box, looking at me, I sold it for a minimal loss, would like to think a third party one would have lost more.

There have been a few threads on here over the time on grips and there appear to be some good aftermarket ones (can't for the life of me remember the name, sorry - I'm sure someone will be along and resolve that) now, but what the difference is in price I'm not sure.

Personnally, I wouldn't go down the very cheap route you see advertised on a certain bay site.

Hope this has been of some help ....
 
Chris, if you do a search you'll find about 500 threads on whether to buy genuine or copy battery grips. The majority of replies seem to favour the copies.
 
Jimi said:
I must admit that I bought a third party grip for my 550d which meant a huge saving over the Canon grip. I did however research it before hand and went for 'a mid price range' cheapy and can't fault it to be fair. Check youtube for reveiws and comparisons I found it helped me decide. HTH
Click to expand...

Did you get one with LCD display with timer functions?
 
No, the one I bought is Meike MK550D made in China think I paid around £45 for it delivered with two spare batteries. I have since compared it directly against a friends Canon grip and it is very hard to tell the difference to be honest. The only difference that I noticed is that the Canon battery tray is ever so slightly different and won't fit the 3rd party grip and vice versa. The build quality is very good for the money.
 
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I have a Meike one for my 5d2 and a Canon one for my 40D

They are both identical in build quality. They also weigh the same so for those that reckon the 3rd party grips dont have Canons alloy chassis I think I'd beg to differ.
 
I bought a very cheap 3rd party grip for my 7D off eBay (H-K) and it works fine. Build quality is maybe not as good as Canon but like many I only use it very occasionally and I couldn't justify the Canon price.

I use it maybe once or twice a year when I know I am going to be doing a lot in portrait orientation. I can never seem to hold the camera level in portrait orientation - though the grid and spirit level systems in the 7D do help a bit.

I don't think there is any need to get one just to double the battery capacity. On a week's fishing holiday to South Uist last year I shot 750 RAWs on one battery! I had the charged up spare if I needed, it, and I had the charge level read-out to the nearest 1% (I put it on 'My Menu' so it is close to hand), so there really was no danger of running out of juice without a grip.

Col
 
I bought a third party grip for my 50D. It wasn't too bad other than keeping working loose and disconnecting the battery which meant several pictures lost.

When I got the 7D I bought the real thing.
 
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