you and me both. I did not have any lithiums in the house, so I use the alkalines. It surprised me too, in fact it surprised as much as did the results from the enel3e tests! I would never have guessed that they would drain down soo fast in relatively cold conditions. . . I mean 15 dgrees aint exactly cold, but after about 45 minutes at 15% your down to about 15% battery. . . .

Tony,
While you are cold weather testing batteries, why not try some AA NiMH rechargables?

Okay, I'll try, I have about 60 2500 mAh energizers.

The thing I hate about them is that they dont hold a charge very long, in fact I think it's about 2-3% per 24 hours, so in a week and a half or so they are almost useless. I've given up on them for that reason. I used to use them in my sb 800's and for my nikon battery supply - dont remember the number or the name, but you know what I'm talking about. . .

I know what you mean about the self discharge. I have gotten into the habit of charging them just before a job. Part of my routine. I have been using the Sony 2500 mAH and they seem to work better than Kodak 2500mAH. Never used the Energizer. I also like the neat battery case the Sony's come in. I have 5 in the flash, 5 in my pocket and any used ones in the charger. I just keep rotating them from charger to pocket , to flash and back to the charger. That way the 20 I own is used the same number of times.

Energizers are notoriously short lived (at least they used to be). Radio Shack NiMHs have historically had the longest life.

I have about the same life with Radio Shack as I do with Kodak. The Sony's last longer for me (could be the cold here in Alaska).

you should get you one of those nikon battery packs, they are awesome!

Tony,
You going to sell me your SD-8a?

LOL - that's the one, no, I will use it over christmas and I've been doing two weddings a year now for two years, also, I've been shooting corperate events and it's really nice to have.

One caution, and it's a huge caution!

If you attached the battery pack to your body, which you should, just dont forget it's there. I did. I set my d2h with a 24-70 2.8 afs, an sb800, all attached to a strobo frame, down on a 4 and a half foot tall bar, and turned around to help the groom with his tie and pulled the camera off the bar and completely destroyed the lens - I mean springs and electronics went flying. . . The camera also was dead, but about a week later she came back to life and she's still working great!