Nikon SB-900 Batteries With everything you need to get started pretty much included in the box of the SB900, the most popular aftermarket SB-900 accessory items are pretty much limited to choosing batteries and high performance battery packs. There aren’t a plethora of options, but there are a couple of popular options for battery packs and also different types of batteries do increase performance quite drastically. Below is a description of the different types of batteries one can use with the Speedlight SB900 flash, and also the Nikon high performance battery packs and a chart of what kind of performance changes one can expect when changing between the options:

Compare Min. Recycle time & Min # of flashes by battery type

Battery Type: Min. Recycle Time Min. # Flashes Interval from full output & ready light on
Alkaline-manganese (1.5V) 4.0 Secs 110 4.0-30 secs
Lithium (1.5V) 4.5 Secs 230 4.5-120 secs
Oxyride (1.5V) 3.0 Secs 125 3.0-30 secs
Ni-MH (2600 mAH) (1.2V) 2.3 Secs 190 2.3-30 secs

    Notes:

  • * At Full output
  • ** Chart is approximentation with fresh batteries, varies with conditions
  • *** 4x AA-Size penlight batteries (1.5Volts or lower)
  • **** Firing the Speedlight at full output once every 30 seconds (120 seconds with lithium batteries.)

See also Nikon SD-9 battery pack & comparing the differences SD9 vs SD8A battery packs

2 Responses to “Nikon SB-900 Batteries & Battery Packs”

  1. ruddy 9 December 2009 at 5:33 am (PERMALINK)

    hey hi.. pls help me. i have sb 900. and it says the batteries recommended are 1.5v batteries. if i were to convert that to mAH, what figure would that be? 1600,1800,2000,2600 or etc.. pls help me.. thanks..

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  2. George A 12 December 2009 at 3:16 pm (PERMALINK)

    I use NI-MH (2700 mah)(1,2V) on my new SB 900 flash , and after a while it overheats .
    I have no problem with the same batteries on my SB 600. Can anyone tell me what is wrong ? (I updated the firmware 5.02)

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