I. Herdman Reviews the Nikon SB-900 Flash:
“Replaced my SB600 & Is great compared to SB-600:”
I shoot weddings for a living and bought myself a Nikon SB-900 Speedlight Flash to replace my SB-600. It was a difficult decision between the 800 and the 900 but what really got me with the SB900 compared to the SB600 is how it can concentrate the beam into a smaller area with the zoom. For outdoor portraits it alone makes this flash absolutely worth it. It also has the light patterns thing which changes the flash tube to either concentrate the light further or even it out almost perfectly. I don’t really use more than one flash at a time in general but I like how easy it is to just pull out my SB600 and just turn the dial on the Nikon SB900 Flash to master, much easier than getting the 600 into remote mode. Also the SU-4 mode is a very interesting feature over the SB 600 although the SB 800 had this too, apparently it was quite difficult to find from what I heard.
I have a Nikon SB 900 on two occasions the flash shut down because of the internal heat build up.I went back to dealer and he said it was because I was using Xtra Power rechargeable battery ,yes the battery were hot,he recommend Energizer Ultimate Lithium non rechargeable,or he said get an external battery, is this true if so what would be a good external battery pack for the SB900, my camera is a D100 & D200 the D 200 I also use a multi power battery pack (MB-200) on my D200 which is on my D200