I've searching for an upgrade from my Nikon's D7000 kit 18mm-105mm, and I've finally decided to go for the Sigma's 17-70mm f2.8-4 Contemporary version.

All the reviews about it are either good or great, but then from what I heard is that Sigma's Optical Stabilizer drains your camera battery like mad!

So for any Sigma 17-70 users or any Sigma user that has OS attached, did it happen to you?

Not sure about 17-70. But I'm using Sigma 17-50 f2.8. 450 shots drain about 30% of my battery.

Sooo, is that normal?

Used the 70-200 f2.8 on my 550D before, managed to get like 700 shots until battery dies.

I'm using Tamron's VC (very strong image stabilizer) and Its normal for it to drain the battery faster, especially for video. Image stabilizer uses power. If you want to preserve battery you can always switch it off.

But since you have used the Nikon kit lens which has VR (image stabilizer), so I don't think you'll see that big a difference.

Ah I see, but still take a look from other users, just for more info
http://www.flickr.com/groups/sigma17-70os/...57628468799387/

It seems that Sigma's OS has troubled some users, very weird.
So that's why I opened this thread to hear it from our "kakilang" users