I should have mentioned the obvious. I figured he had ruled out the one dead cell theory himself. My bad.
For some more on nimh.... On my minolta they do discharge in a matter of just a few days. Not sure if it one battery or all though, I never checked. I just recharge them all. I never turn my camera off and always use auto power offf. The power auto-off circuit sensing circuit could be drawing some current I suppose. Why the one battery drains does seem odd if it is not a bad or very weak cell, and if they are brand new properly cycled batteries and the charger is functioning properly. I have found when I usa auto power off and put my camera in the bag sometimes the bag will be mashing one of the buttons that powers the camera on and that will also do the dirty deed. I also find on my camera the auto sensing eyepiece or viewfinder also powers the dang thing on inadvertantly at times.
Remember too, that nimh (if he even uses them) disharge terribly fast when you first use them. They need to be cyclyed a very good amount before they will work well for you. There is a tremendous difference in the staying power of a propery cycled set and an unconditioned one. I have also found if you leave a conditioned set to die completely they seem to need to be recycled all over again.
Hope it's isn't anything major. My camera is currently in the shopp with this long list of troubles.
1. Broken power knob switch depressor interlock swich thingy.
2. Solarizes vertically.
3. Solarizes when tilt up viewfinder is down.
4. Flash power off key.
5. Loose manual oom rubber ring
6. Broken eyepiece rubber
7. Left side of camera outer cosmetic casing disentigrated on the left side of the camera.
The good news is I have got 50,000 shots out of 2 sets of NIMH's and they are still going strong. Those 8 little batteries pack some kind of long term life.
On my camera I would have used up around 4000 sets of energizers already. Savings of $24,000 in one year.
Did'nt notice the op had posted so long ago. Not much more to say I suppose. My camera has now been gone a month.
Anyway, some nimh stuff to read now anyway. If he did only try one set of batteries and it always is the same cell dying he quite likely does just has a bad cell. I would assume he has tried more than one set or tried them in another device though. Who knows? He did'nt say but he has probably already figured it out by now.
Cheers