I had same problem til i bought external 12v. it lasted from middleof nov til jan 19 with external. I brought it home and put batteries in it to play around with it and set it on 3 pictures and it took 3 pics and the red light come on. It took me alot of missed pictures in the rut b4 i figured this out. The customer support at stealth cam was horrible 1st call i made they told me to pull batteries and let camera reset then 2nd call i made a couple days later the gal tells me batteries only last 7-10 days. I like the picture quality i get but i wish i knew the battery problem sooner.