Why does my SB700 fire multiple times before actually taking the photo?

Just bought a Nikon SB700 flash for my D90. When I set my camera to any of the manual modes, the flash fires several times before actually taking the photo. I'm still pretty new to photography, so can someone tell me what I'm doing wrong?

When you are shooting in near dark, the flash does this to assist in auto-focus

Without a certain amount of light, NO auto-focus system will work on ANY auto-focus camera

Life's like that. Its generally like a couple which is trying to have a baby. Your flash is like the male and the subject is like the female… The couple has to try atleast a few times before getting the lady pregnant…

In a similar way the flash fires a few times before the camera finally takes the picture.

also Note there are 3-4 types of flash firing techniques.'Rear Flash' is my favourite, but thats a separate story altogether…

Two possibilities.

That flash might fire a preflash in order to assist in autofocusing. Test that by turning off the autofocus on your lens and see if it still fires before the shot.

The other possibility is that you have red eye reduction turned on somewhere. This will cause the flash to fire a couple of time in order to cause pupil contraction and eliminate red eye.

Either way, you can control these in your camera or flash custom functions. Refer to your manual for the settings.

Red-eye reduction is on in your D90.

The D90 has it's own low-light focus assist lamp on the camera and does not need the flash for focus assist.

The same thing happens with my SB700 and D90 if I set it to red-eye.

See page 71 in your D90 manual to turn red-eye reduction off.

Turn the anti-red eye function off on your camera/flash.

EDIT: Nikon AF does not use preflash to autofocus… There's a purpose built light for that.