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Olympus C-211 Zoom

Have your cake and eat it too! - 2 megapixels worth of digital photos, and a built-in Polaroid printer!

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Page 7:Shutter Lag & Cycle Time Tests
Review First Posted: 9/25/2000

Shutter Lag/Cycle Times
When you press the shutter release on a digital camera, there's usually a lag time before the shutter actually fires. This time allows the autofocus and autoexposure mechanisms time to do their work, and it can amount to a fairly long delay in some situations. Since this number is almost never reported, and because it can significantly affect the picture-taking experience, we now routinely measure lag time using a special electronic test setup.

C-211 Timings

Operation Time (secs) Notes

Power On -> First shot 3.41
Start with lens retracted. Time is delay until first shot captured.

Shutdown 2.5
Time until lens is retracted, camera is powered down. (No pending image processing though.)

Play to Record, first shot 3.26
Time is delay until first shot captured.

Record to play (max/min res) 8.62/3.84
Slower for max res images

Shutter lag, full autofocus 0.7-1.5 Varied with test conditions. Typical number appears to be 0.7 seconds.

Shutter lag, prefocus 0.30 About average
(Prefocus means half-pressed shutter before shot.)

Shot-to-shot cycle time (max/min res) 2.0/2.0
Pretty quick, thanks to buffer memory. First 2-7 shots this fast, then slows, depending on resolution setting.

Overall, the C-211 Zoom is a surprisingly fast digicam, with fairly rapid startup and shutdown times, decent shutter lag under normal conditions, and a very fast 2.0 second cycle time. The shutter delay was a little perplexing, as our normal electronic test setup seemed to confound the camera's autofocus circuitry. (Possibly due to the rapidly flashing numerals.) In any event, while we measured times on the order of 1.5 seconds with our normal test setup, the old Digital Eyes camera timer showed lag times on the order of 0.7 seconds fairly consistently. Thus, we'd rate the cameras shutter delay as 0.7 seconds in normal usage.

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C-211 Timings
Operation	Time (secs)	Notes
Power On -> First shot	3.41	Start with lens retracted. Time is delay until first shot captured.
Shutdown	2.5	Time until lens is retracted, camera is powered down. (No pending image processing though.)
Play to Record, first shot	3.26	Time is delay until first shot captured.
Record to play (max/min res)	8.62/3.84	Slower for max res images
Shutter lag, full autofocus	0.7-1.5	Varied with test conditions. Typical number appears to be 0.7 seconds.
Shutter lag, prefocus	0.30	About average (Prefocus means half-pressed shutter before shot.)
Shot-to-shot cycle time (max/min res)	2.0/2.0	Pretty quick, thanks to buffer memory. First 2-7 shots this fast, then slows, depending on resolution setting.