Sony RX100 VA Performance

Faster AF and deeper buffers than the Mark V, but buffer clearing is still slow.

Startup to first shot time was about average for its class, the same as the Mark V. Play to Record switching was quite fast.

The Sony RX100 VA's full autofocus shutter lag when shooting the same target multiple times was very fast for a compact camera, and up to ~40% faster than the Mark V. The RX100 VA's full AF-S shutter lag clocked in at about 0.12 second at wide angle using center AF mode. Full AF-S shutter lag was a little slower at full telephoto, at about 0.18 second, but that's still quite fast. Enabling the flash raised shutter lag to 0.20 seconds, to account for the metering preflash.

Manual focus shutter lag was extremely fast at 30 milliseconds and prefocused shutter lag was even faster at only 10 milliseconds, although both these times are slightly slower than the Mark V's 20 and 8 milliseconds respectively.

We also tested lag times in electronic shutter mode but as you can see above, they were slower than with the default mechanical shutter, as they usually are.

Shot-to-shot cycle times were excellent in single-shot mode, at about 0.5 second for Large/Extra Fine JPEGs or RAW + Large/Extra Fine JPEG files. Note that unlike the Mark V and indeed most prior RX100 models, the Mark VA does support capturing JPEGs using the highest quality Extra Fine compression when shooting RAW+JPEG files, which is a nice improvement.

The Sony RX100 VA's Continuous Hi shooting mode burst rate was incredible at very close to 24 fps regardless of file type, and the Mark VA supports continuous autofocus at those speeds. Note that to attain that speed, the electronic shutter is used. This is the same speed as the Mark V but buffers are much deeper, and as mentioned Extra Fine JPEGs are now supported when shooting in RAW+JPEG mode. The RX100 VA also offers Mid and Lo settings rated at 10.0 and 3.5 fps respectively, and we've included test results at 10 fps with the mechanical shutter above.

Buffer depths were about 40-65% deeper than the already outstanding buffer depths of the Mark V, coming in at 233 best quality JPEGs, 103 RAW or 102 RAW+JPEG files before the camera slowed down from 24 fps in our tests. Buffer clearing was still quite slow, though, taking 74 seconds after a max-length burst of best quality JPEGs, 51 seconds for a max burst of RAW files, and 91 seconds for a max burst of RAW+JPEG files with our fast Lexar Pro 2000x UHS-II SDXC card. You can however make setting changes and review images which have been written to the card while the buffer is clearing, though. (Note that the RX100 VA does not support the faster UHS-II interface, but our Lexar Pro 2000x card is at least as fast as our older SanDisk Extreme Pro card in UHS-I mode.)

The built-in flash took an average of 5 seconds to recharge after a full-power discharge, which is quite slow.

Bottom line, the Sony RX100 VA's performance is outstanding in most respects, with even faster autofocus and deeper buffers than the already incredible Mark V. The only real letdown performance-wise remains slow buffer clearing with no UHS-II support, and sluggish flash recycling. Still, very nice performance upgrades from the original Mark V at no extra cost!

Battery Life
Poor battery life for its class.

The Sony RX100 VA uses a custom NP-BX1 rechargeable lithium-ion battery for power, and the battery is charged in-camera via the USB port. CIPA battery life is rated the same as the original RX100 Mark V's at 220 shots per charge when using the LCD monitor and 210 shots when using the electronic viewfinder, which isn't great. We strongly recommend you pick up a spare battery for extended outings.

The table above shows the number of shots the camera is capable of (on a fully-charged rechargeable battery as appropriate), based on CIPA battery-life and/or manufacturer standard test conditions.

(Interested readers can find an English translation of the CIPA DC-002 standards document here. (180K PDF document))