Why the shutter lag?

[Satchidananda Ashram]

Can anyone tell me why a P&S digicam has to have a shutter lag, while the DSLR's seem to manage fine without one? If a DSLR doesn't have one why should a P&S?

Also, are there any decent cameras (i.e. low noise, fairly high megapixels, good lens, manual controls) that have a minimal or non-existent lag between pressing the shutter button and recording the image? I have a Canon 20D but sometimes a camera without an audible shutter sound would be very helpful to me.

thanks,
Rick

[jrsforums]

Originally Posted by Satchidananda Ashram

Can anyone tell me why a P&S digicam has to have a shutter lag, while the DSLR's seem to manage fine without one? If a DSLR doesn't have one why should a P&S?

Also, are there any decent cameras (i.e. low noise, fairly high megapixels, good lens, manual controls) that have a minimal or non-existent lag between pressing the shutter button and recording the image? I have a Canon 20D but sometimes a camera without an audible shutter sound would be very helpful to me.

thanks,
Rick

Most of the shutter lag is in auto focus. You can go look at reviews on DPReview. Many of them show the time for 1/2 press of shutter (AF) and the final pressing.

Essentially most of the difeerence is ya gets whatcha pays for.....better, faster components and processing capability.

John

[David_Buzzard]

I'm not sure why the big difference, but I imagine that it has a lot to do with the fact that on a point and shoot, the sensor does double duty as both a view finder and a capture sensor. With a DSLR, the view finder is a totally different system from the sensor.

The other thing to keep in mind is that even the base model DSLR's like the D40x, are more expensive than 95% of the digital point and shoots. Again, you pay for performance.

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