Timings & File Sizes

Overall the Optio 430 was a fairly "nippy" camera, it made fairly good use of its (limited) buffer which ensured the camera live view returned fairly quickly after taking a shot. The camera's single slowest action is power-up, thanks to the extending lens. Auto focus, as we'd expect, was quicker at wide angle but never really slower than a second and a half even at tele.

Timing Notes: All times calculated as an average of three operations. Unless otherwise stated all timings were made on a 2240 x 1680 Super-Fine JPEG image (approx. 1.3 MB per image).

The media used for these tests was a 256 MB Viking Compact Flash card.

Action	Details	Time, seconds
Power: Off to Record	Lens extension	4.7
Power: Off to Play *1	Image displayed	1.5
Power: Record to Off	Lens extended	3.4
Power: Play to Off *1	Lens retracted	<0.5
Mode: Record to Play	Image displayed	<0.5
Mode: Play to Record	Lens extended	0.7
Play: Magnify	4 steps to 4x magnification	3.5
Rec: Thumbnail view	9 images	1.0

Action	Details	Time, seconds
Zoom from Wide to Tele	Full zoom from 37 mm to 111 mm (3 x)	1.5
Auto Focus LAG	Wide angle (37 mm)	~0.7
Auto Focus LAG	Telephoto (102 mm)	~1.4
Shutter Release LAG	Using viewfinder	<0.1
Shutter Release LAG	Using LCD monitor	0.2
Total LAG	*3	0.9 - 1.7
Off to Shot Taken		5.5
Shot to Shot *4	Zoom at wide angle, record review set to 1 second	4.5
Shot to Shot *4	Zoom at wide angle, record review disabled	4.5

Auto Focus LAG is (roughly) the amount of time it takes the camera to autofocus (a half-press and hold of the shutter release button), this timing is normally the most variable as its affected by the subject matter, current focus position, still or moving subject etc. This timing is an average.

Shutter Release LAG is the amount of time it takes to take the shot after autofocus, this timing assumes you have already focused (half-pressed the shutter release) and now press the shutter release button all the way down to take the shot. This timing is an average.

Total LAG is the total time it takes (not just the two above added together) if you haven't pre-focused, that is no finger touching the shutter release button, press it all the way down in one movement, this new timing is how long it'd take if you were in one of those spur-of-the-moment situations. This timing is an average.

Continuous modes

The Optio 430's continuous mode is pretty slow, even with the smallest file size combination selected you can only shoot at 0.7 fps. It appears to buffer very little data but instead allows you to take the next shot as soon as soon as the current shot has been flushed to the CF card. Below you will find a 'frame to frame' measurement and what frames per second this equates to for a sample of image size / quality combinations. Timings taken using a 256 MB Viking Compact Flash card.

Image Type	Frame to frame	Frames per sec
2240 x 1680	3.6 sec	0.3 fps
2240 x 1680	2.0 sec	0.5 fps
2240 x 1680	1.4 sec	0.7 fps
1120 x 840	1.4 sec	0.7 fps
640 x 480	1.4 sec	0.7 fps

Once more the actual speed at which you can take the next shot in continuous mode is dependent mostly on the final size of the JPEG file and the speed of your Compact Flash card.

File Write / Display and Sizes

Timings shown below are the time taken for the camera to process and "flush" the image out to the Compact Flash card, the timer was started as soon as the shutter release was pressed (shutter click was heard) and stopped when activity indicator LED beside the viewfinder stopped blinking. This means the timings also include the cameras processing time and as such are more representative of the actual time to "complete the task". Timings taken using a 256 MB Viking Compact Flash card.

Image Type	Time to store (seconds)	Time to display (seconds) *1	File size *2 (approx.)	No. on supplied 16 MB CF Card
2240 x 1680	4.7	2.3	1.6 MB	5
2240 x 1680	4.5	1.8	1.2 MB	11
2240 x 1680	3.2	1.4	780 KB	15
1120 x 840	2.5	1.0	430 KB	31
640 x 480	1.9	0.5	110 KB	104

The Optio 430 makes good use of its limited buffer space, after you take a shot the live view returns relatively quickly and the actual writing of the image to the Compact Flash card continues in the background. Actual write speeds are just below average for this level of camera.

Battery life

We ran the camera through our new battery life test. This test is designed to be fair and comparative to each camera and battery type:

• Take 4 shots without flash
• Wait 2 minutes (50% of the time powering the camera off)
• Take 1 shot with flash
• Wait 1 minute
• Repeat

Batteries are fully discharged and recharged before the test and all cameras were reset to their factory default settings. Here are the results:

The Optio 430 appears to use a little more power than the 330 (not much though), not a bad performance for such a tiny little battery. Notably the front of the camera got quite warm during our battery life test. I'd recommend anyone contemplating the 430 to opt for an additional battery.