Last Tuesday I received my new FX100, but didn't have much time to test it until today. For all burst speed tests I used a fast Sandisk Extreme III 1GB SD card.
High-Speed Burst:
Using 1/500s exposure time, I clocked the high-speed burst at 1600x1200 Pixels (2MPixel), which produced 95 continuous shots at 8.5 fps - actually a little faster than Panasonic's spec of 8 fps.
Infinite Burst - Fine Quality:
Using 1/1300s time at 4000x3000 Pixels (12MPixel) with fine quality, the infinite burst speed (I stopped after 41 shots) produced 1.3 fps - again a little faster than Panasonic's spec of 1 fps.
Burst - Fine Quality:
Using 1/40s time (shooting a timer on my computer screen) at 4000x3000 Pixels (12MPixel) with fine quality, the burst speed produced 3 shots (same as specified) and 2.2 fps - a little faster than Panasonic's spec of 2 fps.
Burst - Standard Quality:
Using 1/40s time at 4000x3000 Pixels (12MPixel) with standard quality, the burst speed produced 5 shots (same as specified) and 2.1 fps - a little faster than Panasonic's spec of 2 fps.
The two latter burst tests apparently only use the camera's internal memory, and should therefore be independent on the speed of the memory card.
Overall, the camera is delivering slightly better burst speeds than specified - at least with a fast SD card. Actually I do not understand how CNET editor's review came up with much slower frame rates.
Judging my first photos with this camera (almost exclusively at ISO80), I think picture quality, performance and handling are very good:
- Good focus producing lots of detail
- very good color, both automatic and manual settings,
- almost no chromatic aberration, even at 28mm
- no noticable vignetting, even at 28mm
- distortion at 28mm is fairly small, at longer focus lengths distortion is not noticable
- nice macro mode down to 5cm at 28mm
- LCD is sharp and easy to view, of course limited in bright sunshine
- almost instant reaction of menus etc, overall fast
- good battery life (373 shots including ca. 250 burst shots, transfer to my PC at USB1.1 speed and still 1 of 3 battery indicators is on)
- focus speed appears fast (just my impression, no real test).
There are less good points also:
- Some fine and fairly controlled noise in particular in dark areas, even at ISO80 - however in almost all shots noise is not disturbing viewed at 100% and no longer visible when resampled to ca. 2800x2100 Pixels (ca. 6MPixels).
- some softness at the extreme corners at 28mm f2.8 (perhaps 1% of the image)
- lack of manual controls for aperture and exposure time - there are lots of scene modes as alternative, however many may also change ISO sensitivity, which I do not like due to its effect on noise.
- Slow USB2.0 'Full Speed' (same speed as USB1.1).
Summarizing, the good outweighs the less good by far and I like my FX100 a lot, in particular to complement my FZ30, if I want a small, very good camera and for wide angle.
