What DSLR for newbie with £500

[barreti]

[quote=monkeyhanger]
I've moved on to a 20D now, but i'll get the 300D out and check how many shots i can get on a 1Gb card, as that's the size i use.
quote]

Thanks MonkeyHanger (Hartlepool then!) 20D eh - lovely.

Without wanting to set you and Bee Jay at each others throats can someone explain this from the Rob Galbraith website which I find confusing;

Several EOS Digital Rebel/300D design decisions mean that this camera will benefit from the fastest possible CompactFlash card:
The EOS Digital Rebel/300D's image review features don't fully come to life until the storage buffer is completely emptied to the card. RAW format afficionados will find the wait especially long.

When the camera's processing and storage memory buffers are completely full, you'll need to wait for the camera to finish writing at least one photo to the card before another photo can be shot.

The camera writes slowly, regardless of card.

I'm not sure I understand this last point and it seems to contradict the general drift.
Lets face it though, I'm not a sports photographer and never likely to be one either, and this camera is going to blow the socks off my Nikon Coolpix 2500 - or at least it damned well better do - so I'm not sure its worth getting worked up about card write speeds. I've already got a crucial 512mb card so perhaps I should just stick that in and play with it eh.

[beano500]

Er - it's a bit like a group of people filling buckets. It doesn't matter how many people and buckets you have, if you've only got three taps in your building you can't fill four all at once, the fourth guy will have to wait until someone else has finished and moved away from the tap......

[monkeyhanger]

To put it plainly..or at least try to...

The 300D will clear it's memory buffer at pretty much the same rate, regardless of what type of card you are using. It will not detect an 80X card and write at a faster rate to suit. The 350D(as far as i know) and 20D will.

Basically, after a 4 shot burst in RAW mode you need to wait until 3 out of the 4 shots have been dumped to the card. The camera will then allow you to shoot continuously at 1fps unless you allow the buffer to fully clear..


That said, i used mine happily at track days and motorsports events for almost 2 years and got some good results (for an amateur )

You need to learn to be choosy with your shots and not expect to just hammer away on the drive as the buffer will fill up...

Now...

On a 1Gb card, the 300D will do...

150 Shots in RAW
280 in Large JPEG (fine)
479 in Medium JPEG (fine)
680 in Small JPEG (fine)

All the above are subject to various other setting, but should be a fair guide

Hope that helps

I shot this at Donington last year, using the 300D and a "cheap" Sigma 135-400 lens...just a shame about the fence



>> Edited by monkeyhanger on Saturday 23 July 17:13

[simpo two]

I think that in the same way folk are dazzled by megapixels, it's also easy to fall for the 'fastest card'. Up to a certain point, that's fine, but often the limiting step in practice is the size of buffer.