once again about GX100 RAW speed (positive info)

Hi folks,

I got a very interesting email from someone who was lucky enough to test the preproduction version of GX100 at Ricoh exhibit in Japan Camera Museum in Tokyo. He asked me to post his "hands on with GX100" here, as he is not able to register at dpreview forum (from some strange reasons).

So here is his "hands on" report..

***
Hands on with GX100 by Lee Morris

At a Ricoh exhibit currently at the Japan Camera Museum in Tokyo, Ricoh have set up a “hands on” corner to introduce museum visitors to the GX100. I dropped in Wednesday and had a few minutes’ limited experience with the new model. The attendant (not a Ricoh employee) was told that it was a “display” model, so perhaps not exactly the same as a production GX100. However, there were no pre-production rough edges that I could see. Fit and finish were flawless and all the buttons and switches had a wonderfully positive feel. The GX100 was wired to a display stand and time was limited, but I did manage to explore the menus and enjoy the very good ergonomic feel of shooting with this camera.

I can confirm that the RAW writing speed is improved, at least on this pre-production version. By my count, RAW files were written to the card in about 6 seconds. The card and battery door was taped shut, so I could not confirm what kind of card was inside. I tested both RAW file sizes, the larger 4:3 and the smaller 5:3, about four times each. In every test, the file was saved in 6 seconds or less by my count (no stopwatch). If I’m not mistaken, the larger 4:3 files (3648 x 2736) seemed to be saved about half a second quicker than the 5:3 files (about 5.5 seconds). Is that possible? Clearly, Ricoh have made some progress here.
***

As for the 5:3, I believe he means 3:2? As for faster writing of 4:3 vs. 3:2, I believe it's possible. The 3:2 is just crop from 4:3 photo so this additional crop operation probably adds some processing time to 3:2 saving time. And now imagine how fast would be the RAW writing without noise reduction! I still don't understand why the camera manufacturers did not provide simple NR OFF switch in their cameras? I believe many of us would greatly appreciate that option (in JPEG mode). It's because the manufacturers are worried about a negative reaction of "not-so-skilled" users who accidentally turn the NR OFF and then complain about noisy pictures? C'mon..this is not a simple automatic P&S camera. It's not intended for "simple" users. So I think the NR OFF switch (and maybe selectable levels of NR) should be a standard feature in all digital cameras for advanced users.

Anyway, 6 secs with unknown card is not bad! Of course, it could always be better, but we need to be reasonable..it's neither DSLR nor DRF with 1000+ price! My only hope is that they will not decrease the speed in production model..you know..just for marketing purposes to preserve the GRD sales.

We have to thank Lee for his hands on report! Thanks Lee!