Digital cameras: Shutter lag time. how do brands compare? What other factors effect shutter lag time?

5 different places gave me 5 different answers and recommended 5 different brands as the "fastest". I'm hoping to spend $150 or less.

If you pre-focus by pressing the shutter button half-way down while aiming at your subject - or where you anticipate your subject will be when you want to take the picture - it will help considerably. You can set your camera in "Sport" mode or "Scenery" and this will minimize the lag. If you do not use the flash, it will help. If you turn off "face detection," it will help. If you turn off the LCD monitor and use the viewfinder only, it will help.

Some point and shoot cameras are better than others. I have a Canon Powershot SD900 that seems quite fast to me. If you go to http://www.dpreview.com and read the reviews (once they are available for the cameras you are considering), you can go to the page called "Performance" and see exactly what the tested shutter lag is, as well as several other performace benchmarks.

Here's a link showing a chart of various cameras and their shutter lag as well as the time it takes to shoot five frames. You will not see any DSLR's listed, because they have no shutter lag. If you click on the column heading, such as "One Shot," the chart will sort according to that measurement.
http://www.cameras.co.uk/html/shutter-la...

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my suggestion
go to yahoo shopping
digital cameras
digital camera GUIDE
be sure to check titles on the left side
the guide should answer your questions

If you are looking under $150. Then there will not be any big difference between brands. The best method to deal with shutter lag is turn off as many automatic features as possible. Also, the flash will add additional lag since it takes time for it to charge.

Pretty open on cameras. There are Samsung, Nikon, & Canon cameras that are all in that range and are all going to have about the same lag.

The reason that you had 5 different answers are personal preferences from the people that you talked to.

There is a great deal of bias towards manufactures in the camera world.

At the moment, one major camera retailer has sales competition with the following manufactures.

Sony, Canon, JVC, Olympus, Samsung, FujiFilm, & Nikon...

Depending on who you talk to they might be competing in such a competition.