Canon PowerShot S110Canon updates their Digital ELPH with improved color, movie capture, and direct print capabilities!<<Camera Modes & Menus :(Previous) | (Next): Video, Power, Software>> Page 10:Image Storage & InterfaceReview First Posted: 5/24/2001 |
Image Storage and Interface
The S110 uses CompactFlash Type I memory cards for image storage; an 8MB card
comes standard with the camera. Upgrades are available separately to memory
capacities as high as 320MB. The CompactFlash slot is on the right side of the
camera, covered by a plastic door with a sliding quick-release latch on back
of the camera. The card inserts with the electrodes going in first, and the
front of the card (indicated by an arrow) facing the back of the camera. A small
button beside the slot ejects the card by popping it up slightly, allowing you
to pull the card the rest of the way out.
Although individual CompactFlash cards cannot be write-protected or locked against
erasure or manipulation, the S110 allows you to protect individual images through
the Playback menu. Once protected, images cannot be erased or manipulated in
any way, except through card formatting. The Playback menu also allows you to
rotate images in the LCD display, play them back in an automated slide show,
erase them, and set them up for printing on DPOF compliant printers.
Three image resolution sizes are available for still images: 1,600 x 1,200,
1,024 x 768, and 640 x 480 pixels. Each resolution size also offers three JPEG
compression settings, including Superfine, Fine, and Normal. Both Resolution
and Compression are adjustable through the Record settings menu. The number
of available images is reported on the LCD's information display, in addition
to the selected size and quality settings.
The table below summarizes the compression ratios and number of images which
can be stored on the included 8MB memory card with each size/quality combination.
|
Resolution/Quality 8MB CompactFlash Card |
|
|
|
|
| Large Resolution 1600x1200 | Images | 7 |
|
|
| Approx. Compression |
5:1 |
|
|
|
| Medium Resolution 1024x768 | Images |
|
|
|
| Approx. Compression |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Images |
|
|
|
| Approx. Compression |
|
|
|
|
QuickTime movies are recorded in one of three resolutions: 640 x 480, 320 x 240, or 160 x 120 pixels, selectable through the Movie Record settings menu. When displayed on screen, the movie resolution icon shows only the first value in partial outline (i.e.: the 640 x 480 resolution will be displayed with just the number 640, framed on two sides by a rule). Movie duration is dependent on file resolution and available card storage (no compression options are available). The following chart shows the approximate duration of a single movie recorded at each of the three resolutions:
(20 frames/sec)
(20 frames/sec)
(20 frames/sec)
A USB cable and interface software accompany the S110, for quick connection
and image downloading to a PC or Macintosh. The USB driver (on the PC at least,
which was the platform we tested it on) doesn't mount the camera as a disk volume,
but rather is a TWAIN driver that connects the camera to TWAIN-compliant applications.
We used Canon's own (very nice) ZoomBrowser application to check the download
time, and clocked the S110 at a download speed of 202 KBytes/second. This is
a bit slower than average, as most USB digicams we've tested seem to download
at about 300 KB/sec. It's possible that this timing was adversely affected by
our aging 350 MHz Pentium II computer: ZoomBrowser seems to pause to build a
thumbnail of each downloaded image "on the fly", so a faster CPU could
very well improve throughput. Regardless, 200K/second is no small potatoes,
and overall is a very acceptable download speed. (You really don't need to worry
about buying a separate card reader to speed downloads, at least in our opinion.)
Follow Imaging Resource: