Buffer size: potentially dumb (or at least duh) question

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Morado

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I was reading this post by Thom Hogan (https://www.zsystemuser.com/nikon-z-system-news-and/the-answer-to-your-question.html) and something I had paid no thought to caught my attention. He mentions that the Nikon Z6iii's buffer is 200 photos with the mechanical shutter but infinite with the electronic shutter. It caught me by surprise, so just out of curiosity, could anyone enlighten me on this?

Is it because:
  • The mechanical shutter consumes more power?
  • The sensor is, so to speak, "fully" exposed when using the mechanical shutter?
  • The electronic shutter requires "less processing" in the sense that there is no syncing of shutter blades and data?


While I can I see why a bigger buffer would be needed to accommodate the faster shutter speeds of electronic shutters and higher FPS that are possible, I am surprised that my curiosity is piked by the limit on buffer size when using the mechanical shutter.

I am asking simply out of curiosity. A bigger buffer was always a great thing to have, but I never bothered to wonder what makes it possible. When I got the D500 I thought the 200 photo buffer was more than anyone could ever want. When the Z9 came out with its "infinite" buffer I thought it was a nice convenience/creature comfort but looked at it as something for the marketing department to hype up, even if there were a very tiny group of users that might actually need it or no one at all.
 
My guess is that it's a limit Nikon imposed so if you have the camera on continuous frame advance, powered on, and in a camera bag that an accidental press of the shutter release won't shoot on for who knows how long with the mechanical shutter, causing premature wear.
 
At 10FPS and with the typical battery run time of 2-2.5 hours of continuous use you could shoot 100,000 shots in one battery if you stuck the camera in the bag with an unlimited buffer which can happen with the compressed RAW formats pretty easily or JPEGS. With a battery grip it would be possible to shoot the entire rated life of the shutter on some cameras with one mistake.

I'm sure someone somewhere would do it and then a viral thread would start about needing a shot limit so you don't ruin your cameras.

Nikon looks like they preempted that situation as Steve said.
 
My guess is that it's a limit Nikon imposed so if you have the camera on continuous frame advance, powered on, and in a camera bag that an accidental press of the shutter release won't shoot on for who knows how long with the mechanical shutter, causing premature wear.

Thank you Steve. I did not think of that. My question was indeed of the "duh" kind.
 
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