Max fps and MB-D10

So I have had my D300 a few days and decided to test the speed.

I added the MB-D10 battery pack with Sanyo eneloop NiMH AA-size
batteries which should have given me 8 fps. I tunred the Custom
Setting d4 to 7 fps and started to test. It was fast as hell but I
dont know where to look to see how fast it was really going. Its not
in the camera display anywhere and no metadata seems to show this info
so how do you measure it ?

Also even though this makes sense, in A mode the shutter speed slows
way down when you zoom in. I was using an 18-200 mm lens with VR on I
also turned it off and when zoomed out to 18mm it was full speed but
as soon as I zoomed in, it slowed way down (sounded like 2 or 3 fps)
but again I dont know where to look to see the actual speed.

So 2 questions

(1) how do you measure or check the speed (fps)
(2) Why does it slow way down in A mode only when you zoom the lens in
on the subject ?

Thanks

 

Frame rate is the number of shots divided by the time they take to shoot.
Shoot a burst of photos, look at the time of the last and subtract the
time of the first. Now divide the number by this to find the frame
rate.

Do this several times and take the average.

It sounds like your zooming on a dark subject with more ambient light.
Your zooming the light out of the picture and the shutter speed is going
down to compensate. Zoom on a bright subject and assuming you are using
matrix metering the opposite will occur.

If you spot-meter on the subject this will not occur.

The camera shoots the greater of 1/frame rate or the shutter speed. If
your shutter is set to 1" then you will shoot 1 fps regardless of the
camera spec.

To do these tests your shutter has to be faster than 1/10.

 

The Nikonian Forum answered these.

(1) on a D300 the fps speed can be shown by pressing the INFO button
after the pictures are taken and the fps are indicated in the lower
left hand cornor of the screen

(2) The camera was trying to focus. Once the focus was turned off and
the NR and D-lighting were turned off I got the 8 fps and zooming in
was no longer a problem

 

You stated in another post, that you changed the speed to 7 fps in D4. This
however is the CL mode or Continues LOW speed on the left-hand dial. If you
want the highest speed, make sure the camera can focus, turn the dial to CH,
choose M for mode (to test), choose a shutterspeed above 250 and make sure
the quality is set to NEF 12 bit or JPG. In 14 bit it will only go to 2.5
whatever you try.
Now you got yourself Tommy gun ;-)