A front face illumination set-up and transducers of resonance frequencies between 5 and 100 MHz have been used to explore the lower limit of the time resolution of photoacoustic measurements. A monoexponential test system could be followed quantitatively down to a minimum time constant of 2.5 ns. It was found possible to determine quantitatively a biexponential test system by convolution with five free fit parameters, as long as both slow time constants are in the transducer bandwidth and differ by at least a factor of four. Generally, a reduction in temporal bandwidth and sensitivity is observed on increasing the resonance frequency of the transducer.