Minimum time spans in a conservative era a) for several mass transfer rates when the mass ratio is fixed at q = 0.5 and b) for various mass ratios when the mass transfer rate is fixed at 10^-8 M_⊙ yr^-1. Computations were performed both in the absence (circles) and in the presence of a transient disk around either the less massive (squares) or the more massive component (up triangles), for noise levels equal to 0.001 d (left vertical axis) and 0.03 d (right vertical axis). The dashed line in the right panel covers the range within which the critical value q_cr ≈ 0.83 lies. (This figure is available in color in the electronic edition.)