choosing a compact flash card

[Kelly Grannell]

You'll only see the difference in these 2 instances:

1. when you're reviewing the pictures (scrolling from one picture to the next), very beneficial if you have something larger than 512 Mb card (one of many reasons I keep using Sandisk Ultra II 512 Mb cards)

2. when you're downloading the pics from your card to the PC using a card reader.

 

[0bli0]

there is almost zero difference between the ultraII and ExtremeIII. the extreme is for extreme temperatures. you might want to check Rob Galbraith's CF reference. it's only slightly faster when writing raw, and then you'll only notice it bursting.

 

[Kelly Grannell]

0bli0, you didn't find the Extreme III is about double the transfer speed from your CF reader to your PC?

Regardless, it's not worth the extra money (especially the burst mode on the XT is limited). Heck, with Ultra II I still can do about 40+ frames at 5 fps using JPEG Large compression on my 30D.

PS: I'm comparing downloading 40 frames of the same pics to my PC from Ultra II 512 MB vs Extreme III 4 Gb using Lexar USB 2 CF card reader.

 

[chirurgeon]

Thanks for the quick reply. I will stick with the Ultra II's.

 

[0bli0]

Kelly - i use Extreme III SD cards and mostly UltraII CF cards in my camera - the SD cards are hugely faster. there is no difference between the ExtremeIII and Ultra 2 CF in offloading on either my Macs or PCs.

edit: i'm off to the field now to shoot some games, when i get back i'll run some timing tests.

 

[Kelly Grannell]

wow, I wonder the technical difference between SD cards vs CF. The theoretical transfer speed are supposed to be the same. (between Extreme III SD vs Extreme III CF)

 

[0bli0]

ok - i had a card which had 968 megs of .CR2 (RAW) files. i did some read tests between my Ultra II and Extreme 3 (data copied from Ultra II onto other cards for the test). averages over two runs (broken up by about 5 minutes of big file manipulation)

CF
PC (athlon dual core based) w/ Belkin USB 2.0 reader - copy from card to folder
UltraII - 1:40
Extreme 3 - 1:44

Macbook Pro (intel core-duo) w/ Belkin USB 2.0 reader - copy from card to folder
UltraII - 1:38
Extreme 3 - 1:37

PowerMac (dual core G5) w/ Belkin USB 2.0 reader - copy from card to folder
UltraII - 1:28
Extreme 3 - 1:30

PowerMac (dual core G5) w/ Lexar Firewire reader - copy from card to folder
UltraII - 1:24
Extreme 3 - 1:21

Macbook Pro (intel core-duo) w/ Lexar Firewire reader - copy from card to folder
UltraII - 1:36
Extreme 3 - 1:34

SD
PC (athlon dual core based) w/ Comsol USB 2.0 reader - copy from card to folder
UltraII - 1:29
Extreme 3 - 1:34

PowerMac (dual core G5) w/ Comsol USB 2.0 reader - copy from card to folder
UltraII - 1:17
Extreme 3 - 1:26

i guess i forgot to test it on the Macbook Pro

 

[Kelly Grannell]

I guess there is something "wrong" with my card reader then. Even with Extreme III I never reached that speed!

Time to research and buy a new card reader!

 

[0bli0]

i definitely would - especially if you have an old USB 1.1 reader or a '2.0' one that's not giving you very good throughput.

edit- btw i mentioned bursting above as that's when your write speed really comes into effect. when you fill the buffer, it will empty the buffer only as quick as it wil wite to the card. on non-1 series bodies, you also have to wait for the card writes to complete before shutting the camera off. offloading cards after a days worth of shooting certainly goes much quicker with a fast card and a decent reader.

 

[mhutchinson]

I guess there is something "wrong" with my card reader then. Even with Extreme III I never reached that speed!

Time to research and buy a new card reader!

Kelly,

Unless stated, they will typically test speeds for the cards using firewire protocol or on-board digital media readers to obtain max results. Even as the cards get quicker they are still bound by the speed of the USB capacity and memory restictions in the PC that you are using (RAM, bus, and DASD write speed).

All I know is that they are soooo much faster than they were 6 or 7 years ago. I can't imagine trying to unload a 4 GB card back then, 32 MB was painfully slow

Mike

 

[Kelly Grannell]

So do you think it's worth trying in buying newer card reader. Mine read "USB 2.0 High Speed" which I bought about 2 years ago. I'm using P4 2.66 Ghz with 2 Gb RAM and 10k rpm HDD with Belkin USB 2.0 PCI card.

 

[jann1033]

i saw one on ebay that lets you use an sd card in something needing a compact flash...anyone ever use these with a rebel? i have a 2 gb sd card sitting around growing mold so i'd get one of these if it worked
thanks

 

[0bli0]

yes they work fine. i have one that i picked up in HK last year.

 

[jann1033]

great thanks

 

[handicap18]

You mean something like this SanDisk Card Reader ? This is the one I have. I've used SD cards, CF cards and also Smart Media (I think is whay my mother has) all worked perfect. Great value too and you don't have to use your camera to do downloading.

 

[0bli0]

no - it's a compact flash card sized 'reader' that you can put an SD card in. it then fits in a camera that takes a compact flash card .

 

[Charade]

Oh that would come in handy. I just bought two 1 gig SD cards for my dgf's Canon A620. If we don't take both cameras on vacation, I could get one of those adapters and use the SD cards in my D70.

 

[jann1033]

Oh that would come in handy. I just bought two 1 gig SD cards for my dgf's Canon A620. If we don't take both cameras on vacation, I could get one of those adapters and use the SD cards in my D70.

umhmm or in my case, if hubby gets a work camera which would use the sd i have, i could still use it for my rebel

and i am guessing you can use one adaptar for how ever many cards you have,ie the connection isnt permanent?

 

[handicap18]

no - it's a compact flash card sized 'reader' that you can put an SD card in. it then fits in a camera that takes a compact flash card .

ooohhh,,, kewl. Didn't know they had that type of thing. Excellent.

 

[BFL]

Just thought I would share, as I just bought one myself. Adorama has Lexar 8 GB, 133x Professional High Speed Series, Compact Flash Memory Card with Write Acceleration (WA) for $57 after a mail in rebate. The card is on sale for $119.95 and there is a $50 mail in rebate, shipping was $7.00.

Thank you budget board for turning me onto Slickdeals.