What SD card for a D90?

<p>I need help to sort out the truth and the hype on SD cards for my new 1st DSLR Nikon D90.<br>

Also, how does speed and capacity of the card relate to video, fps and buffering? <br>

Thanks, Mike</p>

<p>I have been using San Disk Ultra 2 SDHC (high capacity) 8GB cards with my D90 and they have been great. I have both class 4 and class 6 cards but usually use the 6; I don't use the video feature very much but my understanding is that class 6 is better for video. Happy shooting! cb :-)</p>

For my D90, I haven't had anything rather than the 8GB Sandisk Extreme SDHC 30MB/s class 10, so I can't tell you how the rest perform. I will tell you one thing though: it's better to overkill and underkill.

<p>stay away from no-name cards and fly-by-night dealers.</p>

<p>I would second Tam. I use SanDisk Extreme 4G SDHC class 10 on my Panasonic G1 (the same 12MP camera as your D90). I also have several different 1G SD class 4 cards but I cannot go back!<br>

A fast card is very beneficial not only when the image is written into it, but also when you transfer the data to the PC.</p>

<p>Overkill means you spend extra money for no good reason. The D90 is not a sports camera. Using faster memory card will give you a negligible advantage. The only real advantage is faster upload time when you transfer the images from the card onto a computer/hard drives. But does it really matter if it takes a couple more minutes to upload those images?</p>

<p>To me, it is not worth it. If it takes a few more minutes to upload the image files, I'll just do something else and then come back to the images.</p>

<p>Thanks for the posts guys. I will keep reading them as more people give their opinion.<br>

Mike</p>

<p>I think spending money on a fast card is stupid. For me the best is the San Disk card. A good choice would be the San Disk Ultra 2 SDHC 8 Mb </p>

<p>A couple of years ago, I tested the difference between Sandisk Extreme 3 vs. Extreme 4 on the D3. I know, today, all of those CF cards have already been discontinued in favor of faster, and more expensive, ones.</p>

<p>If I shoot 15 consecutive frames at 9 frames/sec on the D3, it takes about 1 second to write a 14-bit lossless compressed NEF file onto the Extreme 4 and about 1.5 second to write onto the Extreme 3. If you shoot say 5 consecutive frames and then wait a few seconds before you shoot again, either way there is plenty of time for the camera to write those frames. Therefore, unless you are a big time sports/action photographer and shoot "machine gun" style all the time, buying those expensive fast memory card is merely a waste of money.</p>

<p>On the other end, if may take 4, 5 minutes to upload a fast 4G card and perhaps 7, 8 minutes to upload a slower one. Can you really not wait that extra few minutes?</p>

<p>For a non-sports type DSLR such as the D90, I wouldn't waste my money on fast SD cards. If you don't mind paying a bit more, I would get one with higher capacity such as 8G, 16G so that you won't run out of memory card space. Since there is no longer any film and processing cost on DSLRs, people tend to shot a lot more frames. Speed is not a real concen for the D90.</p>

<p>Shun,</p>

<p>How about when shooting video? Wouldn't speed be a more relevant factor there?</p>

<p>As long as you get a quality card that is reasonably fast, you would be OK. According to the D90 specs you "would need" a 45 MB/s card given its 4.5 fps frame rate and that a RAW image would be around 10 megs. However, the D90 itself cannot write to an SD card at that speed.</p>

<p>As I see it, the best reason for getting cards such as Sandisk Extreme III and the likes is reliability. Yes, they are fast, but what's better is that I do not need to worry about them breaking down.</p>

<p>Nish, I have never used a D90, but I think the D300S' video is close enough. As I mentioned in the following thread, a 1-minute AVI HD video file from the D300S is about 80M, which is like the size of 10 compressed RAW files. That is, it is like shooting 10 compressed RAW frames a minute or 1 frame every 6 seconds: <a href="http://www.photo.net/nikon-camera-forum/00VfzQ">http://www.photo.net/nikon-camera-forum/00VfzQ</a></p>

<p>In other words, the memory card space requirement for video is a lot less than for still images. Keep in mind that on all current Nikon DSLRs with video, it is only 720p.</p>

<p>Thanks Shun - that's good to know.</p>

<p>Thanks guys, great info!<br>

Now onto the lense forum!!!!!!<br>

Mike</p>

<p>I use OCZ 8 GB Class 6 cards in my D90 - never had a problem and video capture is fine. Read speeds seem good to me.</p>

<p>Good info about SDHC cards on Wiki - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SDHC#SDHC">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SDHC#SDHC</a></p>