Memory Card

[markplawchan]

Having just purchased my first DSLR (Canon 50D) and having made the leap from an EOS3...is there any meaningful

difference between the "memory cards"? I ordered an "Extreme IV" (4G) as an interim measure, however when I add an

additional 8 or 16G card which ones are preferred?

 

Thanks---and HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

[davyjo]

The Extreme IV's are great but I find that I rarely need the speed so I have a bunch of the Ultra II's that work flawlessly.

[g dan mitchell]

The differences in performance on your camera between "ExtremeX" and "ExtremeZ" and

"SuperMegaAstonishingFreaking ExtremeZZ" are often not very significant, if they are significant at all.

 

You can also generally order just about any brand of card from a reliable vendor and get a decent product. Most of the

memory cards are actually fairly generic.

 

Why don't you shoot your 4GB card a bit and see how many photos you can get on it. If you shoot RAW it will be

perhaps a couple hundred I would guess. If you shoot jpg it should store many, many more.

 

Then decide how much more storage space you need and buy accordingly. No particular card size is "preferred" over

any other - it really comes down to what you need for your photography. Some will prefer a single large card for

convenience, while others prefer several smaller cards.

 

Dan

[stillbound]

with most cameras short of the 1D/5DII series and the D3/D700 the difference will really never be seen while shooting...

 

If you are shooting lots AND have a firewire card reader then you will see a significant difference on the download times...

 

other than that extreme 3 is more than fast enough for just about anyone and the prices are significantly cheaper..

[robert_edelman1]

In comparing memory cards such as compact flash cards, with everything being equal, the larger the card capacity,

the more slowly the camera will write to the card. For example, your camera will take longer to write an image

to a SanDisk Extreme III 4 GB card than it will to a SanDisk Extreme III 2 GB card. For cards of smaller

capacity, you probably will not notice much or any difference in write time between cards of different speeds. I

suspect that the faster speeds are more important for the cards with much larger capacities. It also depends upon

your photography. Sports photography might need faster cards than landscape photography. I agree with the advice

of trying out the 4 GB card that you have. I think that you will be satisfied with the write time. The question

is of capacity. As far as brands are concerned, I have not yet had problems with any cards. I tend to buy

SanDisk and Lexar brand cards as they seem to have a lesser number of negative comments concerning their

reliability as posted by online reviewers/users compared to some other brands. I have also read that filling the

card up to maximum capacity might not be a good idea as it might lead to file corruption, or something like that.

If the card is nearing capacity, I will format the card in the camera after downloading the images onto a

computer. I recommend a card reader to download from the card, as it seems to be faster than using the camera.

If you want to review the write times of various cards, go to robgalbraith.com.

Robert

[gorasinski]

Considering that you have 50D, I would go for UDMA cards, as this camera supports it and can take more photos in single burst. Moreover, many people would rather go for 2x4GB rather than 1x8GB should something go wrong there is always another card, and not all your works are gone.

Regards,

Lukasz

[markplawchan]

Thank-you everyone! (much as I had suspected--there isn't a lot of difference.between cards..) Now, onto the "learning curve" of a new camera!

[g dan mitchell]

To add one small data point, I've _never_ purchased the "brand name" (and inevitably more expensive) CF cards. I have

used many, many cards in sizes ranging from 16MB up to 8GB. For what it is worth, I have never had a problem with a

card that was due to a defect in the card.

 

A key phrase stolen from Robert's post: "...you probably will not notice much or any difference in write time between cards

of different speeds..."

 

Dan