Which XQD card speed for Nikon D4?

[alexshapiro]

<p>Time to buy a new card. Unfortunately Sony discontinued the 64GB/168MBs card so there are 125MBs and 180MBs at quite a difference money wise. Does anyone have any experience shooting fast sports with Nikon D4 and Sony XQD 125MBs? Thanks in advance!</p>

[dwight200]

<p>The XQD card is a real problem, since it's only used in 2 cameras. It has advantages in speed over the CF cards, but until some other camera(s) start using the card it's going to be a low-volume production, which means you won't get low prices.<br>

If you need the speed for your shooting, get the higher speed card. The expense is not that great compared to the camera body. Parts for your Ferrari are going to be more expensive than parts for your Yugo.</p>

[ShunCheung]

<p>There are only two cameras for still-capture (at least mainly for still) that use XQD cards, namely the D4 and D4S, but there are a few more Sony 4K camcorders that use XQD. The problem is that so far, not many cameras need the speed of XQD, and worse yet, there is a competing CF Fast format.</p>

<p>Two years ago when the D4 first came on the scene, I was hoping that XQD would gain popularity in a year or two. So far that has not happned yet. If you have a D4 or D4S, I would get 1 or 2 low-speed XQD so that you can use dual cards and have a backup. At this point I wouldn't invest heavity on XQD cards.</p>

<p>As a format, XQD may fade away (like Beta video tape and HD DVD), but if it takes off (e.g. 4K video becomes popular), the cost will come down quickly in the future. Either way, it doesn't pay to invest heavily on them at this point. I.e. I would buy the minimum for what you need for now for the D4 but no more than that.</p>

[michael_bradtke]

<p>The XQD card is the one thing I am not thrilled about with my D4. If the D4 had two CF card slots that would have been perfect in my book. I would buy the least expensive one you can.</p>

[mike_halliwell]

<p>I remember in 1999/2000 spending £775 on 3 x LEXAR JUMPDRIVE 128MB 12x speed CF Cards for my departments new Coolpix 990...Yes, that £225 or maybe $350 then, EACH....each-one even came with it's own card-reader!</p>

<p>It wasn't my money but buying at the sharp-cutting edge HURTS!</p>

<p>XQD may remain, but actually investing in it is <strong><em>BRAVE</em></strong>..:-)</p>

[ShunCheung]

<p>I am sort of in the same boat, as I am currently testing a D4S on loan, but the problem is that it is not even my camera. (Full disclosure, Nikon USA as well as many other companies loan out equipment to photo.net to review. Unfortunately, we can't afford to buy everything ourselves, although that would have been nice.) Usually I prefer to have a memory card backup setting so that I write the images onto two cards for duplication. However, the long-term prospect for XQD is in doubt and it would be really silly if I buy an XQD that becomes useless in the future. I would imagine that selling a used card will be tough also given the narrow market.</p>

<p>I think it is a matter of time that the traditional CF cards will fade away, for two reasons: the pins are too vulnerable and the speed. The big question is whether the future is XQD, CF Fast or perhaps something else. We will have an answer when 4K video becomes popular some day, but that day is arriving slower than I thought two years ago.</p>

[alexshapiro]

<p>Thanks for the insightful responses but I'm afraid I wasn't quite clear with the question. I shoot motor sports and other fast stuff on uncompressed NEF, very often at the top fps the D4 can give. I didn't ever manage to fill the buffer with the 168 MB/s card but now they are gone. Any idea what are the chances to fill the buffer with the 125 MB/s card? Thanks.</p>

[Dieter Schaefer]

<p>According to this: http://www.robgalbraith.com/content_page5214.html?cid=7-11674-12366 the H series (which I believe was rated at 125 MB/s) delivered about 92 MB/s on a D4. Did you ever check how fast your 168 MB/s cards were able to write? Maybe about 92 MB/s is the fastest the D4 can actually write and the card speed isn't the limiting factor?</p>

 

[ShunCheung]

<p>If you use XQD + CF in the backup mode on the D4/D4S so that the same file is copied to both cards, as I would use it, the slower CF card is going to dominate the overall write time anyway. I think there is no point to buy really fast XQD cards.</p>

<p>Most likely, people won't spend more than a few hundred collars on XQD cards anyway, as $200, $400 can buy you plenty of cards. If you can afford a D4, "wasting" a few hundred dollars is not going to be the end of the world should XQD be abandoned by the industry in the future, but XQD is a questionable investment at this point until its popularity is proven.</p>

[alexshapiro]

<p>Mr. Cheung, thanks again for an insightful reply. CF card being slower is exactly the reason I don't use the CF slot most of the time and didn't get a chance to regret it so far - and I have the camera since when they were shipping with a card and a reader in the box. Also I do not regard buying a card as an investment but as a necessary expense I have to get the job done. Since this is an expense I'd like to minimize it because I can find a better use for those few hundred dollars elsewhere and therefore I'm trying to figure out not what the future holds for the format but what are my practical chances to fill the buffer with uncompressed NEFs at the top camera frame rate with the 125MB/s card shooting race cars and bikes. Depending on this I will buy either 125MB/s card or 180 MB/s card which costs roughly double.</p>

[ShunCheung]

<p>I have only used the D4S, not the D4. The D4S' RAW buffer can hold 41 frames. The other day I unwisely put a slow Extreme III CF card inside and shot hummingbirds. At 11 fps, it filled the buffer with that slow card in about 4 seconds. That was the first day I used a D4S.</p>

<p>A 41-frame buffer is a lot. What type of subjects do you shoot?</p>

<p>For example, occasionally I shoot tennis. For tennis, you never shoot more than a few frames at a time because when the ball is on the opposite side of the court, there is no action on your subject. Therefore, there is plenty of time for the camera to write its buffer onto the card before you start shooting again. For hummingbirds, its action can continue for 10, 20 seconds non stop, and if you shoot @ 11 fps, you can run out of buffer regardless of card speed (available today).</p>

[alexshapiro]

<p>I shoot a lot of different stuff from classical ballet to drag races. It's the racing that worries me as sometimes bursts tend to be rather long and our usual bright sunlight makes shutter speeds high.</p>