Compact flash write speed

[Tea]

Does anyone know anything about the different write speeds of different compact flash cards?

I've learned a little browsing here and there in the last half-hour or so, but only a very little. I'm about to buy some flash cards for my new Coolpix 4500 (why the Coolpix? Long story, I'll make a new thread for that) and have only just discovered that they vary quite a bit in speed. (I had always assumed that they would be all exactly the same - not so!)

My interest is purely write speed. Read speed is irelevant - they get copied over a USB 1.1 interface to an X-15, so I just tell the machine to start copying, put the kettle on, then come back and view the results at 15,000 RPM.

 

[time]

http://www.dpreview.com/articles/mediacompare/

Check out performance with the Nikon 995 in particular - it should be a good indicator for the 4500. You'll notice that the high speed cards all perform more or less the same in this setting.

Technology has moved on, and current high speed cards such as Transcend are rated at 30x, rather than the 16-24x that most were claiming when they were reviewed. But based on other reviews of cameras, these won't perform any better on a prosumer camera like the 4500.

 

[Tea]

Thanks, Time. Oddly enough, hat was the ite I was reading just before I decided that it seemed out of date and to ask here! Small world, sometimes. Guess I'll just buy ... er ... whatever one seems easiest to get hold of. Transcend, quite possibly. 1MB? Or a pair of 512k? Decisionz decisionz.

Budget doesn't come into it. This week I have utterly destroyed Tannin's budget already, so why stop now?

(PS: I just read that over and decided to leave the typos az they stand - just in case anyone wonders whatever happened to my old zig!)

 

[honold]

My interest is purely write speed. Read speed is irelevant - they get copied over a USB 1.1 interface to an X-15, so I just tell the machine to start copying, put the kettle on, then come back and view the results at 15,000 RPM.

or you could buy a usb2 cardreader and skip the kettle...

 

[honold]

(and the wear/tear on your camera's data port)

 

[blakerwry]

i would agree that a card reader is the way to go.

 

[Piyono]

Separate USB/2.0/1394 card reader. I concur.
Unless, of course, you enjoy watching watter boil. Card readers are almost always faster than camera port transfers.
More durable, too; the connectors won't break if you look at them funny and you won't feel as bad as you would with a camera if you accidentally catch with your sleeve, or trip over, the cable, whipping the whole assembly onto the floor.
Happens.


Piyono

 

[CityK]

Tony, deep within the accessory reviews section of Steve's Digicam site, one finds the link to this CF performance article. Haven't read it, so no guarentees on its quality.

CK

 

[timwhit]

I bought I crappy CF USB2 card reader for less than $20 and it copies many, many times faster than my camera ever did. Check one out...

 

[Pradeep]

I recently bought a 256MB SimpleTech CF card, and it is faster in operation on my CP995 than the 1GB Microdrive. I guess I'll just have to get a camera that is better optimised for the Microdrive.

Did you get rid of your Sony Tony?

 

[Platform]

...1MB? Or a pair of 512k? Decisionz decisionz...

We're talking 1 GB or a pair of 512 MB, yes no?

Anyway, the "speed" issue is simple: Some digital cameras basically require a certain minimum speed of CF, as per specifications. My Olympus (which uses both CF and SmartMedia) doesn't require any particular speed of Compact Flash because it has a large (16 MB) built-in RAM buffer, which allows me to fire off a number of shots in a row without waiting.

As far as CF cards go, I have a few 256 MB and a 512 MB CF card. All are Samsung-based, which I believe are 25x and 30x speed. You can buy up to 40x speed, the last I heard.

 

[Tea]

Still got the Sony, Pradeep. Not sure what I'll do with it. Give it to Kristi, I think. I just bought a new high-capacity battery for it a few weeks ago - $AU145, but worth it as it lasts about three times longer than the old one did, letting me fill up a 128MB Memory Stick without needing to recharge. (And remember that in a 1.2MP camera, 128MB is quite a lot - about 200 pictures.)

Sounds as if the camera is going to be the limiting factor for write speeds, not the flash card. So I ordered a pair of 512MB Apacer cards today, on the simple grounds that they were the brand that the first supplier I happened to call had in stock. While I was at it, I got one of those multi-everything card readers in USB 2.0 flavour. (And it was only to keep you guys happy. It is utterly immaterial how fast I can read a flash card, because I simply dump the entire thing to hard disc, and (if I'm not having a cup of tea just yet), it can always write the data faster than I can examine the pictures - by the time I've looked at frame #1, it's copied up to #8; by the time I've looked at #8, it's done #56, and so on. But seeing as I was zpending $500-odd on flash cards, not getting a $50 reader seemed silly ... er ... I mean it waz only to keep you guys happy.)

 

[time]

SH*T!

Apacer was the brand you shouldn't have ordered.

I have a couple here that wouldn't work with a particular Nikon model (not the 4500). On a positive note, after spending a couple of days chasing the problem, the Oz distributors received a response from Apacer acknowledging the problem, but claiming it was fixed in subsequent batches. At least they got back to me ...

More seriously, do a search of the web and you'll get the idea: Apacer Flash <> Reliability.

 

[Tea]

Serves me right for wanting them delivered by the weekend and calling the supplier who was most likely to have them in stock and usually delivers promptly.

We buy a lot from them, if I have a problem, they will be OK about it.

 

[Tannin]

Stupid ape.

And you can't count, either.

(I waz hoping no-one would notice that. Except Mr Platform, of course.)

(Anyway, what are you doing back here already? I thought you were walking over to the Belinda house to borrow the spare car key?)

(I waz. But I got a lift.)

(You? Who from?)

(Some young guy in a V-8 ute. He zeemed to expect that I was going to sit in the back with his dog. Dunno why.)

(So where did you sit?)

(In the front, of course. What do you think I am? Ztupid? It'z cold outside at this time of year.)

(And he didn't mind?)

(Didn't seem to. He looked a bit surprised, though. I don't zuppose that they have many orangeutans in the bush where he comes from. Anyway, I zaid I wanted to go to the Belinda house, but he said he ought to take me to the zoo instead.)

(Did he now?)

(Yez. So I zaid that I'd already been to the zoo last year, but he looked kind of confuzed so I said that maybe I could be persuaded to let him take me to a concert and pozzibly buy me zome drinkz afterwards.)

(And .....)

(And nuffin. He juzt went a bit quiet and drove really fazt all the way to the Belinda house - where I had apples, and pears, and some left-over banana pudding, and roast potatos with pumpkin, and a nashi, and plum jam on toast, and cups of tea, and some more apples, and cashew nuts, and stewed apricots with cream, and hazelnuts of course - and then Belinda drove me home, so here I am!)

(And you remembered to ask her for the spare car key?)

(Oh. I knew I forgot zomething.)

Stupid ape!

 

[Mercutio]

Apacer DIMM memory is also shoddy stuff. Some of my students used it in a "building computers" class not long ago. There was much grief.

Dare I make the obvious Apacer = Acer connection?

 

[Tea]

I believe so, Merc. We had some pretty ordinary Apacer SDRAM once, so we didn't buy it again. But I was overtaken by an urge to forgive and forget and write it off as an abberation. Buy in haste, repent at lesiure. I'll wait and see if it works, I guess.

 

[mangyDOG]

I just got my first digital camera a few days ago, Canon A60. Nice little unit and the pictures seem quite good (haven't tried any serious photos yet.) I've just ordered some CF cards from Legend, at <$200AU including GST for the 512Mb version it seemed like a good price. I will let you know how they go...

 

[Tea]

Damn! I should have called Legend. For some reason I didn't think of that.

 

[time]

Legend don't make them, Tea. They sell whatever they can get their hands on. They've changed brands more than once, and I found it hard to get them to remember which they're actually selling.

Maybe things have settled down since?

I can buy Transcend for less anyway, and they have published specs, etc.

 

[Tea]

Good point, Time. Legend are a bit like that. Actually, apart from their own RAM which is (of course) excellent, they can sell some pretty crappy ztuff - i.e., MSI motherboardz.

The Apacer CF thingos arrived today. 25X, which is less than they might have been but surely much faster than the camera can cope with. So far az I can tell, they both work fine.

(phew!)

 

[time]

I sounded a little hard on Legend back there - didn't mean to.

MangyDog, I'm curious whether or not your cards will be Legend branded. Don't forget to give us some feedback.


We all know Tea has a sense of humour (after all, she has to put up with Tannin), so I'd like to share some extracts from this Compact Flash survey for Minolta digicams. A couple of other brands also stand out, but here's what some Apacer users had to say:

Apacer 128MB (card didn't work with old firmware, card failed later, see below) - "jake".
Apacer 128MB - first card died after 3months; camera, USB reader, and PCMCIA slot all were not able to recognize the card anymore; so I suspect the card really electrically broke
- second card died one month later; during a shoot the camera reported: 'unable to use card', PC thought it could use the card and reported it was able to copy data to it, however, when trying to read it back the data was corrupted. This time I got a card that my computer was recognized but not by the camera. I quickly learned that the card had no partition table just a FAT. The PC accepts this, the camera does not. By putting in a partition table (making a clone of the first card) the card can now also be used in the camera - Raymond K.
Apacer 256MB - (card died after a while and had to be replaced) - Sven B.
Apacer 256MB - worked 4-5 times and failed in my holidays. Could not be read by my card reader - Lutz N.
Apacer 128MB - I took one picture at the shop and everything was fine. When I got home I deleted the picture and took six new ones in RAW mode in order to measure the write speed. The average write time was 37.9 s (note: I didn't format the card between the shots). When I switched to play mode in order to delete the pictures, the card died. I can't even format it - Marko B.
Apacer 128MB - "No card." Well, I tried another Apacer 128 MB card - Marko B.
Apacer 128MB - Tested 2 cards, neither worked - Bo E.
Apacer 128MB - Camera would not recognize card - Ottar J.
Apacer 128MB - (firmware 121) This Card failed after some pictures. With new firmware in the D7 it seemed to work well. But that was for short time. After taking 24 images everything seemed to be OK. But after turning on the camera for some more shooting, The card became corrupted, all images got lost - Jake.
Apacer 256MB - the 256 is seldom recognized and looses its data if it works - Wayne R.

 

[Tea]

zob

 

[mangyDOG]

I have had a quick play with the Legend CF cards in my Canon A60. The cards themselves are completely plain with nothing but a serial number and a B&W Legend brand sticker ( which looks printed on an office laser printer ). I also got in a Legend multimedia card which is marked with Infineon, the CF cards may use the same brand memory in them but I cannot say for sure.

I first formatted the card in the camera, which seemed to be virtually instantaneous, then took about 20 photos at 1600*1200 .jpg format. I popped the card in my USB2 reader and cut/pasted them to the hard-drive. I don't know if there should be a delay but there wasn't one. As soon as I hit ctrl-V the images where there...

Initial feeling is that they work just fine, plus they have a lifetime warranty so they should be ok. Is there some way I can test the card in a more detailed way, or do I just use it for the next few years and if it is still going, make another post to this thread.. :wink:

 

[blakerwry]

Has any body successfully ran scandisk/chkdsk on a memory card? our winME box has a smart media card reader, but scandisk usually bites the dust when trying to scan the media.

 

[Tea]

There is a tread somewhere in tech support about that subject, Blake. I asked the question, but I think I tacked it onto a thread that Time (or someone) started, as a sort of related topic. I can;t really remember the answer. Pradeep knew a thing or two, I think.

 

[honold]

it works on my lexar 256mb usb2 usb disk, and i've run fsck on flash a lot...