Memory Storage Speed (Sony 900)

davemj98

I recently had an issue at a shoot, that had a very large turnout, and so after just halfway through, my 32GB CF was getting full. When I switched to my 16GB MS, I was appalled at how slow I was able to shoot this fast paced event. I switched to another CF as soon as I could, but after being caught with my pants down like that, I fixed it by throwing money at it. B&H sold me a 64GB CF @600x, and I got the Sony 32GB HS Pro Duo. After installing them and formatting, I aimed at the wall and shot 29 pictures so fast that I got scared! I knew intellectually that the faster cards had benefits, but having it in hand was an eye opener. Now I feel like I was foolish for not getting spending the extra $100 for an even faster card at my local store. Any one have experience on a 900 shooting sports like this can you tell me if an even faster (600x) CF allow the buffer to clear faster, because when the crashes occur, the images are almost priceless. Anyone that has experience with these file sizes and fast paced events can you please advise what level of CF or MS PRO Duo is the max output the the 900?
Thanks,
Dave

skippy77

i know that lexar pro now do a 1000x if that helps

davemj98

skippy77 wrote: »

i know that lexar pro now do a 1000x if that helps

Thanks Skippy,
My question is there are worth to going past where I am now, vs. buffer speed.

Matthew Saville

Hey Dave, just a quick tip for posting here on DGrin, you may not want to use black text since it is much more difficult to read on such a dark grey background.

Aside from that, in regards to your question- The Sony A900 is capable of shooting at up to 5 FPS even in full RAW, but according to DPReview's specifications you will only get 12 frames out of it before the buffer fills. No speed of card will help you if the buffer is full and can't write to the card as fast as the card is. However if you pop into cRAW mode you can get up to 25 frames, or in fine/standard JPG mode it looks like the buffer speed finally surpasses the framerate, and you can go up to 100/285 frames, respectively.

I'm going to bet that a 600X card is going to give you full access to this speed. Just jam your shutter in full RAW and see if you can get to 12 frames before the buffer slows, and that should answer your question. Even if you get a faster card, the buffer will still slow you down at 12 frames. Personally though for sports I've always found compressed RAW to be more than enough, and have NEVER needed to shoot in a burst greater than 5-10 shots anyways... But I don't shoot that much sports I suppose, only the odd BMX gathering etc...

=Matt=