Differences between compact flash (CF) cards?

RovingEyePhoto

Recently had the good fortune to borrow a 30D, loved it, but stupidly allowed a spare 2G compact flash card to be swiped. As long as I'm replacing (owner says no, but of course I will), is there a preference out there in Sandisk line between Ultra II, Extreme II, Extreme III, and Extreme IV. My understanding is that there's no tech difference between the Ultra and Extreme lines or within the three Extremes, that all we're talking about here is speed (different capacities seem available for each). Is this true?

If speed is the only real difference, then how great incrementally are we talking about? I've heard not very great, so long as not shooting long spurts at several fps. Is this true?

Person I borrowed from is a serious hobbyist type, lots of clicks at just about anything that catches an eye, all RAW, some multi-fps spurts but none over a second or two and not very often. Seems to me, therefore, that I'm within respectable bounds buying at the mid-point, maybe Extreme II, spending a few bucks over minimum but saving a few also. Or are there tech and/or reliability factors I'm overlooking? Any concensus out there?

Finally, as long as asking, I'll be purchasing my own DSLR in not too distant future, possibly Oly E-3, so will need to decide on cards for myself. I shoot about the same as described above. What's the consensus in terms of 2G CF cards I should get for myself, where I'll gladly lay out extra if there's a good reason to do so? I'm pretty well focused on 2G as large enough to hold a goodly number of shots, but not so large that a failure totally breaks my heart. Any thoughts on that?

Thanks in advance for taking the time.

gus

If it was me...i would just buy them a 4 gig & be done with it. They are not that much dearer than a 2 gig these days & it would be an offering of thanks for the lend & sorry for the mess up.

gus

Have you looked here btw ? Good info.

RovingEyePhoto

gus wrote:

Have you looked here btw ? Good info.

Thanks for responding. Reference answers my questions. I guess good advice to go to 4G, considering the size of RAW files. Checked your site, btw, very nice images.

TylerW

Just to add to what Gus said, the other thing to consider about 2gb vs. 4gb is what the recipient is shooting with, and how many pictures will fit on it, Vs. accepting that the card may someday fail. On my 10d I'd never want to shoot anything bigger than 2gb, because if the card failed, I'd rather loose 250-300 pictures instead of 700.

Really a question of how big a basket the photographer in question puts their eggs in.

Having said this, I've never had a card fail, but I think my Lexar is about to be retired - I think it might be the first one to bite the bullet.

darkdragon

jimphotog wrote:

If speed is the only real difference, then how great incrementally are we talking about? I've heard not very great, so long as not shooting long spurts at several fps. Is this true?

Thanks in advance for taking the time.

I've done experiments with Sony 133x and SanDisk Extreme III, after that I decided to replace all my Sony cards with ExIII cards. The speed difference wasn't so much in-camera but in the time it takes me to download the images. Paired with a SanDisk Extreme USB reader, we are talking over 30 minutes for the Sony and 5 minutes for the SanDisk. Same set of files for each card.

Now on a generic card reader I noticed that the Extreme III CF card performed a little better than the Sony, but not enough to make me switch cards. I have noticed no difference in my camera, but then again I don't do burst mode.

For 2/4 GB cards, I don't think the difference in speed for the Ext III vs Ext IV cards is worth the money. I think you'd need to get up to 8GB before it would matter.

Hope this helps.

ziggy53

Folks, I moved this thread since CF cards are an acessory item, and we already have a lot of recent interest in card speeds in "Acessories".

RovingEyePhoto

darkdragon wrote:

I've done experiments with Sony 133x and SanDisk Extreme III, after that I decided to replace all my Sony cards with ExIII cards. The speed difference wasn't so much in-camera but in the time it takes me to download the images. Paired with a SanDisk Extreme USB reader, we are talking over 30 minutes for the Sony and 5 minutes for the SanDisk. Same set of files for each card.

Now on a generic card reader I noticed that the Extreme III CF card performed a little better than the Sony, but not enough to make me switch cards. I have noticed no difference in my camera, but then again I don't do burst mode.

For 2/4 GB cards, I don't think the difference in speed for the Ext III vs Ext IV cards is worth the money. I think you'd need to get up to 8GB before it would matter.

Hope this helps.

Thanks. Helps a lot.

RovingEyePhoto

TylerW wrote:

Just to add to what Gus said, the other thing to consider about 2gb vs. 4gb is what the recipient is shooting with, and how many pictures will fit on it, Vs. accepting that the card may someday fail. On my 10d I'd never want to shoot anything bigger than 2gb, because if the card failed, I'd rather loose 250-300 pictures instead of 700.

Really a question of how big a basket the photographer in question puts their eggs in.

Having said this, I've never had a card fail, but I think my Lexar is about to be retired - I think it might be the first one to bite the bullet.

Very helpful. Thanks.