I am wondering if I really need the fastest CF card out there. That one is the Lexar 16GB 1000x UDMA 7 CF Compact Flash Memory Cards, which cost about $70. Currently, I am using a SanDisk CF Ultra CompactFlash 30MB/s 8GB [$29.79] in my D3s for sports photography, in burst mode, at night, in dark high school stadiums. 8GB is sufficient memory for one night of shooting at jpg normal. I don't need fine since most of the photos are viewed in facebook and flickr. I would never shoot RAW since that will take up too much of my time to process.
My question is whether the Lexar will improve the burst rate over the SadDisk CF. I know the Lexar will download to my laptop faster, but that is not as important to me as improving burst rate, if that is possible. So, should I go buy the Lexar to improve burst rate?
Nikon AF-S Nikkor 300mm f/2.8G ED-IF VR Nikon D3S Nikon D600 Nikon AF-S Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8G ED VR Nikon AF-S Nikkor 400mm f/2.8G ED VR II +3 more
Vegasluvr • Senior Member • Posts: 2,102
Re: Which Compact Flash Memory Card is Adequate?
I am a professional sports photographer and I use only 8GB Lexar or Sandisk CF cards in all of my Canon EOS 1D Mark IV, 1Dx, 7D, 60D and 5DMKIIs. I never use anything larger for several reasons. One is I am afraid of errors on a card that will prevent me from uploading images which has occurred on some Lexar and SanDisk cards in the past.
After about 500 images, I upload the CF card to our laptops then reformat the card which is then returned to us on the field, court or arena. I typically shoot with 10-20 cards so I have plenty of memory for images. All of my images are shot in fine mode. Sometimes RAW but that is if a team wants their images to be photo shopped for advertisements.
Canon EOS-1D Mark IV Canon EOS-1D X Canon EF 400mm f/2.8L IS USM Canon EF 16-35mm F2.8L II USM Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM +1 more
slowhands • Veteran Member • Posts: 5,470
Do the math
Your camera has a max burst rate of X, and a cache buffer of size Y, allowing a theoretical continuous burst of Z images before the cache buffer is FULL.
You cannot modify X or Y, although Canon's latest firmware for the 7D did change it's memory management [effectively expanding Y somewhat]
Your camera has a theoretical write speed capability of W, limited by the write speed of whatever card you put in the slot.
Once your card's write speed exceeds the camera's write speed, you have maxed out.
If your current card speeds are slower than the camera's write speed, you will gain *some* by using faster cards. How much you gain depends on the current differential between what you have and what the camera's capable of, and it's ability to concurrently empty cache to card and write to cache as you shoot.
I'll leave it to you to dig out the specs / details and do the math.
My guess - You *might* gain 1 or 2 additional frames in a burst. Is it worth it? Only you can decide.
Canon EOS 40D Canon EOS 350D Canon EOS 7D
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Is CompactFlash still being used?
CF cards today are primarily used as removable memory for higher-end digital photo and video cameras.
Why is CompactFlash so expensive?
Since the controller resides in the card however, it means extra expense in the production of the cards. The faster the card, the better the controller has to be and the bigger the cost difference to a comparable SD card. As far as which is better, it really depends on the two cards and the reader being used.
Is CompactFlash better than SD?
1 ] In terms of storage capacity, CF cards have a higher capacity than SD cards. CF cards can support up to 128PB, while SD cards can only support up to 128TB. SD cards can be divided into 4 types, with the standard SD card supporting up to 2GB storage capacity and using the FAT12/16 file system.
What is the main difference between the two types of CompactFlash CF cards?
The only difference between the CF Type I and Type II memory cards is their thickness. CF Type I card is 3.3mm thick, while CF Type II card is 5mm thick. CF Type I cards can fit into CF Type I and Type II slots, whereas CF Type II cards can only fit into CF Type II slots.