dmoreno
08-20-2009, 04:37 PM
I am deciding what card to buy for my hopefully upcoming GH1. I found this information interesting and wanted to share:
I want to buy 8GB or 16GB SDHC because I need to be able to record continously for at least 1 hour, since sometimes I do weddings and don't want to change cards during the ceremony.
I have read several threads around here stating that a good SDHC Class 4 might work for most of us that plan to use the GH1 mainly for AVCHD video (people that want to record MJPEG or want to do burst raw photos may need a Class 6).
I also found this interesting chart http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/sdhc-memory-card-charts/Avergage-Write-Transfer-Rates,863.html. It shows the different actual average writting rates different types/brands of SDHC cards can really handle. hat might give you an idea of what brands perfom better.
For most of us that plan to use our SDHC cards to record video writting rates are much more important to reading rates, since reading will be done afterwards for editing. Also it is always important to be sure tests reffer to average speed and not maximum speeds that cannot be sustained and might be misleading. T
I checked both amazon.com and newegg.com for reviews on Transcend cards (class 6, 8GB and 16GB). On both this sites together 1500+ reviews can be found for this cards. This is a big enough sample to consider the information "statistically correct".
Around 10% of the reviews claim that their cards stopped working. Some of them didn't work from the start, some stopped working after a few uses and some stopped working after several months.
I checked the same way for A-Data cards (class 6, 8GB and 16GB) and around 20% of the reviews in both sites claimed the same problems. (I found 300+ reviews in total, not as much as with the Transcend brand, but enough to consider this information usefull)
Then I checked Sandisk Ultra II Cards (class 4) the same way. I only found 114 in both sites together, not as big a sample as I would have wanted, but good enough to give it some thought. Only 2.6% of the reviews claimed that their cards stopped working. Actually most of the bad reviews are due to not receiving the sd card reader that appeard on the product picture, or claiming they thought they were buying a Class 6 card because the card missguidingly states 15 MBps speed, which is a maximum burst speed but not a sustainable average speed.
It is important to note that Sandisk Ultra II Class 4 Cards cost roughly the same as Transcend Class 6 cards (like 10% more). A test should be interesting to test the actual writting speeds of this 2 cards. A-Data Class 6 cards cost about 30% less than Transcend Class 6 and 40% less than Sandisk Class 4.
I also checked Sandisk Extreme III (class 6). Found 104 reviews, less than 2% claim cards that stopped working (only 2 reviews). This cards cost 3 times as much as Transcend Class 6 and 4 times as much as A-Data Class 6.
Panasonic Class 6 cards cost twice as much as Sandisk Extreme III Class 6.
I tried the same on Lexar and Patriot cards but I didn't find enough reviews to reach any conclusions.
I want to buy 8GB or 16GB SDHC because I need to be able to record continously for at least 1 hour, since sometimes I do weddings and don't want to change cards during the ceremony.
I have read several threads around here stating that a good SDHC Class 4 might work for most of us that plan to use the GH1 mainly for AVCHD video (people that want to record MJPEG or want to do burst raw photos may need a Class 6).
I also found this interesting chart http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/sdhc-memory-card-charts/Avergage-Write-Transfer-Rates,863.html. It shows the different actual average writting rates different types/brands of SDHC cards can really handle. hat might give you an idea of what brands perfom better.
For most of us that plan to use our SDHC cards to record video writting rates are much more important to reading rates, since reading will be done afterwards for editing. Also it is always important to be sure tests reffer to average speed and not maximum speeds that cannot be sustained and might be misleading. T
I checked both amazon.com and newegg.com for reviews on Transcend cards (class 6, 8GB and 16GB). On both this sites together 1500+ reviews can be found for this cards. This is a big enough sample to consider the information "statistically correct".
Around 10% of the reviews claim that their cards stopped working. Some of them didn't work from the start, some stopped working after a few uses and some stopped working after several months.
I checked the same way for A-Data cards (class 6, 8GB and 16GB) and around 20% of the reviews in both sites claimed the same problems. (I found 300+ reviews in total, not as much as with the Transcend brand, but enough to consider this information usefull)
Then I checked Sandisk Ultra II Cards (class 4) the same way. I only found 114 in both sites together, not as big a sample as I would have wanted, but good enough to give it some thought. Only 2.6% of the reviews claimed that their cards stopped working. Actually most of the bad reviews are due to not receiving the sd card reader that appeard on the product picture, or claiming they thought they were buying a Class 6 card because the card missguidingly states 15 MBps speed, which is a maximum burst speed but not a sustainable average speed.
It is important to note that Sandisk Ultra II Class 4 Cards cost roughly the same as Transcend Class 6 cards (like 10% more). A test should be interesting to test the actual writting speeds of this 2 cards. A-Data Class 6 cards cost about 30% less than Transcend Class 6 and 40% less than Sandisk Class 4.
I also checked Sandisk Extreme III (class 6). Found 104 reviews, less than 2% claim cards that stopped working (only 2 reviews). This cards cost 3 times as much as Transcend Class 6 and 4 times as much as A-Data Class 6.
Panasonic Class 6 cards cost twice as much as Sandisk Extreme III Class 6.
I tried the same on Lexar and Patriot cards but I didn't find enough reviews to reach any conclusions.