The game is up Sony, time to drop SxS prices

GuyB

GuyB

Well-known member
With the release of the new Intel SSD there is now no longer the excuse that SxS are expensive relative to other SSD devices because of their high performance.

I ran some tests on my SxS on a modem fast laptop and a benchmark tool and got some not so impressive results. I doubt their complete accuracy but even allowing for decent error they aren't so high in write performance:

Sequential Read: 29.8MBps
Sequential Write: 4.55MBps

Now take benchmarks of Intels X25-M drive which have sustained read of 200MBps and write 70MBps. That’s around 6x read performance and 14x write performance over SxS.

Now look at cost:

32GB SxS US$1,500 ($47/GB)
80GB Intel SSD US$ 600 ($7.5/GB)

So we have a SSD with simply huge amounts of performance ability over SxS at around 1/6 the price per GB.

The only think SxS has the Intel SSD has is physical size. Even so, this isn't about getting an 80GB SxS at $600, its about being realistic about the value of costs to users.

Heck, what about the U60's value in light of these prices...
 
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right there guys... That's why I'm looking more and more at the HMC150. For 30 bucks I can buy a card that'll record 40 minutes of 1080 at full rez on the cam. For 150 bucks.. It'll do 90 minutes and even the most expensive card at 350 bucks will get me 3 hours. In one year, this card will be probably less than 200 bucks for 3 hours of recording.. I want the solid state to drop in price... been a real pain so far.
 
Intriguing solution with the Kensington reader and a Transcend card. Now, the interest part would be using a 32 gb Transcend card (around $125 at Newegg.com) with the Kensington device.

Do you have a link to that user's report?

Thanks
 
Oops... just found the link.

I just ordered the combo of the Kensington reader and the Transcend 8gb card for $64.45 from Amazon.com. Should be here Thurs 9/11 (scary thing to say...)

Will post results as soon as I have the chance to test.

Ned
 
nsoltz said:
Oops... just found the link.

I just ordered the combo of the Kensington reader and the Transcend 8gb card for $64.45 from Amazon.com. Should be here Thurs 9/11 (scary thing to say...)

Will post results as soon as I have the chance to test.

Ned
Click to expand...

Nice. try some 60fps S&Q and tell me how it goes.

For anyone else curious the post is here - http://www.dvinfo.net//conf/showthread.php?t=129496


"I have today filled a couple of Transcend 8Gb class 6 SD cards with 25P HQ and 720P50 material without any problems. I used a Kingston Express card to 7 way card reader/adapter. All purchased from Amazon UK. The SD cards are a lot faster than the Express SSD cards."
 
Ned,

Let us know how that Transcend card works out for you. The DVInfo poster says that card failed recording after a few seconds. The Lexar car was better but still had some issues.
 
adamr316 said:
Ned,

Let us know how that Transcend card works out for you. The DVInfo poster says that card failed recording after a few seconds. The Lexar car was better but still had some issues.
Click to expand...

Actually,
The stuff Ned ordered (Transcend 8Gb class 6 SD cards with a Kensington expresscard Express card to 7 way card reader/adapter worked for Alister on dvinfo)

Maybe, you are refering to something else?
 
Fohdeesha didn't specify which Transcend he/she bought.

"I've only been able to find transcend cards and these fail after only 30 seconds." - Alister

If class 6 cards work then go for it. If there are more reports from different users that these work without problems then I'll pick one up myself.
 
adamr316 said:
Fohdeesha didn't specify which Transcend he/she bought.

"I've only been able to find transcend cards and these fail after only 30 seconds." - Alister

If class 6 cards work then go for it. If there are more reports from different users that these work without problems then I'll pick one up myself.
Click to expand...



You're quote was when Alister was refering to SxS cards, not his Transcend 8GB and express card reader combo that does work.

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/sony-xdcam-ex-cinealta/129496-lexar-sxs-cards-where-buy-uk.html

We'll know a lot more soon...
 
Just imagine if this card proved to be compatible with the Kensington reader:
http://www.expansys.com.au/p.aspx?i=168935

That is $225 Australian dollars including our 10% GST for 32GB.

This is the card I have the 16GB version of. The card has the transfer rate to handle well over 35Mbps (I sustained around 88Mbps with it), but its the question of for some reason it still being 'class 4'.

I doubt my Kengsinton reader will be in before the end of next week though, they are harder to get 'Down Under'.
 
My card-reader combo shipped from Amazon.com and I should have it tomorrow (9/11). I'll definitely test it tomorrow and Friday in my EX3 and report.
 
I tried that buy Amazon won't ship that to Australia, along with pretty much most of what else I want to buy from them (geographic shipment limitations...)

I had to find someone in Australia who listed them but they are a backordered iteam.
 
There's a lot to be said about reliability. Sometimes it's worth the price.

A month ago I got footage of a marlin weighing nearly a half ton being fought on very thin 50-pound line for more than two hours.

Imagine if the card failed at the most critical moments of that rare opportunity.
 
lol.

Yes of course we arn't going to just start using this stuff untested, but we are all big enough and ugly enough to test it out pretty well. Its why, even though I got 2 16GB Lexars, I only consider them emergency use at the moment and I am chasing down these other options.
 
My luck is that the fish would eat my camera just as I got the close up of getting it into the boat.

I'm waiting for the UPS truck with the Kensington/Transcend combo more anxiously than I awaited the EX3. This opens possibilities including the ability to use inexpensive SDHC cards as archive for original material.
 
nsoltz said:
... This opens possibilities including the ability to use inexpensive SDHC cards as archive for original material.
Click to expand...

There isn't much from stopping you from doing that anyway. Archiving can be done at any later stage. I've thought about it, the laptop has an Express Card slot and a SD Card Reader. Rather than copy a SxS to a folder on the HDD, I copy it to a SD card, or both if time allows.

Still to me even SD is too expensive for permanant archive and I am not sure on the stated data retention period for flash ram.
 
Hmmm..
The more I think about this... I'm wondering if these express card reader/media converters we've ordered to work with the EX1 are going to work at all....

I realize, Alister has got one to work on the EX3, but I'm wondering...

Is it possible that the hardware expresscard communication protocol has changed for the EX3.

Having said that, looking at the Sony SBAC-US10 reader. This reader is a USB 2.0 capable reader but is based on connecting directly to computer systems through a high-speed PCI-Express bus.

It's well known from many others who tried to use other cheaper USB express card readers that would not work with the Sony SXS cards from the EX1. We were forced upon buying the Sony USB reader. This is due to the other USB expresscard readers were not PCIe based capable.
The Sony reader is PCIe based.

This thought had me thinking that the expresscard media adapters we're about to try, are not PCIe based and may not work.

After a bit of research, I found one expresscard media adapter (Compact Flash) that is PCIe based.... hmmm... This just may do the trick. They are claiming to be the first expresscard media adapter that is PCIe based. It's a $65 gamble. If all of our others fail, I'll take the gamble... Unless there are other takers.. LOL. Remember to use the fastest CF cards possible.

http://www.synchrotech.com/products-expc/expresscard-memory-card-adapters_03-compactflash_pcie.html
 
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