C300: C300II CFast Failure

J

jefft99

Active member
While recording in 4k to 2 Lexar 3500x CFast 2.0 Cards (256gb), after switching the slots, something happened. The card seemed to reset itself, giving me the full 83 minutes of record time. I did not initialize it. While I was able to recover some of the information, much was lost. Has anyone experienced this?

Secondly, while I was also recording proxy files, I'm curious if there's a way to use a better HD codec for duel-recording to the SD card as opposed to the proxy...Any suggestions?

Really worried to film documentary work with this camera now...I haven't heard of reliability issues....Your thoughts are so appreciated.
 
I'm sorry this happened to you, I've seen it from others who have used Lexar. I keep saying on every forum DO NOT USE LEXAR CARDS. Arri tested them in the Amira early on and found that they do not stand up to consistent data writing. The san disk cards are more expensive for a reason, they work.
 
My Lexar 128GB 3500x card failed on me too.

The Aero Quartet guys managed to recover a lot of the files off the card for me, you might want to look at the app they've made.
 
Thanks, all. It's odd because those are approved by Canon and listed within the accessories on B&H. Very disappointing, given the costs and what ends up getting lost.
 
Lexar cards

Lexar cards

jm.gardiner said:
I'm sorry this happened to you, I've seen it from others who have used Lexar. I keep saying on every forum DO NOT USE LEXAR CARDS. Arri tested them in the Amira early on and found that they do not stand up to consistent data writing. The san disk cards are more expensive for a reason, they work.
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I've been using lexar cards for something like 14 months now without any issues . Am I missing something? I've shot HD , 2k , 4K , actually lots of 4K , no problems at all.
 
I took Slavik's advice and picked up a Transcend 600 256gb cfast and its' been working great. To be fair I've only done a little 4k shooting, but several full shoots in 12 bit 444 + all slow-mo modes without a single issue.
 
jefft99 said:
Thanks, all. It's odd because those are approved by Canon and listed within the accessories on B&H. Very disappointing, given the costs and what ends up getting lost.
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I'd love to see some real data on this because the one off experiences you read on forums account for so little of the cards in use today. No one posts about how their card didn't fail during a shoot today.

Name brand media tends to be more or less the same stuff. No card manufacturers have a patent on some crazy better card tech that no one else has. I used to use Transcend until one failed. Then I switched to Lexar (so far none have failed for me).

Again, I'd be really interested to see some data on field failures for CFast cards. Anyone have a link to one?
 
I hear about a card failure about once a month either through people I know/work with or on an online forum. There was a similar post like this six months ago and I said the same thing and then there was a dozen people saying they had no problems with their cards. I personally don't see the benefit of going for the cheaper media if it risks even one shoot day out of my year.

Speaking with the some of the san disk guys at cine-gear last year they said they're QC might be more rigorous than other manufacturers. Take that for what it's worth. I've personally used Delkin and Lexar cards all day provided by the production only to have them fail two or three cards into a day. I only need the one experience.
 
jm.gardiner said:
I hear about a card failure about once a month either through people I know/work with or on an online forum. There was a similar post like this six months ago and I said the same thing and then there was a dozen people saying they had no problems with their cards. I personally don't see the benefit of going for the cheaper media if it risks even one shoot day out of my year.

I agree with the idea that risky media deserves no place in my workflow. Speaking of which I have 10 year old P2 cards that still work just fine.... but I don't use them at all.

My lexar cards have had zero failures and I'll continue to use them. Checking B&H today it seems like Sandisk cards are cheaper than Lexars right now-

Failure modes are complex to analyze and we are given to affixing blame to the easiest thing in the heat of the moment. Often times I only know something went wrong and not exactly what went wrong and why. Blaming a memory is easy but not 100% accurate. Is there something I did or some one else did that was a precipitating event for the observed failure? When we lose media, most often the response is to get out of the situation as fast as possible and keep moving forward rather than analyze what happened and why, especially when we are on set and 'losing light'.

Next time I buy Cfast2 cards I'll consider my options carefully but up to this point 14months into C300 Mk2 use I have no reason to suddenly worry about my cards.
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Mark Smith said:
Checking B&H today it seems like Sandisk cards are cheaper than Lexars right now
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This is what I didn't understand about the cheaper media remark. Lexar and SanDisk are in the same class and constantly switch back and forth on who is $20 cheaper than the other.
 
Not to be a smartass, but if you're spooked by card failure, the fact that there are two card slots, allowing simultaneous recording, might set your mind at ease?
 
I have 2 Lexus professional 3500x 256gb cards and I never had any problems loading and off loading data.. Granted I only wrote 7 hours to the card over a few shoots in 4K, but they work without a hitch.. Maybe over the long haul they don't hold up? Not sure, but I did not experience even a hiccup..
 
Sorry to hear about your CFast Card issues. Ughh, never a good thing when expensive media fails. We do not yet own the C300 MKII but have rented it and used it with Transcend and San Disk media, no issues yet. We are contemplating the purchase of either the Odyssey or a Shogun Inferno that could serve double duty as a monitor and recorder whether we end up buying the C300 MKII or a C100 MKIII or whatever other camera looks good for the Spring after NAB. We always shoot with dual recording on our C100 and record to our Ninja Blade for this exact reason and it saved our rears once already. We were shooting green screen interviews at Fox for a TV show documentary, we were three quarters of the way through the interviews with ten different show writers and all of the sudden, for no reason, the hard drive in our Blade decided that it wanted to be formatted. Needless to say, I checked the clips we had recorded and they had somehow disappeared and the drive was displaying the "Skippy" warning indicator on the Blade screen, which is usually the result of a drive problem with skipped frames. Luckily, we had dual recorded the interviews on the C100s internal SD cards so I converted them to Prores in post and delivered them to the client, they keyed fine as they were simple composites and we lit them and the green screen correctly. That was a moment when I realized it is simply too risky to only record on one card, if there are options available to record on two cards, or a card and an external recorder.
 
DavidAC said:
Not to be a smartass, but if you're spooked by card failure, the fact that there are two card slots, allowing simultaneous recording, might set your mind at ease?
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The huge amount of data when shooting 4K sometimes just does not allow simultaneous recording, some environments and time restrictions makes available space on both cards precious.
 
Plexi Head said:
The huge amount of data when shooting 4K sometimes just does not allow simultaneous recording, some environments and time restrictions makes available space on both cards precious.
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Well that's the advantage of the Lexars; they're available in 256 GB so you're more likely to be able to dual record with 82 minutes of 4K vs 128 GB (41 minutes) on the Sandisk. Sandisk may be more reliable (or maybe fewer people bought them so there are less reported problems), but if using Sandisk means not using dual record, then that may actually make Sandisk less reliable. Or maybe not. Hard to say.

I own eight Lexar 256 GB cards and always tripple slot record. Last week I had a Lexar card say at the end of the shoot that it needed to be formatted, so it malfunctioned and would not read in the camera or a computer. Not sure of the problem. Maybe the card is bad. Of course I was dual recording and both the second Lexar card and the proxy were fine, so all ended well.

Now if I had been using Sandisk 128 GB card not in dual record, and that card malfunctioned, then all I'd have left is a proxy file shot on C-Log 3, needing a grade with 8 bits. Then again, maybe the sandisk would not have gotten corrupted. But no one claims Sandisk is perfect; they can malfunction too. So it's a trade off. At least for now I'll take the ability to dual record on possibly less reliable 256 GB cards over not dual recording on possibly more reliable 128 GB cards. We'll see how reliable they remain as more time passes.
 
Eric Coughlin said:
Well that's the advantage of the Lexars; they're available in 256 GB so you're more likely to be able to dual record with 82 minutes of 4K vs 128 GB (41 minutes) on the Sandisk. Sandisk may be more reliable (or maybe fewer people bought them so there are less reported problems), but if using Sandisk means not using dual record, then that may actually make Sandisk less reliable. Or maybe not. Hard to say.

I own eight Lexar 256 GB cards and always tripple slot record. Last week I had a Lexar card say at the end of the shoot that it needed to be formatted, so it malfunctioned and would not read in the camera or a computer. Not sure of the problem. Maybe the card is bad. Of course I was dual recording and both the second Lexar card and the proxy were fine, so all ended well.

Now if I had been using Sandisk 128 GB card not in dual record, and that card malfunctioned, then all I'd have left is a proxy file shot on C-Log 3, needing a grade with 8 bits. Then again, maybe the sandisk would not have gotten corrupted. But no one claims Sandisk is perfect; they can malfunction too. So it's a trade off. At least for now I'll take the ability to dual record on possibly less reliable 256 GB cards over not dual recording on possibly more reliable 128 GB cards. We'll see how reliable they remain as more time passes.
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Always triple slot when recording for 1080 and the proxy files have saved me once. I have always been scared to use 256 GB cards as anecdotal evidence of them failing has always made me wary. Will take your advice and purchase some 256 GB cards.
 
We had few card failures earlier when we got our C300mkiis,

We discovered few solutions after try and error approach to the failures that we faced:

1) Cheaper cards just dying on us
Solution >>> Only using approved-for-Canon Sandisk CFast2.0 cards (And not mixing Alexa mini cards and the C300mkii cards, mark each card for which camera)

2) The camera op used to Switch off the camera immediately after he stops rolling which caused some error in the card
Solution >>> Wait 10 seconds before switching off the camera after a cut.

3) for all other random reasons of failures
Solution >>> We do not change the card (eject or insert) except while the camera is switched off


Hope that helps,
And would love to hear peoples thoughts about this as well, The C300mkii has been my favorite camera to use during the past year.
 
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