Is there a reason not to get a class 10 card?

O

oxband

Well-known member
I need to buy a few SD cards for my camera. I currently use class 6 and am happy with it. thinking about it though, sincve the class 10 have higher transfer rates, part of me wants to get class 10 for the new cards as it's entirely possible in 3 years I could find myself using them on a new-fangled camera with different transfer speed needs. It's not a likely possibility, but i figure it could happen, and since the cost difference is small, I ought go for the class 10.

Has anyone had problems with class 10? [Regretably, for budget reasons, I'll likely be getting Transcend or Patriot cards.]
 
Never buy budget cards. Ever. Only get the very best, most-reliable, highest-quality cards you can get, from a trusted authorized reseller. The HMC150 only needs Class 4. If your choice is between a great-quality Class 4, and some off-brand Class 10, I'd say get the Class 4.
 
the basic fear is that, with a lower level brand, im more likely to have a catatrophic error, that one time i might try to transfer and realize all my shooting is bunk? i'm less concerned about performance than reliability.
 
Barry_Green said:
Never buy budget cards. Ever. Only get the very best, most-reliable, highest-quality cards you can get, from a trusted authorized reseller. The HMC150 only needs Class 4. If your choice is between a great-quality Class 4, and some off-brand Class 10, I'd say get the Class 4.
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Disclaimer: I think Barry is amazing, and talented, and smart, and and... will have to differ with him on this :D

I'm sure as a filmmaker he's had some bad luck with cheaper cards, but today (2008+) many of the same factories who are producing the cards for high end brands are doing the same cards without the brand name. Transcend cards which are like 30-40% cheaper, have been tested against brand names like sandisk without fail. This is sorta like the people who claim goldplated cables are better for a digital signal .. people still believe in that myth.

If the data write speed matches the speed of the card, it will work fine. You only need a faster card if you're writing faster data, and or want to read off it faster.
 
oxband said:
the basic fear is that, with a lower level brand, im more likely to have a catatrophic error, that one time i might try to transfer and realize all my shooting is bunk? i'm less concerned about performance than reliability.
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Me too. Which is why I said exactly what I said -- stay away from fringe brands and only buy the best. And if the best card is slower, so what? At least you'll have more peace of mind in knowing that your footage will actually be there.

A faster speed class is no indication of a card's reliability. There are optional protocols and parameters in the SD card standard, and some manufacturers implement them all, and some cheap out. Stay away from the cheap cards.
 
vagarob said:
Disclaimer: I think Barry is amazing, and talented, and smart, and and... will have to differ with him on this :D

I'm sure as a filmmaker he's had some bad luck with cheaper cards, but today (2008+) many of the same factories who are producing the cards for high end brands are doing the same cards without the brand name. Transcend cards which are like 30-40% cheaper, have been tested against brand names like sandisk without fail. This is sorta like the people who claim goldplated cables are better for a digital signal .. people still believe in that myth.

If the data write speed matches the speed of the card, it will work fine. You only need a faster card if you're writing faster data, and or want to read off it faster.
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Sorry, but I do indeed have to disagree. There are differences in the way cards are made. And, worse, there are absolutely fake/counterfeit/knockoff cards out there. Not all SD cards are the same.

Use whatever you're comfortable with. I don't use "monster" audio cables, as I know when someone's handing out a line of bullpucky. But I do use the Panasonic Gold and SanDisk Extreme cards, and I'm really comfortable with that decision. :thumbsup:
 
vagarob said:
Transcend cards which are like 30-40% cheaper, have been tested against brand names like sandisk without fail.
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I'm a little brand ignorant - I thought Transcend cards were supposed to be good - my 8Gb class 6 has been rock solid for over a year.
 
Transcends have been 100% reliable for me. I've been using a class 6 16 GB card since October of '08. II have just recently added 2 class 10 8 GB transcend cards (on sale at B&H)- no problems with them, either. That being said- the counterfeit card things is out of control. Our department has gotten MULTIPLE bogus cards- they either show up as a different capacity, or much slower than their label states. I guess I am saying to only buy from sellers you trust or have researched. We check every card before we go out on a shoot.
 
Transcend cards are good. Just cheaper than buying a brand name like Panasonic. When I made my post I wasn't talking about counterfeit cards, that could happen with *any* brand name.

I'm talking about the manufacturers of the nand flash chips are limited in terms of where you source them from. Quality control can only go so far in the digital world... either it works or doesnt. its hard to predict why a panasonic card is going to have better reliability over another brand. ive had sandisk cards get corrupted.. was that the card, or the cameras fault?

SD standards for data retention is not something optional, from what I read, so i dunno where Barry got that information -- but id love to read that. In terms of speed and what class you can market it as, thats another isuse.
 
I didn't get get anything about data retention from what Barry said. I think he's referring to the stanards and quality of the components that make up a cheaper the card. A kia will drive me to the store just fine but it's not made up of the same parts as a mercedes. Get the drift!

Furthermore, I just don't get why anyone who thinks highly enough of Panasonic to shell out what it costs to buy a DVX or an HMC, would put anything in it other that what the manufacturer recommends. In life you always get what you pay for. There's no free lunch ; )
 
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I ended up going with Transcend class 10 cards and did not have any problems with them yet. i am not saying that memory cards never fail, but i have seen something good and something bad about every brand out there, except maybe for the EXTREMEs. A lot of problems can be avoided by careful card management. i suspect that there is a lot of operator error generating bad reviews. I read somewhere that formatting too often shortens the life of the card. So i got into the habit of just clearing files after the first use, and then reformatting every OTHER time. not sure if that helps or not, but it seems to make sense. i do think you need to reformat once in a while in order to keep the card from getting fragmented. reformatting (at least in the HMC150) is faster than deleting files, but since it might cause a longevity problem, i dont do it all the time. HOWEVER, if you think about it, you really should be using brand new cards for each new paid job. If we were using tape or film, we would certainly need new stock for each project. If you were to budget 150 dollars for a handful of 16GB cards that could end up giving you 30 or more hours of footage by the time you go through them all 4 or 5 times, you are still way ahead of the game compared to buying that much tape or film. That is being super conservative, but im just saying that we shouldnt complain if a card fails after several dozen passes.
 
AGMedia said:
Coming from a pro photography background -- among the top rules is to buy only the best storage media. Two years ago I bought a series of Sandisk Extreme 3 "30 Mbps" Class 6 SDHC cards. In two years with hundreds of hours of filming and God only knows how many formats -- I have not had one single problem. NOT ONE SINGLE PROBLEM. I've never once seen "Card Check" -- that I only know about because I've read it on this forum. ON THE OTHER HAND -- there's a bunch of characters who saved thirty or forty dollars by buying "Transcend" or "Patriot" or whatever no name brand -- and you can read all about their card failure issues on this forum (do a search).

SO -- DON'T COMPROMISE ON YOUR MEDIA -- and, like me, after two years of brutal use your SDHC cards can prove to be exactly as reliable as our P2 cards.
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This discussion pops up about every month on this HMC150 forum -- and I suspect this exact same discussion will continue for the next three years in the AF-100 forum.

Inexperienced people think they're saving money by buying generic cards, and then try to justify themselves by claiming all cards are the same. They are not the same. Yes, you get what you pay for. I don't care what "they guy who sold me the card" told you nor what is written at the Transcend marketing web site. Do your own scientific analysis -- search this forum. To date there is one very vague claim of an unspecified Sandisk card failure. There are two or three Panasonic SDHC card failures reported. There are Delkin card failures reported -- but to Delkin's credit they came forward and stated that there was a problem with various cards they sell when used with the HMC150 and they offered some kind of resolution. Beyond this there is an OCEAN of Transcend and aData card failures reported in every form from pleas for help through to warnings and horror stories.

The cheap card purchase situation is the same as buying a no-name DV tape for an HVX200 at The Dollar Store, claiming it's identical in quality to a Panasonic Broadcast tape, and then blaming the HVX when the no-name Dollar Store DV tape gets chewed up in the camera.

So, I don't know what it's going to take to prove to people that a high end Sandisk is not identical to a "Transcend" -- but I'm telling you that they're not the same and whatever money you saved by buying generic will likely turn out to be the most costly money you've ever saved.

The advice Barry Green gave at the opening of this thread is entirely correct.
 
AGMedia said:
This discussion pops up about every month on this HMC150 forum -- and I suspect this exact same discussion will continue for the next three years in the AF-100 forum.

Inexperienced people think they're saving money by buying generic cards, and then try to justify themselves by claiming all cards are the same. They are not the same. Yes, you get what you pay for. I don't care what "they guy who sold me the card" told you nor what is written at the Transcend marketing web site. Do your own scientific analysis -- search this forum. To date there is one very vague claim of an unspecified Sandisk card failure. There are two or three Panasonic SDHC card failures reported. There are Delkin card failures reported -- but to Delkin's credit they came forward and stated that there was a problem with various cards they sell when used with the HMC150 and they offered some kind of resolution. Beyond this there is an OCEAN of Transcend and aData card failures reported in every form from pleas for help through to warnings and horror stories.

The cheap card purchase situation is the same as buying a no-name DV tape for an HVX200 at The Dollar Store, claiming it's identical in quality to a Panasonic Broadcast tape, and then blaming the HVX when the no-name Dollar Store DV tape gets chewed up in the camera.

So, I don't know what it's going to take to prove to people that a high end Sandisk is not identical to a "Transcend" -- but I'm telling you that they're not the same and whatever money you saved by buying generic will likely turn out to be the most costly money you've ever saved.

The advice Barry Green gave at the opening of this thread is entirely correct.
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There is so many things wrong with your post... you cannot do "scientific analysis" based on a forum search, especially one that favors the Panasonic brand. You cannot compare analogue vs digital. of course a tape that is better manufactured will have a longer life, because there are moving parts.

Someone link me to a research paper that shows why Panasonic brand is better in terms of reliability and ill start to believe the 30-40% price difference.
 
Scientific or not, the number of reports speak for themselves. Panasonics and Sandisks cost more and have less reported failures. Full stop! If $30 or $40 is worth risking a job worth thousands then I do wish you the best of luck. According to the numbers you're gonna need it!
 
robydon said:
Scientific or not, the number of reports speak for themselves. Panasonics and Sandisks cost more and have less reported failures. Full stop! If $30 or $40 is worth risking a job worth thousands then I do wish you the best of luck. According to the numbers you're gonna need it!
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I'm not talking about saving $$$. I don't care about the extra $40, i'm talking about people who claim Panasonic/Sandisk brand is reliability better without any evidence to back that up -- other than personal views and forum posts.

People argue the same thing about hard drives (and now SSDs). google released a report on hard drive failure (hundreds of thousands) and brand name did NOT play an impact on drive failure. Thats a device with mechanical moving parts. Now you're claiming brand names matter in product failure with SD memory chips? prove it.
 
Vagarob, as I have said, the number of failures of the brands you are advocating for speak to their reliability! Please take the time to read the forums on same.
 
At NAB I have had the occasion to discuss such things with the engineers who make these kinds of products. And I've been told that yes, the core NAND memory is pretty much the same. But the difference comes in how the memory card works with that memory. Some just slap some base memory in there, strip out all additional features, and sell it for cheap. And it'll work, for a little while. But if they haven't implemented integral wear leveling, you could end up wearing out sections of the card through repeated rewrites to the same place. There are things that the manufacturers can do which will increase the reliability of the card, including sophisticated error checking instead of just dumping the bytes of data out there and "hoping they stick". An intelligent controller can scan and test for bad memory cells and mark them as bad. A lazy/cheap controller may not go through the effort and just write the data and if it works, it works, if it doesn't, it doesn't.

I don't have any outside white papers to direct you to, all I can point you to is the marketing materials the companies themselves provide, where they make their claims as to what types of technologies they employ to minimize errors and increase reliability.
http://www.sandisk.com/business-solutions/ssd/movie-4-flash-reliability-%E2%80%93-flash-technology-tutorial
http://panasonic.net/avc/sdcard/features/index.html

I searched Transcend's site but couldn't find any comparable claims, other than to say that they support "ECC - Error Correcting Code", but no mention of if it's 4-bit or 6-bit as SanDisk claims.

Same thing with A-Data; I didn't see any mention of anything they do to improve reliability other than using ECC.

Read into that what you will, use whatever cards you like, but I've been told by the engineers of these cards that they're doing things that are above and beyond what the SDHC specification calls for, and they seem to be loudly trumpeting that too. Maybe I'm a sucker and paying more and maybe the Transcend or A-Data really are just as good, I don't know. But I do know that I'm happy with the way these cards are working, I have had issues with other brands before, and I think trying to save money on your storage medium is about as unappealing a move to me, as trying to save money on your lens filters.
 
I've been using 6 Patriot 32GB IRIS SDHC cards for over 18 months now, and never experienced any problems with them.

The Patriot web page for the IRIS cards states: "The Patriot IRIS memory card is designed for video professionals"

Compared to other SDHC cards the IRIS cards seem to be slightly thicker and denser, but they fit perfectly in all the SDHC slots I've used them in.

The reason I tried Patriot SDHC cards in the first place is that Patriot is only a memory company and doesn't make any other products.

Using the ATTO Disk Benchmark my Patriot cards showed a write speed of 17 MB/sec and read speed of 20 MB/sec, which is way over the Class 6 spec of 6 MB/sec read/write speed.
 
The absolute cheapest counterfeit cards will use weak materials and you'll run into issues other than the memory. If the thing snaps in half it doesn't matter how great the performance was.

The real brands have some good cards, and just because Panasonic& Sandisk say we're the best doesn't mean its true. If people want to buy into that marketing hype ... well thats okay :) I'm more into controlled tests ... and since i can't find any you really do have to use your own judgement.

I just don't think its right to express that judgement publicly while denouncing all other brands as crap & unreliable. If you want to see some more heated discussion just check out the SSD forums Intel Vs OCZ .... :)
 
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