What's the difference between series E & R in P2 cards?

A

Angelshare1

Well-known member
I was about to buy a 170 and saw that this may be an issue. I understand you have to download a software upgrade if you use E series and film in DVCPRO HD. Does this work fairly well or would you recomend staying away from E series for the 170? Does the upgrade cost anything?

Thanks in advance!
 
The firmware upgrade cost nothing - and the cards function exactly the same... zero quality differences.

The E cards can actually be offloaded faster (depending on how you connect them to your system) - but are also rated for less read/write cycles.

Whereas the R series cards were rated at somewhere over 100,000 read/write cycles if I"m not mistaken (and I might be)... the E series cards are rated at somewhere around 2,000 full read/write cycles.

But - to put that in perspective - you can write and reformat a FULL E series card every single day for 5 years before it will reach anywhere near the end of its life cycle. And obviously, if you don't fill them every single day...they'll last much longer.

In the scheme of things - that is an eternity as far as I'm concerned.
Think about what we were shooting on 5 years ago.
:)

I just got two new E series 32GB cards, and they perform exactly the same as my old R series.
 
E Series cards last for fewer read write cycles but are cheaper. I suspect they'll last at least as long as you have your camera for even with heavy use...and maybe even for as long as P2 remains around (not that it's going anywhere soon.)
 
DJDecay said:
E series cards are cheaper, but PANA disclaims any responsibility for their life-cycle, lost footage etc..

If you're shooting something quite important ($$$$$) use R, hobbies and no shooting schedule use E.
Click to expand...

This is complete nonsense. Please ignore.
 
The 'E' series has a life span of five years of use if filled ONCE a day for five years. That means you are good for five years if you do not refill that card during your shoot that day.
So, If I have a 16g card, with an expected rec length of ~16 minutes, and I am shooting a full day [5 hours actual shooting], and swapping with another 16gig/16min card. That gives me 2.5 hours of shooting, & transfer that day on that card, and that makes ten read/write cycles.

And THAT would mean you just reduced the life of the card by ten days in just one shoot! Now if you are doing this daily, like shooting a series, or running news show, your life expectancy of an 'E' series card is no longer the 1825 days of shooting, but now only 182.5, or roughly six & a half months.

The way I look at it, the 'E' series is a bic disposable lighter compared to the 'A through R' series being a Zippo.
 
I believe the E cards use the equivalent of wear leveling just like SSDs do so that the MLC cells aren't constantly rewritten and use is spread across the entire capacity of the card.
 
zogh said:
The way I look at it, the 'E' series is a bic disposable lighter compared to the 'A through R' series being a Zippo.
Click to expand...

I like that analogy. I wouldn't consider an E-series second hand. Both are overpriced but the alternative is MiniDV (HVX200). Still, once mine arrive (R-series, maybe it doesn't matter, may it does) I'm sure I'll be able to put the price behind me and look to the overpriced bag to put the camera in. Still not sure if getting a great deal on a HVX (not much more than the DVX I was looking for) was a good idea as my wallet continues to hemorrhage on accessories. But I'm definitely in love with it. Nice, big and heavy - fits my fantasy, though I've already given up on trying to use it without a tripod. 2.5kg is literally a sack of potatoes!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top