Following on from a thread I started in March ( Numpties DSLR) and thank you one and all for the feedback. After my most recent trip, which involved backpacking and mountain storms, followed by several days kayaking with friends, I have decided to go for a waterproof camera. Last weekend I was caught in two torrential downpours whilst out on long walks, and was grateful I had an Aquapac for my phone. The ability to take a short video of the rain coming down in biblical proportions would have been good!
I'm going to buy an Olympus TG4 as I have a 16 day rafting trip early Oct, and I shall be able to hang it off my life vest, and after that I may be joining friends kayaking so lots of water is involved.
My question is, are memory cards much of a muchness, size apart, or are some better than others? Any advice appreciated, as always.
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I've had loads over the years running 5 cameras between the family in this house. I'd not worried much about brand in the beginning but for the last few years I've only bought premium brands from authorised sellers, I've also replaced all our budget ones.
This was prompted by one no-brand card that failed in the software sense taking a whole load of important images with it, another where the casing came apart due to the frequent removal/insertion and, although not in a camera, another cheapy micro SD card in my marine mapping Garmin corrupted risking a reduction in safety at sea.
I've been buying Sandisk Extreme cards lately.
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Yes, on the good-as-the-weakest-link principle, don't skimp on cards. I've found Sandisk reliable and the Extreme ranges are worth the extra for the speed, so you're not waiting for the camera to write to the card before you can shoot again.
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I've never had an SD card fail. I suspect any differences in reliability are to do with quality control, Lexar and probably others say their 'professional' or top-line cards are all checked but that only means they worked when they were tested, so you should get fewer DOAs. I've bought Kingston, Lexar, Sandisk, and even 7dayshop cheap ones. My cameras currently have Sandisk Ultra or Extreme in them. I imagine my most-used one is a 32GB Toshiba Class 10 micro SD card in the dashcam - that gets overwritten every 6 hours of driving and hasn't failed after over a year.
Consumer tests are always about speed. They don't fail often enough to get a reliable reliability index, unless somebody has been collecting data by brand from the year dot. Even then, I suspect there are fewer actual manufacturers than brands and the innards could be sourced from different places from time to time. Speculation.
A new card is more likely to fail than one that has been used and 'tested' a few times, it seems to me. So I wouldn't put a brand new card in for a special trip. If you haven't a suitable card already, buy new and use it a few times (transferring, erasing, rewriting) before you go.
Eventually they will fail, but that is probably more about the number of writes and erasures than age unless the card has been damaged (wet/corroded/bent). The number of write cycles they can be expected to handle is high enough not to worry about for most applications - on a scale of 100,000 has been suggested.
Last edited by: Manatee on Fri 28 Aug 15 at 10:37
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This link to the SD Association website should prove interesting as it explains the differences between the various ranges:
www.sdcard.org/developers/overview/speed_class/
Like flash drives, memory cards have not only prove faster and with ever higher capacities but also dropped very substantially in price.
I paid £25 for my first purchased SD card, a modest 32Mb, to use in company with the 8Mb example that came with a Minolta E203 digital camera. That was in 2001 - today you can get microSD cards of 32Gb or 64Gb for much less than that...:-)
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My best memory card has been a Duracell branded one. Sandisk have never let me down.
Don't get one thats too big tho. 32gb is well enough
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"32gb is well enough"
Agreed. Apart from the 'eggs in one basket' scenario, some older PC's can't read more than 32Gb from a card.
Also, if only on the rule-proving exception principle, I currently have a Sandisk Extreme SD card and one each of Lexar and Toshiba USB sticks, all of which once worked, but no longer do. With camera cards, when I've copied the files onto a computer (and checked them!) I re-format the card in the camera, which ensures that the camera can talk to it and that the file system is set up the way the camera wants.
As long as the camera can play back files, you can always extract them using a USB lead.
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Just received this offer via a news e-mail from 7DayShop (excellent outlet for many years):
tinyurl.com/nchtnmj
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Don't buy cheap ones from eBay (regardless of the store or card branding).
They're almost certainly counterfeits that are only about 32MB but report a capacity of X gigabytes to the device they're in. Pretty much anything written to the card will be corrupted.
They're so cheap from the right place that there's not really any excuse. Even Currys will sell you a 32GB card at a bearable price, or occasionally you can get stupid bargains from mobymemory.co.uk.
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I've just bought a couple of Kingston Class 10 32GB miniSDHC with adaptors for 7 notes a pop from the same emporium:-
tinyurl.com/pl6svs6
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don't use mini cards with an adaptor. Two sets of contacts is one set of contacts too many.
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>> don't use mini cards with an adaptor. Two sets of contacts is one set of
>> contacts too many.
>>
I've been doing it that way for donks without issues. YMMV.
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I use adaptors so as to write to a card, for example putting maps onto a micro SD card for my walking/cycling Garmin. Agree with Z though about more general and intensive read/write use.
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>> I've been doing it that way for donks without issues. YMMV.
Indeed MM has varied. The ONLY lost data I have suffered is from micro sd cards in sd card adaptors.
You are happy to take the risk, thats fine.
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How do you transfer data to/from a micro SD card otherwise?
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most devices you put the micro sd card into have a USB port. They were never designed for ease of removal or insertion.
Last edited by: Zero on Mon 31 Aug 15 at 13:41
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>> don't use mini cards with an adaptor. Two sets of contacts is one set of contacts too many. >>
Come with them anyway. The miniSD card I bought was for my HTC One M8 mobile.
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On the subject of micro cards, my smartphone (Which I hate with a passion) has a micro sim. I fancy going back to a flip phone but most use a standard card. Are there likely to be problems using one of those micro to standard size adaptors?
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>> On the subject of micro cards, my smartphone (Which I hate with a passion) has
>> a micro sim. I fancy going back to a flip phone but most use a
>> standard card.
Firstly, are you sure about that?
>> Are there likely to be problems using one of those micro to standard
>> size adaptors?
as long as it goes into the phone, and stays there once in, shouldn't be an issue
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Thanks everybody for the advice. Think I will go for the Sandisk, bur undecided whether to take one or two of the 32 Gb size on the trip. There will be no mains charging available for 16 days, so I may need a spare battery. I have an old solar charger but it is a pain to use, and on flat water popping a new battery into the camera should be an easier operation.
One more question please...a spare OE LI-92 B battery is expensive , so would a compatible one be acceptable? In the grand scheme of things, money wise, it's not a deal breaker compared to the cost of my trip. But it is the price of a night in a motel compared to putting the tent up somewhere!!
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I've had compatibles from here
www.exprodirect.com/
with no problems. They also sell on Amazon if you find it easier to buy from there.
Your battery number doesn't come up but you can search by camera.
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Thanks. I shall have a look at that website.
An Olympus Li-92B rechargeable Lithium is £44.99 on Amazon. Maybe I'm just out of touch with battery prices, but it isn't a cheap camera to start with. I hope to be taking plenty of video, at least when I'm able to.
OTOH, I find it impossible to capture on film the places I have backpacked. Sometimes best just to sit quietly and stare for a while!
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>> Thanks. I shall have a look at that website.
>> An Olympus Li-92B rechargeable Lithium is £44.99 on Amazon. Maybe I'm just out of touch
>> with battery prices, but it isn't a cheap camera to start with. I hope to
>> be taking plenty of video, at least when I'm able to.
>> OTOH, I find it impossible to capture on film the places I have backpacked. Sometimes
>> best just to sit quietly and stare for a while!
Buy a go pro when you get back to the states
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. Sometimes it's best just to sit quietly and stare for a while!
>>
There's a lot to be said for that approach. I find it rather sad that a lot of people never really look at anything. Out comes the phone or camera, take the picture and move on.
A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
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I'm firmly in that camp CGN. I spent a long time staring recently whilst walking the TRT. Some people rush round in 12 days, we took 18 days, with several side trips. Leisurely afternoons in and out of mountain lakes, quietly watching wild life, sitting reading and dozing in the sun. The idea of rushing a walk, head down, and seeing nothing doesn't appeal. You cannot capture the sounds, smells and emotional fulfilment with a camera.
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Looks as if it could be catalogued as a 90B - Amazon uses both designations for the same battery.
www.exprodirect.com/product.php?productid=41438&cat=14537&page=1
£7.97
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Thanks Manatee, A virtual pint of Kirkby Lonsdales ' Single Track' is on its way!
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Write speed can also affect a card. Look for the small number in a circle on the front of the card. Higher the number, faster the write speed.
Write speed dictates how quickly the image is written to the card - useful when shooting burst mode or HD video. It also speeds up the file trasnfer process when downloading images to a pc. Ive always used Kingston or Sandisk SDHC cards. Only ever had one failure (physical rather than loss of data) which was a split in the plastic cover. I tried to repair it and 'fiddled'' too much. I still have the actual chip which I could send to a specialist recovery company, but I can't be ar...bothered.
Never buy cheap (unheard of brands) cards off dodgy auction sites (or even Amazon).
I've heard tales where the images saved are constantly overwritten because it claims to be 32gb when in fact its only 8gb. Some dodgy sellers can make a card read as a larger capacity than it actually is despite what your pc tells you.
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Final report.
Memory cards (2x 32Gb) received, went for Sandisk Extreme, plus two spare batteries from the link above. In addition got a sport holder, so I can attach the camera to a buoyancy vest plus a float strap. Lightweight tripod on its way, so hope, with practice, to get some decent composite shots... Star trails etc. hoping for very little light pollution down the big hole!
Thanks again for advice. Much appreciated.
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Camera memory cards - Fenlander
