Getting new SD Card(s)

[Dakwooz]

Hi,

I've recently purchased my first full frame camera; a 6D. Since it uses SD card and I'm scouting to get them, I have a few questions in mind before purchasing them;

1) It is recommended for me to get a 128GB SD card or 2 x 64GB instead? As I think if the camera runs for too long with the card intact while shooting a video, the heat might cause some damage(s) to it(?)

2) I got an offer on brand new PNY SD Card 128GB Class 10 95mb/s @ $79. Should I get that or brand new 2 x 64GB Sandisk Extreme Pro Class 10 95mb/s instead? (This question implies more on the brand comparison)


Hope to hear some of the more experienced photographers out there's point of view in this and hopefully I can come to a verdict on this. Thank you for your time reading

 

[SkyStrike]

Personally, I feel that it will be "safer" to have 2 cards rather than 1 card. Main reason due to wear and tear. Card do wear out and dies (corrupted or totally unreadable) after use. Some folks I know still bring many pcs of 8gb cards.

1) Are you going to shoot RAW video alot? (I don't think 6D have raw video output, unless you installed ML to do some advance video stuffs) Because RAW video stuffs does take up alot of memory. If you are only going to shoot stills, I'll go with 2 x 64gb. (*if you are doing alot of video stuffs, check out fstoppers, I think many moons ago, they did some detailed tests on video recording and the read/write speed on cards with different capacity stuffs*)

2) Brand preference.... I'll go with Sandisk any day. But some may disagree. Tons of brands out there to pick. But the popular ones are Sandisk and Lexar.

 

[kandinsky]

I'm also with the multiple card option for a mix of practical reasons - Don't put all your eggs in one basket. If card A gets lost/damaged/corrupted, you still have card B. Also when I bought my cards, 64gb kinda had the best price/capacity ratio. I have about 4-5 64gb cards (Sandisk and Transcend).

Believe your fear is unfounded. Have never heard of camera heat damaging sd cards. SD cards generally fairly durable. There are stories of cards that were lost at sea for months and still able to retrieve images off them when found. They're more likely to fail from other reason, data corruption, etc. (Interesting read here: http://photo.stackexchange.com/questions/40489/what-causes-an-sd-card-to-go-corrupt). If anything, your sensor is the one likely to overheat and prevent normal operation.

My impression of PNY is more from their thumbdrives, and they seem to be a bit inconsistent, although pricing is always quite attractive. I'd be wary of trusting my images on their cards. That said, any card from any brand might fail on you if you're unlucky. The only card I ever had fail was a sandisk microsd in my mobile phone.

 

[Dakwooz]

Personally, I feel that it will be "safer" to have 2 cards rather than 1 card. Main reason due to wear and tear. Card do wear out and dies (corrupted or totally unreadable) after use. Some folks I know still bring many pcs of 8gb cards.

1) Are you going to shoot RAW video alot? (I don't think 6D have raw video output, unless you installed ML to do some advance video stuffs) Because RAW video stuffs does take up alot of memory. If you are only going to shoot stills, I'll go with 2 x 64gb. (*if you are doing alot of video stuffs, check out fstoppers, I think many moons ago, they did some detailed tests on video recording and the read/write speed on cards with different capacity stuffs*)

2) Brand preference.... I'll go with Sandisk any day. But some may disagree. Tons of brands out there to pick. But the popular ones are Sandisk and Lexar.

Thank you for your opinion on this! No, It will mainly be focused on stills as compared to RAW videos, and yup, I've checked it out before and Sandisk overpowers the rest haha.

 

[Dakwooz]

I'm also with the multiple card option for a mix of practical reasons - Don't put all your eggs in one basket. If card A gets lost/damaged/corrupted, you still have card B. Also when I bought my cards, 64gb kinda had the best price/capacity ratio. I have about 4-5 64gb cards (Sandisk and Transcend).

Believe your fear is unfounded. Have never heard of camera heat damaging sd cards. SD cards generally fairly durable. There are stories of cards that were lost at sea for months and still able to retrieve images off them when found. They're more likely to fail from other reason, data corruption, etc. (Interesting read here: http://photo.stackexchange.com/questions/40489/what-causes-an-sd-card-to-go-corrupt). If anything, your sensor is the one likely to overheat and prevent normal operation.

My impression of PNY is more from their thumbdrives, and they seem to be a bit inconsistent, although pricing is always quite attractive. I'd be wary of trusting my images on their cards. That said, any card from any brand might fail on you if you're unlucky. The only card I ever had fail was a sandisk microsd in my mobile phone.

Sorry for the wrong information on what I thought might happen to the SD card(s). Thank you for your opinion on this. I've already purchased 2 x 64GB Sandisk Extreme Pro earlier on today cause my head kind of wrapped around that idea like yours too. Thanks also for the additional information on your input on PNY brand

 

[xjosephtbr]

hello skystrike, you mentioned that sd cards do wear out and die. Is there a lifespan or a timeframe of these sd cards before they wear and die out. Im planning to change mine before that happens. im using those sandisk ones

 

[SkyStrike]

hello skystrike, you mentioned that sd cards do wear out and die. Is there a lifespan or a timeframe of these sd cards before they wear and die out. Im planning to change mine before that happens. im using those sandisk ones

I do not have scientific experiments that proves this. But I firmly believe that all hardware will wear out, especially storage.

Personally, I do buy new cards from time to time and "write off" when one does dies from wear and tear. But till then, I still do continue to use them.

 

[Blur Shadow]

Well, I, thankfully, have not had a card die on me.

I would say most of my cards last me years. I just recent found an old 32MB MMC card and another 16MB SD card and they still work fine. They are both over 12 years old.

Flash cards are fairly hardy. I won't imagine them to fail too quickly.

 

[Octarine]

hello skystrike, you mentioned that sd cards do wear out and die. Is there a lifespan or a timeframe of these sd cards before they wear and die out. Im planning to change mine before that happens. im using those sandisk ones

Several layers come in here.
1) Maximum write cycles for the memory cells. Flash memory has a maximum amount of cycles during which data can be written on. These are 6-digit numbers that most users will not reach.
2) Cell failures. To prevent this, spare cells are included and the embedded controller will handle the switching. (Comparable to bad sectors on HDD.)
3) Controller failure. Unpredictable. If it happens, data are gone because only the controller 'knows' the structure of the data inside the memory cells.
All the above are greatly depending on the quality of the maker. That's where cheap brands and counterfeit items fail.
4) File system errors. The file system is as old as Windows 95 (ok, xFAT is newer but still a FAT system). Failures can render data inaccessible for camera and explorer. Data recovery is easy (many tools available) but can be tedious if file names are screwed. Can be prevented by a) do not fill a card to the last image; b) do not delete images on card using camera or explorer; c) use 'format card' in camera menu or 'quick format' in any computer to clear images. Full format can be done occasionally because it enforces a sector check. It results in one additional write cycle to all cells (see 1), though.

 

[Mythmaker]

128GB vs 2x 64GB.

It really depends which era you ask this. Mainly, it depends on how big the die size is. At the current generation, it's probably at 128Gbit, which is 16GB. A 64GB sd card will require 4 NAND dies, and a 128GB will require 8 NAND dies.

Traditionally (and I still believe), SD card's NAND controllers are optimised for 4 NAND dies. Looking at the current pricing for Samsung PRO SD cards confirms this. The further you are from the optimal value, the lower the reliability of the SD card. Most testings are conducted at optimal configurations: the further away it is, the lesser it is tested. So 2x 64GB will be more reliable than 1x 128GB or 4x 32GB. 8GB SD cards are generally the worst nowadays in reliability, unless your 8GB card is produced during an era where mainstream die sizes are 16Gbit (where they are even more reliable due to having more electrons per cell, but that's another topic altogether).

Of course, reliability also comes with the question of whether it's using TLC or MLC NANDs. Samsung EVO is less reliable than their PRO series, mainly because it's on TLC NANDs.

But then again all SD cards are generally unreliable. The NANDs used for SD cards are those that failed to pass the test to be SSD's NAND. SD cards are at the bottom of the food chain (RAM -> SSD -> CF -> Thumbdrives -> SD)... so they get the most jia lat NANDs (Unless you know, that your 8GB card is designed during an era where there's thumbdrives doesn't exist. So it's either RAM quality NANDs or SD quality NANDs then it's probably rock solid reliable. That explains why SD failure is so much higher nowadays compared to the past, because more and more stuff need NAND memory and are being placed ahead of SD cards in the food chain.).

The above are off my mind and I haven't visited SD card architecture for some time (then again, they don't change). So it might be completely off.

 

[ernestt]

I use multiple of 32GB cards, for just picture taking, no video.

Started with 2 sandisk, picked up extra cards during the IT shows over time, when there are really good discount.

Suggest to go with fast cards. You don't want the cards to be the bottle neck during shooting.

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