Compact Flash, types?!

Scott Salisbury · 28 May 2007 at 14:48

Hey all,

I'm getting into a bit of photography as a hobby so I've just bought myself the Olympus E400 SLR which I spotted in a sale.

At the moment I've bunged in an old 512MB xD card from my other camera, but after setting it up to the settings I want, I'm only going to get 60 pictures on it, which is not great.

I'm thinking about buying a Compact Flash card to go with it, I've spotted a lot of really cheap non-brand cards and some god damn expensive branded cards but I'm not sure what the differences are. Are the expensive ones just faster?

What do the different types mean? Type I, Type III etc.

Any recomendations? I had my eye on the Crucial 4GB on OCUK for £30 but it's a type I?!

glitch · 28 May 2007 at 15:03

The faster 'rated' a CD card is, the quicker data can be written to it and read from it. Speed only comes into account when your camera's internals can take advantage of the faster data-transfer speed when it moves the data written on its internal buffer to the memory card that is inserted.

it's always advisable to go for the fastest card card you can afford, but be aware that not all cameras have the necessary technology within to take advantage of the really speedy ones.

Most people will recommend the SanDisk Extreme III range as being the best balance of price and performance, and apart from getting a quick, reliable memory card you'll also get a very useful image recovery program bundled with it.

As for types, CF I and CF II relate to the thickness of the cards themselves more than anything. You'll find all (certainly all I've ever seen) memory cards are Type I and things like the Microdrives (minature hard-drives in the shape of a CF card) are Type II.

Scott Salisbury · 28 May 2007 at 15:13

Thanks for the reply.

Ah right, well I just checked the manuel for my camera, it supports CF Type I and Type II.

When shopping around though, some sites give them a speed rating rather than a 'Type'. How do I know if the given speed rating is supported by my camera as the manual doesn't specify?

glitch · 28 May 2007 at 15:24

You'll really never need to worry about 'Type' as all solid-state CF cards are going to be Type I.

As for speed, I believe the Olympus can take partial advantage of the faster cards, but it's not got the innards that would suit something like the SanDisk Extreme IV range or Lexar Professional 133X - you'd need the level under that, which is Extreme III territory.

Spend an extra £10 over the Crucial and get a 4GB SanDisk Extreme III. I doubt you'll regret it.

SilverPenguin · 28 May 2007 at 15:31

Even the D2x doesn't take advantage of the read/write speeds of Extreme 3 cards. That said, viewing images and zooming in to them etc is instant with no lag at all no matter how fast you are cycling through, that probably helps with faster cards.

Just get the fastest card you can afford and the camera will write to it as fast as it can.