Fact or Fiction - Memory card life?

[Ray.Petri]

Hi Guys

Has anyone out there in cyberspace got an authoritive answer for me - Do memory cards have a limited life if too much formatting is carried out. Note: Ido not refer to microdrives. The reason I ask is that a few of my friends are under the impression that continued re-formatting in camera will reduce their life.

Many thanks.

[vchavez]

I don't care or you could don't care If you purchase Sandisk Compact Flash cards
they have for live warranty.

[Double Negative]

Technically, there IS a lifespan specified. I think it's something like 100,000 erasures or something equally vague. For all intents and purposes, it'll last forever because as vchavez said - SanDisk at least comes with a lifetime warranty.

[claudermilk]

It'll become obsolete long before it wears out. I have some 16MB cards from years ago still going strong...of course they only hold 2 images anymore so are effectively useless now. :)

[denMAR]

Everything has a life, it just depends whether or not you'll see it die or not.

[mbellot]

Technically, there IS a lifespan specified. I think it's something like 100,000 erasures or something equally vague.

Its technically 100,000 write/erase cycles (up from 10,000 for first generation flash parts).

Thats "gauranteed" performance for the flash memory - real life use will probably yield higher numbers.

Go ahead and format each time if it makes you feel good. I usually reformat about every fifth or sixth time through the camera/card reader.

[defordphoto]

Remember: Lifetime Warranty means for the effective lifetime of the card itself, not YOUR lifetime.

[Ray.Petri]

Thanks Everyone.

The answer is obvious from anyone who replied 'SanDisk at least comes with a lifetime warranty'

I shall now carry on reformatting as it's quicker than deleting.

Regards

[Double Negative]

I reformat all the time for just the same reason.

[wazmunstr]

i used to format every time. now i dont see the point. once in a while yes, everytime? ive heard it does something to the card.

[Double Negative]

I've reformatted my Microdrive zillions of times.

Why should it be any different than writing/erasing? A format does a lot less reading/writing and accomplishes the same thing - actually causing less wear.

[Wilt]

Think about it...memory in a CF card is merely memory in a physically different package than computer memory. Every time you start your computer and every time you start a program and every time you load a data file, you are writing over the memory...over and over and over and over. Get the point?...do you worry about 'wearing' out your PC's memory or do you just use it over and over? So one day a bit might fail, and so you get new memory...CF is really temporary memory like PC memory is.

--wilt

[Jon]

Think about it...memory in a CF card is merely memory in a physically different package than computer memory. Every time you start your computer and every time you start a program and every time you load a data file, you are writing over the memory...over and over and over and over. Get the point?...do you worry about 'wearing' out your PC's memory or do you just use it over and over? So one day a bit might fail, and so you get new memory...CF is really temporary memory like PC memory is.

--wilt
Actually, not quite. Flash memory (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_memory) (CF cards) undergoes a state change when you write to it; DRAM only maintains the signal as long as power's supplied. That's why it's "Dynamic". It's the changes that flash goes through as it's written that are the limiting factors.

[Lester Wareham]

Hi Guys

Has anyone out there in cyberspace got an authoritive answer for me - Do memory cards have a limited life if too much formatting is carried out. Note: Ido not refer to microdrives. The reason I ask is that a few of my friends are under the impression that continued re-formatting in camera will reduce their life.

Many thanks.

Aparantly there is but I suspect it is not a practicle limit in real life. The camera format seems to be a quick format (rather then writting to each location like on a floppy) that just resets the file allocation table, deleting all shots takes much longer to execute as this seems to rewrite each directory entry. So formatting may cause less operations than deleting.

[lakiluno]

the number of 100,000 writes per sector is about right. Reading doesn't do anything much. As Jon said, Flash memory is nothing like RAM found in computers. (try fitting a battery into an SD card and you'll know what I mean :D)

Remember that a format simply wipes the first bit of information in the file system, effectively erasing any reference the file system had to the files on it. The files are still there, just the file system has discarded them. A delete works in a similar way, but has to wipe the reference to each file independantly, so takes longer. Personally, I format. Its quicker and gets rid of everything at once, and its not any more harmful than deleting.

Leo

[Double Negative]

Exactly...

[storeman]

Deleting the images simply replaces the first character of the filename which the OS / firmware recognises as the file has been deleted. Formatting clearss the file allocation table (FAT) which removes the pointers to the images and clears the filenames. Formatting is quicker because it changes fewer bytes on the card or disk. Formatting flash memory is less likely to reduce the life of the card than deleting.

[Jon]

Um . . . Formatting the card always clears the File Allocation Tables, which are at a fairly static area on the card; deleting a file changes a byte in a subdirectory which may occur at a random place in the card. If your only concern is getting maximum card life (a dubious exercise in many ways[/i] you should always delete files, and periodically (but not every time) delete folders rather than reformat. If you delete the files and folders every time, you're causing the \DCIM\ directory to be rewritten every time, while by letting extra folders build up, you're changing where data's written.

[Citizensmith]

The limited write/erase cycles for flash memory is unlikely to ever be a limiting factor for digital photography.

It's different in the hard drive world though. A few companies are looking at flash as a way of either providing hard drives with a much improved cache, or replacing them all together. Suddenly 100,000 write/erase cycles is something you could be hitting in months. Be interesting to see how they come up with ways around it.

[YARRO]

In a Dutch computer magazine flash memory was tested.
After several hundreds of thousands of write/cycles they stopped the test for practical reasons, the deadline for the magazine.
The flash cards all worked as if fresh out of the box and will most certainly outlast the camera and probably it's owner.

[bones]

I don't care either....all the ones I own are guaranteed for life.

Bones

[Wilt]

Actually, not quite. Flash memory (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_memory) (CF cards) undergoes a state change when you write to it; DRAM only maintains the signal as long as power's supplied. That's why it's "Dynamic". It's the changes that flash goes through as it's written that are the limiting factors.

Doh... but of course, I know enough about memory that I should have considered that!

[JohnnyG]

Let's see here. If the flash cards are good for 100,000 cycles then if I format my card 5 times a day which of course is very high but let's say I did, then the life of the card would be approx. 54 and 3/4 years if I did that right but either way, that's a very long time and me and my camera and cards and everything else will be history!

So, I'm not worried about formatting my cards which I do every time after I use them!

So, there.........