CF1 or CF2 Which one to get

[Nascar Nut]

I am going to pick up my DRebel this weekend. Was wondering if there is much difference between the two cards. I don't really care if it takes longer to transfer to my computer or not. I want the best card for the camera. Will I notice much difference between the two while taking pictures. I like taking photos of sports and wildlife mainly so I want to be able to take multiple shots if needed quickly. There are some great deals on the 512 mb 1 cards this week in the paper. Thanks for any imput you may have.

[CyberDyneSystems]

Theres quite few threads on this subject.. in brief the DRebel and 10D do the worst job of taking advantage of card speed of just about all the DSLRs out there. by buying a faster card,. you may not see a noticeable increase in performance.

Most any "fast" card is faster than the DRebel can handle. Buy a name brand quality card to keep your data safe,. but I would not worry too much about speed ratings.

[cloudless]

CF Type I and CF Type II differs only in physical size, with CF Type II roughly doubles the thickness of CF Type I. Is that what you're asking about?

[Nascar Nut]

CF Type I and CF Type II differs only in physical size, with CF Type II roughly doubles the thickness of CF Type I. Is that what you're asking about?
No, I was wondering about the speed of the card in the camera.

[cloudless]

So I guess the subject should be more properly named "Ultra I vs Ultra II".

[Nascar Nut]

So I guess the subject should be more properly named "Ultra I vs Ultra II".
Ok, you could say that. There are several CF cards on sale. No ultras though. Is there that much benifit in the ultra cards as far as the camera is concerned?

[BCdives]

Hey NASCAR, if you are going to be shooting NASCAR I would tell you, regardless of the make of card you buy, pick out the biggest fastest one you can afford...then buy the next size bigger. You will be amazed how fast your will fill them up with all the sights and sounds at a NASCAR event. :shock: (that is if you plan on shooting any) Hey but thats just me!

Have fun and enjoy the DRebel!

[Conor]

Hey NASCAR, if you are going to be shooting NASCAR I would tell you, regardless of the make of card you buy, pick out the biggest fastest one you can afford...then buy the next size bigger. You will be amazed how fast your will fill them up with all the sights and sounds at a NASCAR event. :shock: (that is if you plan on shooting any) Hey but thats just me!

Have fun and enjoy the DRebel!

its already been said many times that these canon cameras do not take advantage of the faster cards. so just spend hte extra money on buying a "bigger" card instead of a faster card.

[Nascar Nut]

I will be shooting Nascar races for sure. So a regular cf card versus the ultra will do just as good in the canon rebel. There is a big difference in the price. Why would you want to pay more if it isn't going to help out. I want to make sure I can just snap those shots off

[CyberDyneSystems]

Nascar Nut,.

If this is an important issue to you,... you may want to look at the definitive resource for CF speed info;

http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/multi_page.asp?cid=6007

Read up and draw your own conclusions.

In the drop down menu you can select cameras... all of the same cards are tested in each camera listed.

So first check the Drebel, and see how much extra speed the premium cards will offer,., (ther is a little boost)

But then look at the fast cameras like the D2h and see how much speed you are missing.

Then draw your own conclusions as to whether or not the incremental speed boost is worth the cash to you. :wink:

[CyberDyneSystems]

Hey NASCAR, if you are going to be shooting NASCAR I would tell you, regardless of the make of card you buy, pick out the biggest fastest one you can afford...then buy the next size bigger. You will be amazed how fast your will fill them up with all the sights and sounds at a NASCAR event. :shock: (that is if you plan on shooting any) Hey but thats just me!

Have fun and enjoy the DRebel!

its already been said many times that these canon cameras do not take advantage of the faster cards. so just spend hte extra money on buying a "bigger" card instead of a faster card.

The thing is it is not a cut dry answer,. I agree with you Conor,. but BC is in fact totally correct that there IS a speed increase to be gained.

The bottom line is it is only a matter of opinion as to whether the speed increase that is gained with certain faster cards is in fact worth the extra$$

To me,.. the increase is far to small in the 10D for it to be worth the $$$

For BC.. that slight increase is worth his $$$

No ones right or wrong.. it's just a difference of opinion on where we place the value.

BC raised another good point on this the last time he and I mixed it up on this issue :) (we do this often,. it's like excercise! :wink: )

... the point,. Our man BC may be holding a 1Ds or a MkII someday...

Then those pricey cards he invested in will shine.

As it stands,. I too am hoping to be holding a 1DMkII by June... (oh lord it be sooner)

...at which point I will be crying over the slow cards I have.


Anyway,. in the 10D they are nearly as fast as an "Ultra" at half the price! :P :P

[Nascar Nut]

Thanks for the link CyberDyneSystems, going to read up on these and figure out what I want to do. Looks like I am not in as big of a hurry now. Went to get my camera I had on hold at ultimate electronics. That is the only place in town that had one. They had only one. Guess what some salesman did. Yep, sold it this morning. It was tagged as sold to. The guy will hopefully loose his job. I bet he sold it to a friend. Anyway to try to make it right, they took $200 off the price. Getting the kit for $800. That eased the pain a little. Now I have to wait 2-3 weeks. Was really looking forward to playing around with it tomorrow to.

[CyberDyneSystems]

Wow! :shock: :shock:

GOOD Deal!

I wish some Idiot salesman would do that to me and save me $200.00!

Looks like you can spend it on a 2Gig CF card! :)

Here's the best price you'll find on a quality "normal" speed CF @ 1Gig

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=10340687&loc=1978

[Nascar Nut]

Was comparing the sandisk ultra vs standard.
Ultra is 1123K/sec
Standard is 736K/sec
That seems like alot to me. I am new to the slr digital stuff. With my 35 mm I can just snap the shots off one right after another. Will I be able to do that with the standard card or not. Excuse my ignorance please. I really am thankful for what ever help I get.

[Canuck]

It is also worth mentioning that the CF II cards are mini harddrives and they too have limits. A CF I card is rated at 4,000G or a 10 ft drop. Try that with the CF II (not really). It will not survive. The way it works like their larger computer hard drives is that it floats on a cushion of air and this too is another point...it will not work at extremely high altitudes. That is, if you go up in the Alps, or toward the top of mountains in Colorado or the like it will not work in the rare air. It too has temperature operating tolerances and I believe they are not as broad as the CF I and now especially with the Ultra and Ultra II. CF I cards are solid state and also have no moving parts so that is another bonus. There used to be a time when CF II cards were larger and cheaper then CF 1 and that seems to be no longer the case. There will be 8 GB cards out later this year from what is said. That's insane! I have 2x 512MB at present.

[CyberDyneSystems]

Was comparing the sandisk ultra vs standard.
Ultra is 1123K/sec
Standard is 736K/sec
That seems like alot to me. I am new to the slr digital stuff. With my 35 mm I can just snap the shots off one right after another. Will I be able to do that with the standard card or not. Excuse my ignorance please. I really am thankful for what ever help I get.

There are a lot of standard cards on the list with 1000K/sec plus ratings.. the 736 you picked is the slowest of the bunch I think. The Sandisk original @ 1018K/sec for instance.

So that extra $$ for the ultra will buy you a 10% - 12% increase over a Sandisk "normal" or not even 10% over a Microdrive @ 1097K/sec

Where as the "Ultra" will give you a 300% increase on a D2h!!!!!!!! :shock:

That test does not include the Viking,. but at DPreview the Viking scored with some of the fastest cards they tested.. faster than Lexar 12 and 16X cards! :shock:

http://www.dpreview.com/articles/mediacompare/page2.asp

Also note there are "fast" cards that rate slower than some "normal" ones on that list,. so just by getting a card rated as fast makes no guarantee!

Be sure to get a card that is rated well on the list! :)

[Mikesht]

Wow! :shock: :shock:

GOOD Deal!

I wish some Idiot salesman would do that to me and save me $200.00!

Looks like you can spend it on a 2Gig CF card! :)

Here's the best price you'll find on a quality "normal" speed CF @ 1Gig

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=10340687&loc=1978


Let me offer one small suggestion: I would buy not one lagre card but a few small ones (like 256 or 512) just because they do go bad sometimes, and then you loose all your photos at once and plus you do not have a card to keep shooting untill replacement. Just my 2 cents of wisdom.

[drisley]

CF1 and CF2 are exactly the same in every way except thickness.
So, there is no difference in speed.

But when it comes to high speed CF cards (a totally different subject)...

I had the basic Sandisk CF cards that I used on my Digital Rebel.
I just bought a Dane-Elec 12x CF card and I definately notice a difference. It's about twice as fast as the basic single-speed Sandisk cards.

The best part was that these 12x cards were the same price (in some cases cheaper than) as the basic and 4x cards.

[Nascar Nut]

Thanks everyone for the info and the links. I ended up buying a Lexar 512 mb 12x for 80 bucks right here in town. That was to good of a deal to pass up. Will start out with that one and see how it works. I want to get another 512 as well. That Viking looks very impressive to me.

[Jesper]

It is also worth mentioning that the CF II cards are mini harddrives and they too have limits.

That's not necessarily true. Maybe all microdrives are the size of a type II CF card, but not all type II CF cards are microdrives.

[CyberDyneSystems]

Thanks everyone for the info and the links. I ended up buying a Lexar 512 mb 12x for 80 bucks right here in town. That was to good of a deal to pass up. Will start out with that one and see how it works. I want to get another 512 as well. That Viking looks very impressive to me.

Thats a GREAT PRICE on a lexar 512!!!!

[theoldmoose]

Folks have hinted a bit about speed issues related to the camera itself, but let's be a bit more clear:

If you care about shooting a bunch of high speed photos back-to-back, as in Nascar shots, you really don't want the Digital Rebel.

I know that it is a good deal (I have one, and like it for the price, in particular), but it is not a substitute for your motor-drive 35mm SLR.

If you check out the Digital Rebel review on dpreview, and I believe steves-digicams also talk about the shooting speed of the cameras they review, you will find that most digital cameras will shoot a limited number of initial frames (sometimes as few as 3 or 4) and then stall, sometimes for 20-30 seconds, while they write the in-camera buffer to the flash card storage. If you shoot RAW, it's usually even slower.

Some cameras can keep shooting as long as there is a least enough space in the in-camera buffer for one image, but at a reduced rate, because they are now being paced by how fast the camera can write to the flash card at the same time it is buffering incoming data from the sensor/image processing section.

There is a reason that (at least up 'till now) there have benn two distinct categories of DSLRs out there -- the fast ones, and the large sensor ones. If you get a camera with a large (6MP or bigger, at the moment) sensor, quite likely you will not be happy with the shooting speed, if you are trying to shoot motorsports. This situation is improving, with the introduction of some pricey, fast cameras, but then the 'large image sensor' marker is being moved up into the 8+ MP range, as well.

I know that the Digital Rebel looks like a great buy, but the salesman that 'sold one out from under you' may have done you a favor, and saved you from an almost-thousand dollar mistake. If you can't afford one of the multi-thousand dollar high-speed cameras, then you probably should hold onto your motor-drive film camera for a while, yet, until the price of a fast 6MP+ camera comes down to your price point.

Otherwise, I'm afraid that you are in for a big disappointment.