CF & SD cards for 5d Mk3

Just about to purchase the 5dMk3.

I also need to upgrade media storage, CF & SD cards have come on a long way since I last purchased. Could anyone please recommend a a good option for both in terms of speed and quality. Also what size card would you recommend, is it cheaper to buy two smaller cards than one large.

Thanks

SD on the 5D3 is a far slower animal than the CF by design. The camera does not support the UHS (Ultra High Speed) standard for the SD slot so even if you were working with an SD and CF card of the exact same speed the performance of the CF would be far superior. If speed is mission critical for you I would avoid using the SD slot altogether in favour of CF. Many people feel Canon dropped the ball on that one but it is what it is. Doesn't mean the SD slot is useless. I use it most of the time.

Card size is really about personal preference. I tend to use smaller cards around 16G because I travel a lot. I swap them out often, back them up and keep the originals till I get them home and backed up on my main system. This way if I suffer a failure or a loss I'm only risking a limited amount of photos. There is no lack of good cards around. I tend to stick with the more popular brands. SanDisk, Lexar, etc. Watch Amazon, B&H, etc for discounts. They pop up often. I avoid eBay. Too many stories of knockoff cards.

Difficult to recommend a specific card as you don't say what your intended use is. Casual shooter? HD video??

Thanks for the Feed back, I a casual shooter, do not take sports type photos often, I have thought much about the use of the 5dMk3 for video or how good it will be but I sure I will use it. Is it best to have to cards, one for video one for photos. Prices vary quite a bit, don't want to buy something I don't need and at the same time something that is bot up to the job. I understand it/'s nit easy to recommend a specific card but what would you lean towards for general photography.

Thanks again

From my memory, the 5D3 manual suggestions a CF minimum write speed of 30MB/s, but recommends 45MB/s. I have Sandisk 30mb/s and 60mb/s cards and haven't had any issues. Personally, I think the manufacturer specs can be very misleading. I believe we are interested most in the guaranteed minimum write speeds. With that said, take a look at this Lexar Pro 800x (120MB/sec) card, and then read the first line of it's description. ( http://www.amazon.com …fRID=0MA8QXNE67​KHFMR519ZB )

For 5D3 giant RAW files I like a 16 or 32GB card.

Sandisk, RiData and Transcend have all been good to me. The latter cards are bargain priced, the Sandisk has better reputation and likely faster speeds.

Shoot with the CF cards as others have mentioned, especially if you intend to shoot fast! and consider the slower SD card as back up.

Thanks for the replies

In my 7D2 I have two SanDisk extreme pro cards, the SD is rated at 95mb/sec and the CF at 160, my understanding is that with the CF card at that speed I can shoot JPEG until the card is full at 10fps...

i have 4 sandisk extreme 32 gb 120 Mb/s cards, and they work great FWIW..

for what its worth...

just purchased a 5dmarkIII bundle from B & H. Had some concern about the CF & SD cards for this camera AND my computer and its limitations. My computer is a 27 in IMAC mid 2011 and comes with 2.0 usb and thunderbolt I. USB 3 started right after I purchased my computer so even if I use the usb 2.0 with a 3.0 card reader (backwards compatible) there will still be a bottleneck with the 2.0.

So wanting an efficient solution for reading my cards to the computer I found the Lexar hub workstation II (thunderbolt and 3.0) a prime candidate for my needs. A quick phone call to a Lexar rep provided some worthwhile information.

1) the canon 5dmarkIII can utilize the CF 1066x (read and write) effectively
2) the canon 5dmarkIII with the SD is another story...although it quite can't get to 600x speeds I ordered one over the lesser grade of card...from the way I understand it, the bottleneck will be at the camera (writing). Reading it to the computer will not be an issue with thunderbolt.

IMO the Kingston ultimate 600X 32GB is the speed-v.-price winner.

http://www.dpreview.co​m/forums/post/55421524

Only $48. http://www.amazon.com …ngston+ultimate​+600X+32GB

The limiter on record speed is the 5D3's system and not the cards' speeds.

SD card interface on 5DMk3 is limited to 25MB/s. In reality with overhead and stuff, it is more like 18-20 max. It is more than sufficient for the default video recording. If you shoot a lot of burst in RAW mode, then CF is the way to go.

Buy from trusted sources like the larger camera shops and watch for the periodic sales. The two packs are a nice bundle and they are offered in 16 and 32G sizes when speaking of the San Disk Extreme and Lexar. Sandisk has done well for me over the years so most mine now are the Sandisk 120MB/s cards.

I'm mostly a portrait/cosplay shooter, so I don't really do the rapid burst-mode shooting, so my slow Transcend 400x (blue) 32GB CF cards are fine for me, been shooting for 3 years with them on my 2 5DM3 bodies. I have the 5DM3's write the RAW files to the CF card slot, and the JPG files to the SD card slot (and shoot RAW+JPG, obviously).

I also use the Transcend SD cards, usually 32GB in capacity, I think the 45MB/S (or higher) rated SD cards. The SD slot does slow down rapid burst mode shooting.