just ordered my first DSLR

I took the plunge and went for the Canon Rebel XT (black).

My question is, should I order a 1gb CF Card for 20 bucks? or
should i just cough up $80 bucks and get a 4gb CF card?

how many pictures can i take with 1gbCF Card? i was trying to look for a chart that shows u an estimate of how many photos you can take at which resolution but no luck.

How about a middle ground - 2GB?

1Gb will store around 290 JPEG's, or 90 RAW's at max res & size.

You can take plenty of photos on a 1GB card......I personally would prefer (and currently use) a series of 1GB cards so that "all my chickens are not in one basket".....so to speak. If you start to fill up a 4GB card and have an issue - could be trouble and all photos could be lost.

Just my two cents.....

Congrats on the new camera!

get 1gb now and just buy another one if you need it. They are more reliable, will have faster write times and are cheap as chips! 4GB are prob more useful for the 5D's, 1Ds MK2's of this world.

Try to make sure the card has a fast write time eg. x40 or x80 speed as the xt buffer is small

First of all, congrats on taking the plunge...

I would go with the 1Gb cards. It has been said before, but if you have a problem with the card, you don't want to lose 500+ shots.

j5uh wrote in post #2360010
How many pictures can i take with 1gbCF Card? i was trying to look for a chart that shows u an estimate of how many photos you can take at which resolution but no luck.

I'm pretty sure egghead is wrong about the no. of RAW. I put it at about 110 -120 (ISO100) pictures. As for the large and best quality JPEG, it's about 290 pictues. Those are the only values you should be interested in, as you should only shoot at the best quality.

You must also think about the ISO you are shooting in. At high (ie. 1600) ISO, you will get less pictures that if you shoot at low (ie. 100) ISO. The difference may be as much as 50 JPEG pictures (1Gb card). That is something to take into consideration if you are shooting in low light situations.

Andrew.

congrats, i was in the same boat not long ago at all.

it will turn your hobby into a passion quite easily, just don't get frustrated at first if your results are not up to par with your expectations...there can be a learning curve at first!

stick with the 1GB card for now...it should be sufficient. i grabbed a 2GB and have RARELY come close to filling it even half-way....

now you play the waiting game...lol...it's rough!

get 2 - 1 gig cards

Congratulations and welcome to the DSLR 'club'
Here's my two bitsworth on cards...
You must buy a quality 'fast' card from either Lexmar or Scandisc who are the market leadeer You presumably rejected lesser cameras so don't skimp on the card!
Cheap cards will be unreliable and slow to record and slow to download.
Have fun with your new camera - exciting times - I remember them well...
happy snapping!

argh. too late. i ordered the 4gb late last nite. haha.
it was 80 bucks! not too bad.

Wheres the best place to get a camera bag? any suggestions?

ok, i contacted buy.com requesting to switch me to the 1gb instead of the 4 gb card. hopefully they switch me out.

I am with bigcountry post #7. I got my Black XT last month and a 1gb card at Circuit City for $54.00 with a 15$ rebate, so it was 35$. It holds about 250 exposures. On BlackFriday, I got a 2gb for $40 at Staples, although I really wanted another 1gb. But the 2gb was a better deal...

Upon getting my camera, I got the UV lens protector and the 1gb card. Then a 50mm lens. I have a few more things: a battery, ext flash, camera bag and a walkaround lens (either 24-105 or the 28-135)...I am waiting until after the holidays, as I have lots of family and friends to get gifts for!

Good luck and welcome! Dont forget to post your picture of a duck...=)

B&H or Amazon to get a good camera bag. I am ordering one from B& H this month...

Where are you getting 1gb cards for 20bucks?

I got my 2GB for $33 at newegg...i'm sure the 1GB are just a bit lower..

no need to spend a bunch on fancy brand names IMHO, i've never noticed a difference between the two....

others will say that it's faster to use the more expensive ones though...who knows...i can't tell a difference and my income can't quite justify much more than $33 for a little memory card, so .... yeah

I guess I will be the lone voice in favor of a 4 GB card. I love mine, they match well with the storage capacity of dvd's making back-ups easy. I guess I could lose a lot of photos if one failed, but I have never had a card fail *knocks on wood*. I'm much more worried about losing one or having it stolen than actually failing.

I often shoot RAW + small jpeg. Nice combo imho as it gives you the RAW for latter post-processing and printing, but you also get a quick jpeg to look at on the computer or send via email.

argh... well thanks guys for the input!
but they shipped the 4gb card already!

i guess ima just keep it.