Digital Camera Media, what's the difference?

[xerocool]

Basically I'm looking into get a new digital camera, the Canon S60 that just came out looks pretty good to me, but it uses CompactFlash memory which I understand has slower read and write speeds than Secure Digital.

So basically I'm asking this question to all you camera buffs out there, which is the best (regardless of price), and which is the best (inclusive of price)? And why?

Also, I heard different media are used for different things, like some lady at Good Guys said that like SD was used just for movies and CF was used for pictures, or some trash like that, I doubt it's true, but for those cameras that can take more than one type of media at a time, what's the purpose of that?

Thanks!

 

[cw42]

i did a google search, and here is one of the articles.

google is god.

 

[xerocool]

Originally posted by: cw42
i did a google search, and here is one of the articles.

google is god.

thanks!! and google is god if i invest in them and they make me rich

 

[anthrax]

I would say SD and Compact Flash enjoy the broadest support.
SD for smaller comsumer devices...
Compact Flash for power users, that need loads of space and capacity..

 

[RanDum72]

price/MB winner = CF, with SD a close second.

 

[secretweapon]

The are different media formats developed for digital storage. In terms of camera memory, MMC & Smartmedia are generally for older/cheaper cameras with lower capacity. I have yet to see these 2 formats with cards bigger than 128mb.

Compactflash is the old standard and is widely employed by Cannon/Nikkon. It is also the card of choice for prosumer/SLR cameras due to it's larger storage of up to 8GB. They're not necessarily slower, the higher models have speeds of 40X or more.

SD is joint developed by Toshiba/Panasonic/Sandisk. It is smaller and labeled as the future choice for digital cameras. More and more compact cameras are converting to this format. The panasonic ones are considered the best as panasonic cards with 256mb capacity or more have speeds of 10mb/s compare to 2mb/s for the generic stuff.

XD/Memory stick/Memory Stick PRO/DUO are priporietory (sp?) memory for Fuji/Olympus/Sony respectively. Olympus and Fuji co developed XD and it is the smallest memory card of the group. Some of the Olympus cameras require Olympus brand XD cards for the panaoramic function. Sony uses memory sticks. Memory stick Pro is faster and is required for their newer Movie modes. Memory stick Duo is smaller and is used in their new compacts like the T-1. Some of the Konica-Minolta cameras such as the G-400/500 aka KD-410/510 can also use Memory sticks.

Hope this helps.

 

[AndyHui]

There are different versions of Compact Flash. CF has the memory controller onboard, and it is up to the manufacturer as to which one to implement. If you buy the high-speed CF cards, these can significantly outperform SD cards (for a price of course).

CF's advantage is that it comes with much larger capacities, such as 2.2GB and 4GB, however, it is a larger card. SD currently tops out at 1GB or so.

As for the other memory formats...

MMC, or MultiMedia card, is effectively a dead format limited to 128MB and is superceded by SD.
Sony Memory Stick is expensive and generally limited to Sony devices.
SmartMedia is a dead format.
XD is a format used by Olympus, Fuji and a few others. It is similar to SD, but is smaller in size. Price is very high though.

 

[xerocool]

thanks for all the replies guys!! but for those cameras that can handle more than one format at a time, like my mom has a minolta g500, what happens when you put more than one format into a camera at a time?

 

[vegetation]

One major reason why I like compact flash so much is how well it adapts to a cheap $10 pcmcia pin converter. Just swap in the memory card and dump everything very fast. Since no driver is ever needed, I can take my pin converter card to a friend with a laptop who never has used this device, but it wont matter. While I've seen a few pcmcia type SD readers, they were like $50 and required instaling a driver. I don't like to use any external dongle converters either, as it blows chunks when you have a laptop.

 

[GTaudiophile]

Originally posted by: AndyHui
There are different versions of Compact Flash. CF has the memory controller onboard, and it is up to the manufacturer as to which one to implement. If you buy the high-speed CF cards, these can significantly outperform SD cards (for a price of course).

CF's advantage is that it comes with much larger capacities, such as 2.2GB and 4GB, however, it is a larger card. SD currently tops out at 1GB or so.

As for the other memory formats...

MMC, or MultiMedia card, is effectively a dead format limited to 128MB and is superceded by SD.
Sony Memory Stick is expensive and generally limited to Sony devices.
SmartMedia is a dead format.
XD is a format used by Olympus, Fuji and a few others. It is similar to SD, but is smaller in size. Price is very high though.

Andy: I need to correct you. CF cards now top out at 12GB.

CF cards are the most widely used I would say and offer the best value, MB/$.

 

[AndyHui]

GTaudiophile: A question of semantics. I never said what the highest capacity for CF actually was.