SDHC card for Nikon D5000

[phexac]

My mother is buying the Nikon D5000 camera. It's 12.9MP and can snap multiple pictures per second and shoot 720p video. So naturally, it needs a fast memory card. I was looking for flash cards on newegg and basically found several class 6 SDHC cards from OcZ and Kingston for about $20. As I understand it, class 6 means guaranteed speeds of 6MB/sec data transfer. http://www.newegg.com/Product/...?Item=N82E16820227235)

But then I saw a SanDisk card that did not specify what class it was, but rather had 30MB/sec in the specification. And that card is about $70, so 3.5 times as expensive. http://www.newegg.com/Product/...?Item=N82E16820171377)

My question is whether that card is actually faster or is SanDisk just choosing to advertise something that all class 6 cards can do anyway. And would any class 6 card actually be fast enough? I mean I was doing some math, and if you snap 5-7 frames per second at 1.5MB-3MB per frame, that's way more than the 6MB/sec transfer speed that those class 6 cards guarantee.

I appreciate any input here. Thanks guys.

 

[jpeyton]

Sandisk cards are faster, but not necessary for video.

I use a cheap Class 6 A-Data Turbo card with my D90 to record video and it works just fine.

 

[OulOat]

Every quarter or so Sandisk offers excellent rebates on their cards. The past couple times I checked you could get the Extreme III 8 gigs SDHC cards for ~5 bucks. I believe I got mine for $20 a year or two ago.

 

[BabaBooey]

sandisk extreme III or IV cards are blazing fast,I have the 8gb EXTREME III and it does very well in my D40x and S5is cameras.


S5is for sale BTW ...

 

[tdawg]

I'm using class 6 pny cards (their national geographic line, i think) and I've had no issues shooting continuous frames or video with my d90, so you should be fine without sandisk.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

I bought 2 Transcend Class 6 cards and they both peak at 20mb/ps... i can upload 700mb real fast...

 

[Madwand1]

Originally posted by: phexac
My question is whether that card is actually faster or is SanDisk just choosing to advertise something that all class 6 cards can do anyway. And would any class 6 card actually be fast enough?

There's more data available for the similar D90, so I'll base some estimates on that.

This site gives a 100 MB/min approximate video storage rate. That comes under 2 MB/s, so any class 6 card should be OK for video.

http://www.luminous-landscape....iews/cameras/d90.shtml

This site gives more detail on still capture performance:

http://www.robgalbraith.com/bi...page.asp?cid=6007-9597

Using an inexpensive A-Data Turbo 8 GB SDHC card in a card reader, I measure ~12 MB/s write and 18 MB/s read using FAT32. The packaging stated 10 MB/s write and 22 MB/s read.

The D90 at least has some more headroom for write performance according to Galbraith's measurements, but it's not that much for most cards, and the price climbs rapidly beyond this sort of level at present.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

Here are the little guys I bought. They also come with just the card here.