Sony Camera Memory Cards

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benjamming

benjamming

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I'm about to buy a new camera, Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX9V which uses SD, SDHC, SDXC, & Sony's Memory stick cards. I need a new memory card since my old camera used CompactFlash. I had sorta thought that I would get a 16GB Class 10 SDHC card. However, I don't know if this is the optimum size & type. How much room does an 1080p/60p HD video occupy on a per minute basis?

Which SDHC card brands are better or are they all pretty much the same as long as they are Class 10?
ABT Electronics has the Transcend TS16GSDHC10 for $23.70. The "same" Sony card SF-16NX/TQ is $39.95. Any reason to justify buying the higher priced Sony card?
There is also the Transcend TS32GSDHC10, a 32GB Class 10 card for $45.55. Of course, the Sony SF-32NX/TQ is the "same" card but higher at $69.

Or, should I get an SDXC card? A Transcend 64GB card is ~ $91. A Lexar 128GB card is ~ $179.

I don't think that I would want Sony's Memory Stick as they are proprietary & couldn't be used in as many other devices.

Thanks.
 
Originally Posted By: benjamming
How much room does an 1080p/60p HD video occupy on a per minute basis?

Go to Sony's website and download the owner's manual for this camera. Specifically page 24 will answer your question. Depending on the quality/compression level you select, you can fit from 9 to 25 minutes of video on a 2GB card, so between 72 and 200 minutes of video on a 16GB card.

Quote:
Or, should I get an SDXC card? A Transcend 64GB card is ~ $91. A Lexar 128GB card is ~ $179.

It's up to you. Personally I'd rather get a handful of smaller cards (such as 16GB) instead of one huge one. Not only are they cheaper, but you're also a bit safer. Should a card go bad for some reason, you'll only lose what's on that one card vs. losing everything. And if you're traveling and one card fails, you have another one or two standing by to record your photos/videos on.
 
Also, if I did my math right, 2GB/9min = 3.7 MB/s, so a Class 10 card should have no problem keeping up with this demand.

Then again, are you planning to use this camera mainly for video recording? If so, you may be better served with a dedicated camcorder which will have much better zoom capabilities and low light performance. These small digicams are cool for recording brief video clips in good lighting conditions, but otherwise...
 
Personally, I think as long as the card has good speed (i.e. class 10) then it is a good card, and personally, I'd prefer a big card than a bunch of small one so if I move to a new camera with higher resolution or move to a video camera i can still reuse it.

It used to be that some cheap skate brands (i.e. some from Taiwan) would use high speed memory in the beginning then the low speed stuff in the end to make it appear to be very fast, or use an algorithm that is very fast at first then slow down when the card is full. The newer SD speed class test against that and now most cards perform as expected, especially in the class 10 grade.

I'd stay away from Memory Stick as Sony's standard is going down hill and would not want to get stuck with a big card only for one brand. Sony does not have a FAB or their own SD controller company, so they are just re branding their stuff from someone else (most likely Toshiba or Panasonic).
 
SDHC and SDXC are to get around the file system and size limitation of the standard, for all card above 4GB it has to be SDHC (regular SD 4GB is theoretically possible but no one made it), and I think anything above 32GB is SDXC.

The internal design of the same brand between SDHC and SDXC are very likely identical.
 
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Just a personal preference but if it was me, I would rather have several smaller capacity cards instead of 1 large capacity card, it's rare but if something ever happens to the card and it was a high capacity card that you had everything on it's a much bigger loss than if you had it spread out over several smaller cards...that's not to say if you just lose the camera and all the cards with it then nothing is going to help then lol..
 
QP,

For whatever reason (I'm calling it baby brain), I had not thought about downloading the camera manual prior to purchase. Excellent idea.

I'm certainly not looking at shooting tons of video with a camera, but I like the flexibility.

PandaBear,
Yeah, so no Memory Stick. I'll stick with SDHC I reckon.

Good to know about the performance amongst the brands.

wkcars,

Yeah, I'll stick with either a 16GB or 32GB card - nothing too huge.
 
I shoot as a hobby and as a side (part-time) job.

I use nothing but class 10 4gb cards.

There are two MAJOR reasons why you want to use 4gb aswell.

1) You don't want all your eggs (photos) in one basket (memory card).

Memory cards (even the best ones out there) malfunction. They break, get lost, ect. . . .

I do not want 16gb worth of photos on ONE card. If one card goes bad or gets lost, I normally have (depending on the shoot) atleast one if not two other cards with work on them. So the project is not a total loss.

2) It is EASSSSSY and CHEAP to back up your work. One blank DVD holds 4gb! One memory card fits on ONE DVD.

Backing up your photos is important. DVDs are cheap and are a great way to have a second or even third back up of your work.

Breaking up photos from a 16gb card is a pain and a waste of time. One sd card fits one DVD.

Done!!!


Hope that helps!!
 
FYI, Newegg has these 16GB Wintec cards on sale for $20.99 right now with free shipping. The reviews are very positive. I ended up buying one. The write speed (using my PC and a card reader) is around steady 16 MB/s.
 
Originally Posted By: benjamming
Why only Sandisk & Lexar? Which other ones have you tried that turned out poor? What made them poor?


I have never tried any other ones. No need to.

Ask any real pro what they use. And not the ones that get paid to say "lexar".

National Geographic, NY Times, AP, ect. . . photographers use either Sandisk or Lexar for the most part.


Just like:
Nikon and Canon.

Are Pantax cameras bad????

No.

But there not a Nikon or Canon.

You use whatever. But there are so many great reviews for the main two makers. Why buy anything else?????
 
There is a difference between "professional card" and the bargain cards: the memory is SLC rather than MLC so they are more durable.

At least for SanDisk the performance is tuned differently, but the firmware and controller hardware is the same. When I was there the stability verification is very strict, primarily in random write and read with power cycle to see if it gets corrupted. I heard good things about Lexar as well as Toshiba (Kingston SD card, they use Samsung for USB).

There used to be a huge difference between big brands and generic brands, but with speed class the gap has shrunk.
 
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