[35mmfilmfan]

I've been reading many of the earlier threads on this site (thanks to all posters and responders, brilliant way to spend a wet afternoon), and I have noticed some common 'issues', one of them being failure of SDHC cards, and much advice being given about formatting in camera, using specialised PC and MAC software to do so, etc.

I have not yet (touching wood) had any such issues, and I wonder if it may be due to my UOKF policy. No, it's not rude - stands for Use Once, Keep Forever. I backup my cards after every session to PC hard drive, then backing that up to a separate hard drive, and when each card fills up - I file it and use a brand new one.

I'm surprised people will happily (even joyously) spend large amounts on bodies, lenses, tripods and ancillary equipment, then 'economise' on the most important link in the entire image capture chain - the capture medium, which is undoubtedly the least expensive item needed ! After all, no matter how good the camera, the optics and the vision of the photographer, if the image fails to record all is lost.

Just a thought.

Tony

[lithedreamer]

If it works for you, go for it? I've only had SD cards fail on me rarely, and never when I was relying on them. I don't cheap out on my SD cards (my favourite at the moment are these guys) but... :shrug:

I do agree with you wholeheartedly on the importance of back-ups, though! Do you have any off-site?

[narual]

I don't see the point of pretending that your SD card is a single use device. People use them constantly, all over the world, day in and day out. Of course a few are going to fail. That's why they have warranties, and why the (optional) battery grip of your camera has a slot for a spare SD card.
A Sandisk Extreme Pro SD card costs about $50-100 depending on size and speed (you could go up to $310/card), and you need 2 of them, plus a spare, for a K3 or newer.

I can only guess that you're taking JPGs rather than raw, and not very many of them, or it would very quickly eclipse the cost of your camera and lenses.

[35mmfilmfan]

I suppose, being from the days of film, I prefer to make each shot count, rather than utilising my camera (second hand K20D, for those that are interested) like a machine gun. I do shoot RAW, but only as many as I wish, and the cards I buy are 32gb from a local electronics store, at about £8 to £10 each. At least by only using each card once, should my backups fail, I have a good chance of keeping the original images - after all, film is a 'use once only' medium, and the negatives are carefully filed and kept.

Each to his own.

Tony

[lsimpkins]

I've been reading many of the earlier threads on this site (thanks to all posters and responders, brilliant way to spend a wet afternoon), and I have noticed some common 'issues', one of them being failure of SDHC cards, and much advice being given about formatting in camera, using specialised PC and MAC software to do so, etc.

I have not yet (touching wood) had any such issues, and I wonder if it may be due to my UOKF policy. No, it's not rude - stands for Use Once, Keep Forever. I backup my cards after every session to PC hard drive, then backing that up to a separate hard drive, and when each card fills up - I file it and use a brand new one.

I'm surprised people will happily (even joyously) spend large amounts on bodies, lenses, tripods and ancillary equipment, then 'economise' on the most important link in the entire image capture chain - the capture medium, which is undoubtedly the least expensive item needed ! After all, no matter how good the camera, the optics and the vision of the photographer, if the image fails to record all is lost.

Just a thought.

Tony

I believe in carrying spares and once I have formatted a card, I confirm that it accepts new data by taking an image or two before heading out on my shoot. I buy only known good quality product and feel that the likelihood of my reaching end of life on a card is on the same order of magnitude as me buying a card that is dead on arrival. But by all means, do whatever you are comfortable with.

[narual]

I suppose, being from the days of film, I prefer to make each shot count, rather than utilising my camera (second hand K20D, for those that are interested) like a machine gun. I do shoot RAW, but only as many as I wish, and the cards I buy are 32gb from a local electronics store, at about £8 to £10 each. At least by only using each card once, should my backups fail, I have a good chance of keeping the original images - after all, film is a 'use once only' medium, and the negatives are carefully filed and kept.

Each to his own.

Tony

I love that superiority thing people who prefer to pretend they're still using film get. It's really quite charming.

[pepperberry farm]

I love that superiority thing people who prefer to pretend they're still using film get. It's really quite charming.

agreed - that, and making sure everyone is aware of it....

[BrianR]

I'd guess SD cards are pretty reliable - think of the billions of photos being taken daily without issue. No one bothers to start threads about trouble free SD card usage, but you can be sure we'll hear about the unfortunate failures.

I don't think standard SD cards are intended for long term storage. Your scheme might make sense if you used those write once archival type sd cards, but I don't see that they're readily available (SanDisk SD WORM). As it is, I'd rather buy and reuse a pair of 16 or 32GB cards (one for use and one in the bag as a backup) and spend the money I'd save compared to your scheme on external hard drives (and maybe cloud backup). After 3 or 4 years, I'd be stocked up on 1 or 2 TB external drives for as much redundancy as I have time for.

But whatever works for you.

[35mmfilmfan]

As I said, each to his own. Yes I do still use film, when I so wish. My thanks to all for their amateurish attempts at patronising me - way to go, guys, but keep trying.

Tony

[Des]

I've been reading many of the earlier threads on this site (thanks to all posters and responders, brilliant way to spend a wet afternoon), and I have noticed some common 'issues', one of them being failure of SDHC cards, and much advice being given about formatting in camera, using specialised PC and MAC software to do so, etc.

I must have had at least 20 SD cards and I've never had one fail despite repeated re-use. By contrast I've got about half a dozen failed USB flash drives in a drawer. Now you can take that either way - SD cards are a more viable long term storage medium than flash drives, or SD cards are not high-failure items and can be re-used with confidence. I mean it the latter way. Having multiple backups is the key - there's no reason to worry too much about card failure.

To buy a new card after each is filled is an unnecessary expenditure. I agree with other posters that cards are designed to be re-used. The main limiting factor is that each generation of cameras requires larger-capacity and faster cards. The 2Gb and 4Gb cards I used to use with my K100D Super would be only for emergency use in the K-3.

I suppose, being from the days of film, I prefer to make each shot count, rather than utilising my camera (second hand K20D, for those that are interested) like a machine gun. I do shoot RAW, but only as many as I wish

I don't see any virtue in applying this film paradigm to shooting digital. After having to be parsimonious in shooting with a film SLR for 25 years, it was a great relief to be freed from that constraint with a digital SLR. There are things to miss about film, but that's not one of them.

[lightbox]

Being a type of flash memory, SD card memory cells can lose their charge (and thus their contents) over time if unused. On a really good SD card that could be on the order of years but it's not worth the risk. They are devices intended for data transfer and regular use, not long term cold storage.

Having said that they do wear a little bit each time written to, so do replace them periodically. There is a fixed number of writes that a memory cell will support.

[victormeldrew]

Yes, this is the major difference between film and SD. Negatives will still be usable in 50 years...SD won't. To me it is a terrible waste of resources and money to use a device rated for tens of thousands of cycles just once and then consign it to a slow death in a drawer. It's like proudly announcing that your car never breaks down because you buy a new one for each journey.

I've been reading many of the earlier threads on this site (thanks to all posters and responders, brilliant way to spend a wet afternoon), and I have noticed some common 'issues', one of them being failure of SDHC cards, and much advice being given about formatting in camera, using specialised PC and MAC software to do so, etc.

I have not yet (touching wood) had any such issues, and I wonder if it may be due to my UOKF policy. No, it's not rude - stands for Use Once, Keep Forever. I backup my cards after every session to PC hard drive, then backing that up to a separate hard drive, and when each card fills up - I file it and use a brand new one.

I'm surprised people will happily (even joyously) spend large amounts on bodies, lenses, tripods and ancillary equipment, then 'economise' on the most important link in the entire image capture chain - the capture medium, which is undoubtedly the least expensive item needed ! After all, no matter how good the camera, the optics and the vision of the photographer, if the image fails to record all is lost.

Just a thought.

Tony

That may work for a hobbyist but not a working photographer.

While I still shoot some MF film, here's a thought about SDXC Cards. After 9 years and 600K + shutter actuations on 8 Pentax DSLR bodies, I've never had a card fail. I've used Transcend, SanDisk and Samsung. But I do carry spares, as I carry backups for all my gear - bodies, lenses, batteries, speed lights, monolights, etc. Also, I only use manual exposure so I check histograms often, worst case, I'd lose a few frames, way better than a film advance issue.

After a shoot, I go to the "home office", stick a card in USB adapter, select "Get Photos From Camera" in ACR and download to the event directory which automatically applies my metadata.

Then I go upstairs and open beer. Later, I return and the remaining card or cards. When all done, I make an Incremental Backup to External Disk Drives. Once I have files on two disk drives, I reformat the cards in camera. Every time. Ready to shoot next day which is often the case. All my gear is paid for by business revenue. Adding new and unnecessary SD cards for every session is not in my business plan.

Quarterly, I make a Full Backup and swap those drives with a Duplicate Set in a Bank Safe Deposit Box. So I don't have to worry if my disk drives get burned up in a house fire.

If I did have a house fire, I'd lose all my MF Negative but not the scans, which are in both sets of disk drives.

Last year I replaced 3 failed disk drives which wasn't an issue. I had a practical backup plan and knew drives fail. Also, about every 2 or 3 years, I buy double the disk capacity for the previous price.
I expect all to be SSDs in 3 years, no moving parts. Like giant SDXC cards.

Disclaimer: 40 years or IT experience and I shared an office with a Disaster Recovery Specialist.

[vector]

Not sure about other brands but Kingston gives a lifetime warranty on their premium high speed SD cards.
SDHC/SDXC UHS-I U3 Card - 16GB-512GB | Kingston

Buy a couple of those and go nuts. If you have a k3 or newer buy 2 and have the camera write to both. Then if one fails you still have your pictures and you can RMA the failed card for a replacement. For long term storage you should be copying your files to some kind of redundant storage (could be a cloud service or a local NAS device) and then back that up to another location.

[lithedreamer]

Not sure about other brands but Kingston gives a lifetime warranty on their premium high speed SD cards.
SDHC/SDXC UHS-I U3 Card - 16GB-512GB | Kingston

Buy a couple of those and go nuts. If you have a k3 or newer buy 2 and have the camera write to both. Then if one fails you still have your pictures and you can RMA the failed card for a replacement. For long term storage you should be copying your files to some kind of redundant storage (could be a butt service or a local NAS device) and then back that up to another location.

Lifetime warranties are pretty common on cards these days. The ones I linked to -among others- are water/xray/shock/snowproof too apparently.