Compact flash cards are they doomed.

Moderator Location : Between Coventry and Leicester

Been buying cards today . and have got wind of many of my supppliers that the compact flash card is on its way out.

So as they are cheap at present i would suggest you buy some as the prices will go up.

Yes i can hear you say that most DSLR's are CF . but i have it from a few good souces that they are on there way out. and they will be harder to source in times ahead.

Admin Location : East Midlands Spotter Watch Member : Yes

Actually it's the opposite SSD (Solid State Disks/Cards) are doomed. CF cards are still the way to go.

Ok SSD/cards has no moving parts, like CF Cards.

However SSD's are more expensive £150 for a 64gb card/HDD

SSD's actually slow down the more it gets written to. As after time the fragments of files get left on there.

Even after you have deleted them. Also SSD's cannot be defragmented.

Also with SSD's the flash memory doesn't last long enough because each memory cell can only be written to on a number of times. Various companies have tried to cure this problem using a method called Wear Levelling.

But it doesn't work as the performance of the SSD still degrades.

Tests with SSD works well with Linux but is very poor with XP, Vista and has also been tested with Windows 7.

Moderator Location : Between Coventry and Leicester

Just what i have been told over the past week.
fully aware of the digital media cards,

When they 1st came out at 32 mbs . the real capality was 128gigs .
over the years we see a small increase in this size, but they can hold much more then the markets
sell them. or produce them.

Just the fact that many suppliers will not be selling them and this will increase the price from what at present is very cheap.

Admin Location : East Midlands Spotter Watch Member : Yes

Actually CF cards are being preferred over SSD cards in micro/helmet cams. As the picture quality is far superior from playback on CF cards than it is on SSD cards.

Subject: Re: Compact flash cards are they doomed. 2009-09-17, 07:37

This latest rumour I would pass on, since they said that VCR's are out and Blu-ray is set to get rid of both CD's and DVD's, but I still see the media on offer in most supermarkets and electrical stores and still cheap as chips.

They said that digital would kill wet film photography, but they still make the wet film for those who still use SLR cameras.

My opinion is so long as they keep making appliances that take the media then there will always be a need, but even if they stopped making the appliances the chances are that manufacturing the media will continue for at least the following 5 years after the last appliance comes off the line, by which time a new media will be available for what ever new appliances use it and most people will be looking to replace old for new. Nothing digital is future proof, but we all know this Compact flash cards are they doomed. 711487

Compact flash cards are they doomed. 711487

How long a life would you give your current Digital SLR, before you would look to replace?

Location : Glasgow

Sandisk have just added to/replaced their CF range with new ones with far higher transfer rates (upto 90MB/s) so I guess that they don't see them as being doomed (at least in the short term).

Admin Location : East Midlands Spotter Watch Member : Yes

90MB/s is fantastic speed and is great to see that they are leaping ahead on technology.

Again CF cards are great for helmet cams because 90MB/s would make still shots from moving images very similar to pictures taken with a DSLR.

Shame that the camera manufacturers cannot offer an upgrade service on our DSLR's to have faster buffers.

Sadly wet film is disappearing from various outlets, and also what used to be £3.99 or cheaper to develop a 36exp is now nearly £10.

Location : Colchester

vulcan558 wrote:: So as they are cheap at present i would suggest you buy some as the prices will go up.

I would suggest this is a bit of scaremongering. Whilst it is true that memory card makers are always looking to improve on speed and capacity, regardless of the format, I would be very surprised if CF cards have disappeared from sale within the next 5 years.