ByteStor 512MB Hi-Speed CompactFlash(40x)

The only time you will need very fast write times in your camera is when you are shooting in continuous mode - that is where you hold down the shutter button and the camera takes a series of photographs as fast as it can. The only time you would use this would be if you were shooting a fast moving subject, or perhaps a portfolio of someone modelling. A fast write speed is not essential for casual shooting of stationary or posed scenes.

Having said that a fast card is a luxury well worth investing in, especially if you are transferring more than 100Mb of images. I timed the High speed continuous mode on my ixus with the flash disabled and got the following results;

6 frames in 5 seconds
6 frames in 8 seconds
The camera finished writing the images to the card 7 seconds later

That is a total of 12 shots taken and stored in around 20 seconds.

I have a Belkin 8-in-1 Portable Flash Card Reader. With a USB 2.0 connection it took less than 2.5 seconds to download the 12 images to the PC. The total size was 9.03Mb, each image being around 650-850Kb.

In my opinion this is excellent performance and I definetly recommend this card for use in the Ixus cameras.


Bytestore 512 Mb X40 high speed compact flash   August 6, 2004
61 out of 62 found this review helpful

I have been using one of these cards for around 9 months, and have found them to be very good and reliable and excellent value for cost v performance, in fact I have just bought a 2nd one
I don't agree that the Jessops standard card is equal to this card and in any case it is 20 more than the Bytestore (maybe some cards are faulty) but not the two that I have.
I use this card with a Canon EOS 10D it will write a Raw+small fine Jpeg is under 3 seconds (approx 7Mb file) and a large fine Jpeg in approx 1.5 seconds approx 3.5 Mb so that is consistent.
On a 470 Mb test file it will right from PC to card in approx 3 minuets and download from card to PC in approx 50 seconds (using a USB 2.0 card reader)
I tested it on a benchmarking program and it returned an average (over 3 separate tests) x32 read and x20 write. (Cards are seldom if ever as fast as their rating)
I have never encountered any in cameras errors and have used the card in temperatures as low as -4 C at this temperature the battery power in the main issue with all cards and cameras, all batteries are less efficient low temperatures. And high speed cards will have more drain at low temperatures.
One thing of note is that a 512Mb card is actually 488Mb when formatted this is due to the way the capacity is calculated.
Capacity:
Raw+small fine Jpeg approx 75 files At IS0 100
large fine Jpeg approx 200 files At IS0 100 the higher the IS0 that you use will decrease the amount of files that can be stored due to digital noise
There are faster cards available but not at this price.


Works well   July 8, 2004
14 out of 17 found this review helpful

This card has worked well in my Canon 300d, no problems after several weeks of use.