13 Tips for Using and Caring for Memory Cards
How should I care for my digital camera’s memory card to make it last as long as possible?
Where there are many things that are unique from one digital camera to another - one thing unites us all (or most of us) - we all media cards to store our photos onto (the exception to this are a few cameras with lots of internal memory).
So how can you care for your memory card and get the best results from it?
Here are 13 tips for using and caring for Memory Cards (note - if you want advice on buying memory cards check out our post on Which Memory Card Should I Buy:
1. If Disaster Strikes - Stop Shooting
If you have a disaster and accidentally delete your images or see an card error message - stop using the memory card. All is not always lost when you have one of these problems and it may be that you can still recover your images - the key is to stop using the card or else you might overwrite your other images. Data recovery services or tools may be able to restore your images for you.
2. Delete Images on your Computer not In Camera
Deleting images from your card while the card is on your camera can actually prolong the life of your memory card. The rule is that the fewer times you add or remove data on your card the better. Erasing all your images at once after uploading them to your computer means one erase cycle rather than lots of them if you delete them one at a time on your camera.
3. Remove Cards Safely When Connected to Your Computer
After uploading images to your computer from a card make sure you follow the proper procedure to eject the card before removing it from your card reader. In OSX this means right clicking the drive assigned to your card and hitting ‘eject’. In Windows use the ’safely remove hardware’ option in your system tray to remove the card and the card reader).
4. Multiple Cards Can be Better than One
I learned this lesson on a recent trip when I had a memory card die on me mid trip. Having a second card handy meant that I was able to continue using my camera. It also means that if you do lose the data on one card, not all of your images from a shoot will be lost. Of course multiple cards can also mean problems too as there are more to keep track of - I’ve heard h3 arguments for both - but personally rotate through 3 cards at present.
5. Avoid Filling Your Cards Completely
I have a friend who recently had an issue with a memory card. When he took it into the store he bought it from for advice they asked if he’d completely filled the card with images. When he said he had they told him that this could occasionally cause problems with some types of cards. I’d not heard this before and am a little skeptical about it myself - but it’s probably worth keeping in mind. I guess the advice is to regularly take images off your cards rather than doing it just when they are full. This is common sense anyway as it stops the heartbreak of losing gigabytes of images if you lose a card/camera or have a card error with a three quarters full memory card.
6. Periodically Reformat Cards
Every now and again reformat your memory card. This will wipe any data, images, file names on the card and set it up afresh for your camera. Of course you should only do this AFTER you’ve downloaded any images on the card or you’ll lose them.
7. Format your Memory Card In the Camera You Want to Use it on
Formatting your memory card while in your camera will make sure that the card is set up and structured specifically for your camera. If you’re using someone else’s card in your camera (and they’ve used it on a camera with a different make) you can end up with issues that can be resolved by reformatting on your camera (just make sure you’ve got all the images that were on the card off it first as reformatting deletes all data on the card).
8. Switch Your Camera Off before Removing Memory Card
This was a tip that was given a lot a year or two ago for fear of cameras giving cards ‘voltage shock’ on removal of the card. Manufacturers seem to have made improvements in this area since then - although I can’t speak for all of them and I guess that it is better to be safe than sorry. Check your camera manual to see what they recommend.
9. Keep Your Camera Up to Date
Camera manufacturers will release firmware updates from time to time. These keep your camera up to date with any fixes for errors or problems that are identified with a camera. Some of these can relate to the camera’s interaction with the memory card.
10. Periodically Update Your Cards
While memory card life spans have increased significantly over the last few years - they do have a limited life and will need to be updated from time to time. With prices coming down this is fortunately a less and less expensive task.
11. Replace Batteries Before they Run Down
Keep an eye on the power level left in your camera’s batteries and either recharge them or change them over for a fresh set before they completely run down. This will stop your batteries running out halfway through writing an image to your card. This will stop you losing that last image but also can stop card errors that can occur when an image is not fully written to a card.
12. Don’t Switch Off Your Camera too Quickly after Shooting
This tip is for those of us who shoot in ‘burst’ or ‘continuous shooting’ mode. When shooting lots of images quickly a camera needs a little time to write all of the data you’ve taken to the memory card. If you’ve taken numerous images very quickly your camera will be ‘buffering’ images and if you switch it off during this process you’ll lose images and could even find yourself with a system error (note: some more modern cameras have fixed this problem and will now continue buffering after you switch them off).
13. Common Sense Maintenance
It should go without saying - but keep your cards dry and clean, don’t expose them to extreme temperatures, don’t drop, bend or puncture them and don’t expose them to h3 electro/magnetic currents. Storing cards that are not in use in a plastic casing (usually supplied with the card) can give it an extra layer of protection.
Bonus Tip - Prepare Your Card for Being Lost
One last tip from our archives. One fear that many digital photographers have is that they’d lose their camera and/or memory card. One tip that I heard a while ago now is to take a picture of your business card or luggage tag complete with your contact details and to keep it as the first image on each of your memory cards. Lock it so that it’s not deleted and hopefully if your camera or card is lost the person who picks it up will get in touch (if they’re honest).
Got some memory card tips to share? Feel free to add them in comments below.
Read more posts like '13 Tips for Using and Caring for Memory Cards'
November 9th, 2007 at 12:51 am
Not really a tip, but I have heard that the popular memory card brands (Sandisk, Lexar) are more reliable than other cards. Also, there are fake cards around so buying from a reputable store is a good idea.
November 9th, 2007 at 12:53 am
Another tip, keep your mobile phone away from your camera (and storage card).
I just had my Canon Powershot on vacation and happened to put it in my pocket NEXT TO my cell. It stayed there all day and then I discovered that the LCD on the Powershot and the card became corrupted. Reformatting the card worked, but the LCD always had “streaks” in it.
November 9th, 2007 at 12:55 am
I am always a little concerned with Compact Flash (CF) cards as they fit onto 40 pins in the camera and these can be easily broken or bent. On pervious camera I did notice that after years of removing , downloading and inserting card back into camera there was some problems occurring with the card being properly seating and therefore connected to camera. Would flash ‘not memory card’ and would sometimes occur out in the filed.
With my new camera I always leave the card in (8GB). I download files directly from camera, which does drain the battery more (you should always have spares) and reformat every time rather than delete the card.
Niels Henriksen
November 9th, 2007 at 1:07 am
A couple comments:
2. Delete Images on your Computer not In Camera
Your best bet is to reformat the card in-camera. This involves less rewriting of data than deleting all files at once and, should you have to recover them, is more likely to be recoverable.
And, regarding putting an identifying file on your card: this doesn’t work very well when you reformat it. You’re better off putting your name & address on the side of the card.
November 9th, 2007 at 1:09 am
If I turn off my D50, it stays on to continue the buffer.
November 9th, 2007 at 1:22 am
I don’t usually let my card get completely full, but I won’t format it until I have my photos backed up in two places - my computer, and an external hard drive. Once I put photos on the external hard drive, I’ll format the card in-camera. And like Niels above, I also like to keep the card in the camera at all times. There’s less of a chance of damaging it or getting it dirty.
November 9th, 2007 at 2:27 am
Indeed, I learned about #11 (batteries running out of juice) the hard way. Sometimes a camera may not handle the running out of power situation correctly and start misbehaving and writing corrupt JPEG files on the memory card. This is a sneaky problem because you may not realize it while it’s happening and think everything’s okay. Perhaps when the battery indicator reaches the last mark before empty, that’s a good time to reload new batteries. Other areas of camera performance may also be affected (focusing, etc), perhaps more so with AA-powered cameras?
Also, I’d like to congratulate Digital Photography School for being ranked #250 among all the blog feeds around the world in the new beta Bloglines Top 1000. I am going through the list in my blog, looking at how the different camera and photo blogs are doing.
November 9th, 2007 at 2:28 am
a link to a great free utility to recover deleted files from memory cards: http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec
It works magic IF you haven’t taken new pictures after the accidental deletion. Otherwise, you may or may not be able to retrieve all deleted pictures.
Was able to get 100+ pictures I had accidentally deleted last week…
November 9th, 2007 at 2:47 am
@Scott: about writing your name and address on the card, that’s easy with big cards, like CF, but with others it’s quite difficult because of their size (xD, for example).
November 9th, 2007 at 3:07 am
#2 - Modern cards can handle a lot of operations before they wear out. You probably have stopped using the memory card long, long before this happens (remember: there are now hard disks being made using the same technology)
I doubt if this was even an issue with old cards. Moreover, I have the feeling that my Sony DSC-S600 deletes the photos one by one anyway, even if I delete them from the computer, so if I delete 100 photos, it looks like 100 operations, not a single “update the folder, 100 photos are deleted”. Remember, deleting a photo is just updating a folder entry, not actually overwriting each image with zeros. If a memory cell wears out, it’s mapped out and another part of the memory card is being used.
#12 - I doubt this: it’s not that hard to make the off button *not* cut off the power directly, but connect it to some electronics. I guess that on most camera’s this is the case, and that the off button is able to “wait” until there are no more operations on the memory card in progress that can result in data loss. I’ve never lost a single photo by turning off the camera too fast, not even with my now very outdated Philips ESP 60…
November 9th, 2007 at 4:33 am
I learned the hard way to avoid removing the card as much as possible. It does take longer to download pictures from some cameras, but it is one of those things you can start and then walk away from.
I will definitely start formatting my cards every once in a while.
Lastly, I usually don’t delete photos from my camera until I upload them to my Smugmug site. Then I have them saved in two places so there is very little chance they will be lost.
November 9th, 2007 at 7:01 am
“Your best bet is to reformat the card in-camera. This involves less rewriting of data than deleting all files at once and, should you have to recover them, is more likely to be recoverable.” ~ Scott
Deleting your files from you camera may make them easier to recover and may involve less writing, but not formating. Formatting your card regardless of where you do it will overwrite all the data on the card. That makes it extremely difficult to recover any of the cards contents. Even companies who specialize in data recovery may not be able to recover your photos.
Given the longevity of flash memory I don’t think that how many times you write to your card should ever be a concern. It’s far more important that your card functions reliably while it is alive. If that means formatting every so often, then that’s a *very* *small* price to pay.
November 9th, 2007 at 9:17 am
I too had a situation where I bought a new CF card that worked fine until it was filled up. Crucial tech support told me to make sure it was formatted in the camera, not the computer. After investigating further, I discovered that all my cameras use the FAT file system but the default for formatting in Windows is FAT32.
BTW, I was able to recover the files using FileRestore.
November 9th, 2007 at 9:30 am
Delete Images on your Computer not In Camera
My recommendation is to never format or delete images from a memory card on your computer. I believe most camera manufacturers will echo that. You should always delete images from the camera, not the computer. Digital cameras are fairly touchy about formating and there may be subtle differences between the format from your computer and your camera. Formating or deleting images on a computer may result in a card that your camera will have trouble reading and writing. It’s always best to format the card in your camera after you are sure the images are safely written to your computer.
As to the notion that removing Compact Flash cards from your camera is dangerous — that is just wrong. I use multiple Compact Flash cards and interchange them with several different cameras. I always use a card reader — it is faster and safer. After several years of heavy use, I have never had a CF card (or a Micro Drive) give me any trouble. I have however, seen images lost trying to transfer over a USB cable.
I believe it might have been possible to incorrectly insert the old Type I CF cards — they were thinner and didn’t have a strong failsafe stop. Unless you use brute force, it is nearly impossible to insert a TypeII CF in the wrong way in a quality digital camera. TypeII cards have a small ridge that prevents inserting it incorrectly. TypeII cards have been fairly standard for at least five years, so unless you buy some el-cheepo card somewhere, you probably have already have a TypeII card.
Use name brand TypeII memory, get a card reader and don’t worry about how often you swap memory cards.
Hope this helps!
Tom Bonner
http://alphatracks.com
November 9th, 2007 at 9:46 am
I always format my cards in camera after they are imported.
I never delete files from the card, only from the computer when the card is fully imported.
I always buy high quality SanDisk Cards.
I never buy cards that take more than 150-200 images in the highest quality raw format, so if a card goes bad, I havent lost a full days work.
November 9th, 2007 at 11:01 am
Formatting a card in-camera is best practice and it should be done *every* time the card is inserted into the camera. Any decent DSLR will have a key combination to do it so you don’t have to dig through the menus.
If you delete some photos or even all the photos from the card using a computer, the file structure on the card can be compromised when used back in the camera and may affect the writing of new images.
If you have a memory card issue in the field it may lock up and only a format will recover it, if that’s the case you’ll lose all the images on the card if you can’t download them.
Format every time you reinsert the card, it’ll save tears in the long run.
November 9th, 2007 at 12:39 pm
man, you keep going back & forth - just format in camera every time.
November 9th, 2007 at 6:18 pm
hmmm, yes, I reformat every time I’ve downloaded the photos from the cards.
I’ve a friend whose D350 had to be sent back to Canon during the first year because the CF pins got bent when replacing a card *during his honeymoon*!
Since then he never removes the card and simply fills it then downloads it.
My suggestion, though I’ve not (yet) done it myself, is to get a CF card that’s an adaptor for SD cards, then to use those as normal, removing them from the CF card when full.
The reason I’ve not done this yet, is because I enjoy the (slightly) faster read/write times of my Sandisk Extreme III 2GB card and I suspect that having an adaptor between the slr and a fast SD card would probably slow things down.
Thoughts anyone?!
November 9th, 2007 at 10:26 pm
John Bokma — Canon’s older dSLRs (I think including the Rebel XTI, but I don’t know for sure) are notorious for shutting off instantly if you open the card door even if there’s still data in the buffer.
November 10th, 2007 at 2:14 am
I’m with XX in saying that #2 doesn’t fly. Flash cards still use the old FAT filesystem where deleting a file means writing a few bytes in the allocation table saying the space previously occupied by that file is now free. In FAT this is done by overwriting the first character of the filename.
Repeat for each file you erase.
When you “format” a card, all you really do is rewrite a blank FAT (a few hundred Ks of data), you don’t actually format anything.
Now where it *used* to be the case that flash media only had a very limited number of read/write cycles available, nowadays, not only has that number grown way up but the controllers tend to cycle the writes all over the memory so that it gets abused evenly. So all in all, chances are you’ll drop your card in the harbour, in a puddle of beer, or lose it in whatever way (or just dump it because it no longer fits in any of your cameras) before it starts to fail. If you buy decent flash memory to begin with of course.
Basically, avoid the noname stuff and you should be fine.
November 10th, 2007 at 5:09 am
@jamesc359 - “Formatting your card regardless of where you do it will overwrite all the data on the card. ” - I am not sure if this is really the case, I guess that formatting just creates the file system layout. There is no need to overwrite *all* data for a format, just laying out the file system is enough. And if I am correct, data can still be recovered (but not as easily).
“Even companies who specialize in data recovery may not be able to recover your photos.”
If you’re correct, and all data *is* overwritten, then data can’t be recovered as far as I know. Flash memory works very different compared to magnetic recording systems like hard disks.
@Matthew Miller - that’s not the same as turning off, but more similar to pulling a floppy out of a drive while the computer is still writing data to it. Does opening the card door also eject the card?
But like I wrote, there is no reason for turning off your camera with the on/off button resulting in data loss other than badly designed electronics.
November 10th, 2007 at 5:26 am
I have a Nikon D50 and I download everything to my laptop, run it through Photoshop, delete the junk, then save it all on a Maxtor 300. I check to make sure everything is OK, then I delete the card in the PC, remove the card and format it in my camera.
November 10th, 2007 at 7:37 am
About tip #2, I’m a IT administrator and developer, and I know how FAT and FAT32 file systems (the ones used by almost all camera makers) “erases” the files: they simply change the first character in the name of the file! It’s a special one, so the operating system in your computer or camera knows that the space in disk is free to be written again.
So, it really doesn’t matter if you erase only one file at a time or all together, all then will be marked/written the same way.
On the other hand, formatting your card from time to time (every week or month, for instance) could have a good impact on your camera performance it it’s a little slower writing files or you shoot often in continuous mode, given that this will restore the writing area on the disk/card to a continuous space and images will be recorded one after the other without having to skip already written areas.
November 10th, 2007 at 8:38 am
John Bokma, I read here a long while back that formating a memory card is different than formatting a hard-drive, in that your camera will overwrite everything. I wish I could find my source again, but Googling hasn’t turned up anything so far.
Not being happy with that I did my own little test. I downloaded some software that claims to be able to recover files after having formated your memory card.
I started by taking two pictures, deleting them and scanning the memory card. The software managed to recover both images after it’s first pass.
I then took another two shots and reformatted the card in camera. The software found nothing on the first pass and switched to a more intensive scan which also turned up nothing. I can’t be 100% certain this is because the camera overwrote the files, but what ever it did do it made recovery a lot more difficult.
For those wondering I used a freeware app named PC Inspector smart recovery.
http://www.pcinspector.de/Sites/smart_recovery/ueber_uns.htm?language=1
It is possible that maybe using other software or a different camera or even a different type of memory card I’d have gotten different results. But who knows.
November 10th, 2007 at 9:07 pm
@jamesc359: formating is the same in a card and in a hard drive: they both rewrite the first sector of the media being formated, erasing the file structure(the way files are laid out on disc) and this is why is not possible to recover images from a formated card/HD.
The only difference is that the hardware inside the card maps different areas of the card to be the “first sectors”. The reason behind this is to spread the writing of data in different areas of the card, given that cards have a finite number of writes.
November 11th, 2007 at 7:14 am
How should I care for my digital camera’s memory card to make it last as long as possible?
Where there are many things that are unique from one digital camera to another - one thing unites us all (or most of us) - we all media cards to store our photos onto (the exception to this are a few cameras with lots of internal memory).
November 13th, 2007 at 6:28 pm
Accidentally deleted your image files from your memory card?
Three words:
Zero Assumption Recovery
(www.z-a-recovery.com)
Great little program that will help you recover lost images very quickly.
I was going to write a review on Sciencetext.com, and may yet do so, but the program does what it says on the tin and is worth having in your memory card software arsenal.
db
November 23rd, 2007 at 1:23 pm
2. Delete Images on your Computer not In Camera
Deleting images from your card while the card is on your camera can actually prolong the life of your memory card.
–I found this advice conflicting. Should I delete in camera (as the body suggest) or on computer (as the title states)?
January 2nd, 2008 at 3:34 pm
Yeah, I also got confused there. I had to read it a couple of times. :-)
So, which is which?
Thanks!
January 3rd, 2008 at 1:22 am
I am new to digital cameras and also ‘technically challenged’ when it comes to computers. I have already removed the camera memory card from my computer without using the ’safe to remove’ button. (yes, I’ve already been chewed out by my son) but no suggestions on how to repair the issue. If that is the issue that is now causing my laptop to shutdown on a regular basis. My son thinks I may have damaged the hard drive. Any thoughts or suggestions? I appreciate your advice and expertise.
January 22nd, 2008 at 4:20 am
#5 This is correct, and has to do with the file system. (FAT32) It has to write information about the file to the file Allocation Table. If the card is full, there is no room for changing the information and you risk “disc” failure.
And as stated by others, formating in camera, actually means rewriting of just the FAT, and saves writing cycles on the card as this is actually very little writing on the card itself, as opposed to deleting.
April 10th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
I have a 4gb chip i got at buy.com and for some reason my computer will not recognize it if i remove it from my camera. i have formatted it and everything but still. so i just connect my camera to the comp and it works only then. is there away to make it work?