How important is record speed on memory cards?

[Pwn3dPhotoN00b]

Hi All -

I recently picked up a Nikon D7000, which by the way, is amazing so far. Formerly, I used a Nikon D40 with Sandisk 2GB Extreme Class III (20 mb/sec). The 6 megapixel D40 never experienced any record lag (that I ever noticed), but the 16 megapixel D7000 might be a different story once I get out into the field. I used to be able to record about 1000 shots on my D40 with JPEG Fine, but certainly not the case on the D7000.

In your opinion, how important is record speed on memory cards? Will my D7000 keep up with the Extreme Class III @ 20 mb/sec? Is it better to buy a few smaller cards at 4GB versus putting all of your eggs in one basket on a larger 8, 16, or even 32GB cards?

Considering I just spent my last dollar on this new body, I'd prefer not to spend a lot, but I'd also like something to be reliable and last for years. I would be shooting mostly JPEG Fine, but hope to get more into doing RAW in the future. On my 2GB card with RAW on D7000, I can only get 57 shots! Yikes! I'd also like to use the video recording ability, admittedly, in a limited capacity.

I'd love to hear your experiences with different card speeds/capacities.

Many Thanks!
PPN

[jdepould]

Do you shoot motor drive?

[corvus2606]

ultimately record speed only comes into the calculation if you are doing long fast bursts. If you aren't doing stuff like sports photography, I wouldn't be worried.

Generally it's best to go for multiple smaller cards instead of one big one, if one of your cards dies, you wont lose all your images that way. 4G is probably a good size to go with.

[gturner]

The ability of the camera buffer is almost more important.
The D7000 has a buffer of 11 raw files, so unless you are shooting long series of continuous bursts, you will be fine with a 20mb card.

[TheEagleSpirit]

Originally Posted by gturner

The ability of the camera buffer is almost more important.
The D7000 has a buffer of 11 raw files, so unless you are shooting long series of continuous bursts, you will be fine with a 20mb card.

I have a D7000 and doing just fine with SanDisk Ultra 8GB cards. I shoot jpeg fine.

[LeeR]

The SanDisk Ultra has a write speed of 15MB/sec. which is fine for shooting a compressed file like jpeg. However, if you are shooting uncompressed RAW in bursts, you may find you need a faster card. The SanDisk Extreme will handle 100MB/sec, and other brands are faster still. If your camera has a buffer that will hold 11 shots waiting to be written to the card, that may be all you need. But on my older model camera, the little blinking light that tells me stuff is being written to the card stays on a lot longer with the slower card.

[jdepould]

Originally Posted by LeeR

The SanDisk Ultra has a write speed of 15MB/sec. which is fine for shooting a compressed file like jpeg. However, if you are shooting uncompressed RAW in bursts, you may find you need a faster card. The SanDisk Extreme will handle 100MB/sec, and other brands are faster still. If your camera has a buffer that will hold 11 shots waiting to be written to the card, that may be all you need. But on my older model camera, the little blinking light that tells me stuff is being written to the card stays on a lot longer with the slower card.

Those are the CF cards. The D7000 is SD.

[LeeR]

Originally Posted by jdepould

Those are the CF cards. The D7000 is SD.

I was looking at the SanDisk website when I wrote that. The site allows you to enter the camera you are using (in this case I entered Nikon D7000) and it will show you which of their products can be used (SD cards for the D7000). I did make a mistake in saying that the write speed on the Extreme is 100MB/sec; that should read 30MB/sec for the SD card. You can check the details for your camera here.

[kirbinster]

I use Extreme III 8gig CF cards in my D300 and D700 that are rated at 30mb/sec and only shoot raw and have never had a significant problem. I shoot in compressed (loss-less mode) raw. The only lag I noticed was this weekend when I was shooting my puppy in highspeed burst mode with the D700 and NiMh batteries in the grip. I noticed that after the burst was done the LCD display on the back was still updating from the buffer - but it really was not a problem. For normal shooting you should have no problems.