Sandisk Ultra & Extreme -v- Sony High Speed MS for F717

plevyadophy · Oct 16, 2006

I want to buy a high capacity Memory Stick for my F717.

I have seen three high spead variants: Sandisk Ultra 2, Sandisk Extreme III and Sony Memory Stick Pro High Speed.

1)
Which one of these cards is the fastest?

2)
And does the Sony High Speed card really offer read/write speeds of 160MB/s?!!

Now comes the all important question.

3)

Will any of the above cards make a difference to the speed at which files are saved on my camera?

Or is the speed at which data can be written determined by the hardware of my F717?

4)

And if there is a F717 limitation in terms of speed of writing and reading does anyone know what that speed is?

The reason I am asking all these questions is that I want to shoot in TIFF mode. But TIFF files are painfully slow to write to the memory card and release the camera for the next shot, taking around 49 seconds to do so.

I note that the F828 and R1 can write much faster. So I was wondering this faster performance was purely a function of the camera hardware or whether it's because since those cameras were made there are now faster memory cards on the market.

I would appreciate any advice.

Thanks in advane.

.

slowzuki · Oct 16, 2006

I think you'll find the 717 can't write any faster to a faster card, is it even compatible with MS Pro cards? My s-75 won't take the pro cards.

robfitsy · Oct 16, 2006

I would check if the F717 can take anything larger than 128 MB (as I remember having seen on this forum)

plevyadophy · Oct 16, 2006

The F717 is compatible with Memory Stick Pro and the manual says it can take up to 1GB. But that is said only because when the manual was printed the biggest cards available were 1GB. In actual fact the F717 could take a card up 2GB as it formats the card in the FAT16 format.

JudyK · Oct 16, 2006

I just purchased a 1 GB memory stick duo (Sony) from Amazon for $33.00 and it was also a High Speed and was concerned about the compatibility with some of my older Sony cameras. I wrote to Sony Support and they sent me this website which has a chart of all compatabilities for memory sticks and Sony cameras. Hope this helps you out.

http://esupport.com/EN/info/mspro-camera.html

Judy

JudyK · Oct 16, 2006

Sorry--I fort got the word sony--This is the site:

http://esupport.sony.com/EN/info/mspro-camera.html

Judy

R2D2 · Oct 16, 2006

plevyadophy said:
I want to buy a high capacity Memory Stick for my F717.

Still working that old 717, eh?

Me too.

plevyadophy said:
I have seen three high spead variants: Sandisk Ultra 2, Sandisk
Extreme III and Sony Memory Stick Pro High Speed.

OK.

plevyadophy said:
1)
Which one of these cards is the fastest?

SanDisk Extreme III is rated fastest: 18 MB/s, Read/Write.
Sony MS Pro High Speed: 10 MB/s, Read/Write.
SanDisk Ultra II: 10 MB/s Read, 9 MB/s Write.
Sony/SanDisk MS Pro: just under 2 MB/s, Read/Write.
Regular MS: Snails pace.

plevyadophy said:
2)
And does the Sony High Speed card really offer read/write speeds of
160MB/s?!!

Not close (and don't confuse MegaBYTES with MegaBITS).

http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/en/-/USD/SY_DisplayProductInformation-Start?CategoryName=acc_MemoryStickMedia_MemoryStickPROmedia&ProductSKU=MSX1GN&TabName=specs&var2=

plevyadophy said:
Now comes the all important question.

3)
Will any of the above cards make a difference to the speed at which
files are saved on my camera?

Yes.

plevyadophy said:
Or is the speed at which data can be written determined by the
hardware of my F717?

At some point, yes.

plevyadophy said:
4)
And if there is a F717 limitation in terms of speed of writing and
reading does anyone know what that speed is?

Somewhere between 2 MB/s and 9 MB/s.

plevyadophy said:
The reason I am asking all these questions is that I want to shoot
in TIFF mode. But TIFF files are painfully slow to write to the
memory card and release the camera for the next shot, taking around
49 seconds to do so.

I had done some tests in the past but couldn't find them tonight. So I redid the tests using freshly formatted Sticks (highest resolution in TIFF Mode):

Regular old Memory Stick: 51 seconds.

Memory Stick Pro: 42 seconds.

SanDisk Ultra II: 36 seconds.

SanDisk Extreme III: 36 seconds.

Sorry, I don't own a MS Pro High Speed, but I would think that it would write at the same speed as the Ultra II and Extreme III (all being limited by camera hardware).

plevyadophy said:
I note that the F828 and R1 can write much faster. So I was
wondering this faster performance was purely a function of the
camera hardware or whether it's because since those cameras were
made there are now faster memory cards on the market.

The newer cameras are definitely faster at writing.

plevyadophy said:
I would appreciate any advice.

I keep a 1 GB SanDisk Extreme III in my 717. When writing JPEGs, the difference between the Extreme III and the MS Pro is almost negligible (not nearly the difference seen when writing TIFFs). I do notice a difference between the MS Pro and the regular old MS though, in both "shot to shot" speed and "shot to review" times.

As the timings show, I'd go with whatever High Speed stick you prefer. They'll all write TIFFs at the same speed. You might want to consider your future camera purchases though (that's why I bought the Extreme III). I'd also recommend that you buy your stick in the Duo format (the 717 will accept all Duo's in any flavor/speed - with supplied adapter).

Hope this helps Plevy',
R2

--
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.

http://www.pbase.com/jekyll_and_hyde/galleries

plevyadophy · Oct 16, 2006

@R2D2

WOW!

Thanks for that reply. That was quality. The best answer I think I have received to anything I have posted on these forums. Thanks.

Anyway, just a few more points questions:

1) "Still working that old 717,eh?"

Yes I am.

I regard it as the most beautiful prosumer digicam ever made. Sometimes I just pcik it up and hold it in my hands for no good reason other than it is such a beautfil piece of machinery. Of course the problem with it being so beautiful is that you have to be very careful where you pull it out lest you attract muggers and theives.

It was (and probably still is) the best 5Mp (iin terms of picture quality) ever made. And certainly the best digicam Sony has ever made (yes I know the F828 is vastly superior in its user functions but it can't do what its bread and butter task is supposed to be, namely take decent pics (problems with noise and purple fringing) and it certainly wasn't a class leader. The R1 is fantastic but it doesn't have a long enough zoom and no infrared NightShot)

I would love to upgrade to a higher res camera but there is nothing out there that has the wow factor that the F717 did and still does.

So yep, like you I am sticking with the F717.

2) Card speeds.

The speeds I have differ from the details you have given. I have it as:

SanDisk Extreme III Memory Stick Pro = 20MB/s
SanDisk Extreme III Memory Stick Pro Duo = 18 MB/s

Sony Memory Stick Pro = 160Mbps (20 MB/s)
Sony Memory Stick Pro Duo = ?????

So it seems that the SanDisk Duo card is slower than the full size card. The speeds you quoted, are they for the full size or Duo card? For I notice you qoute the same speed for the SanDisk card as I have quoted above for the SanDisk Duo.

If you are quoting Duo size speed then it seems that the Sony cards are woefully underperforming yet they cost an absolute fortune ( Sony Duo Pro High Speed 1GB @ £196.99 -v- SanDisk Extreme III Duo 1GB @ £109.99 and even worse still there is the Sony Duo Pro High Speed 2GB at a whopping £439.99, again the SanDisk variant is around half the price)

3) "Don't confuse megaBYTES with megaBITS"

Yep, [BLUSH] I did realise my error after I posted but I couldn't be bothered to edit it. In fact I realised my error after pondering on it for a while and thinking "hey it can't possibly be writing at 160 megaBYTES per second"

4) Memory Card timings

According to the review done by Phil Askey here on DPReview the writing times for the plain vanilla cards was 49 seconds. Which is pretty much what I timed it at.

I was really hoping that a faster card would halve those timings.

So although I am disappointed that I am not gonna get the speed improvement I want, I need bigger media so I am just gonna have to get on with it and buy the fastest card available. And I guess, 36 seconds is a considerable, even if not vast as I would like, improvement on the speeds one gets with the standard Memory Sticks.

5) Your advice

I note what you say about the "shot to shot" and "shot to review" timings of the Pro cards as compared with the plain vanilla ones. That is quite interesting and is something I hadn't considered. So thanks for that bit of info. I think that is an important element and helps to make the caamera much more user friendly and enjoyable.

Your advice that I should buy Duo sized cards is excellent advice and is the advice I would give. For I have noticed that the later Sony cameras (according to the link you gave to the Compatibility chart) now only accept the smaller Duo size Memory Sticks.

However, I can sometimes be a bit weird and nerdy and I have to admit to being in my nerdy/weird mode at present. You see I have a collection of Memory Sticks which sort of cover the development of the medium and is a reminder of the previous limitations of cameras like the F707. So I have 32MB, 64MB, 128MB, and a 128MB x2 Card (that's the one with the little switch that gives you two banks of 128MB, do you remember those cards?!).

So now that I want to upgrade, I want to do a similar thing by getting all the Memory Stick Pro cards up to the limit that the F717 can take. So that will be 256MB, 512MB, 1GB, 2GB.

Nice for a bit of history but I guess financial suicide given that any future Sony camera I buy will not accept such larage sized (i.e. non Duo) cards

6) One more thing

Since you give such good quality answers, I wonder if you could help me with another question of mine. The question is posted here: http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/readflat.asp?forum=1002&thread=20456940

I hope you can help on that one too.

Anyway, must dash.

Thanks in advance.

plevyadophy

.

R2D2 · Oct 17, 2006

plevyadophy said:
I would love to upgrade to a higher res camera but there is nothing
out there that has the wow factor that the F717 did and still does.

So yep, like you I am sticking with the F717.

I'm using the 717 for macros (does wonderfully).
I'm really enjoying the reach and speed of the H5 though...

plevyadophy said:
2) Card speeds.

The speeds I have differ from the details you have given. I have it
as:

SanDisk Extreme III Memory Stick Pro = 20MB/s
SanDisk Extreme III Memory Stick Pro Duo = 18 MB/s

Extreme III Pro, and Extreme III Pro Duo both Read/Write at the same speed: 18 MB/s.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0409/04092806sandisk_extremeiii.asp

You might be confusing them with the Extreme III Compact Flash or Extreme III SD cards, which Read/Write at 20 MB/s.

plevyadophy said:
Sony Memory Stick Pro = 160Mbps (20 MB/s)

More like 16Mb/s (2 MB/s).

plevyadophy said:
Sony Memory Stick Pro Duo = ?????

Exactly the same as the Pro.

plevyadophy said:
So it seems that the SanDisk Duo card is slower than the full size
card.

Nope. It is not. Your source is wrong.

plevyadophy said:
The speeds you quoted, are they for the full size or Duo
card?
For I notice you qoute the same speed for the SanDisk card as
I have quoted above for the SanDisk Duo.

They are both rated exactly the same.

plevyadophy said:
If you are quoting Duo size speed then it seems that the Sony cards
are woefully underperforming yet they cost an absolute fortune (
Sony Duo Pro High Speed 1GB @ £196.99 -v- SanDisk Extreme III Duo
1GB @ £109.99 and even worse still there is the Sony Duo Pro High
Speed 2GB at a whopping £439.99, again the SanDisk variant is
around half the price)

The Sony "High Speed" is certainly overpriced IMO. I've gone with the SanDisk sticks and have never had a problem.

plevyadophy said:
So although I am disappointed that I am not gonna get the speed
improvement I want, I need bigger media so I am just gonna have to
get on with it and buy the fastest card available. And I guess, 36
seconds is a considerable, even if not vast as I would like,
improvement on the speeds one gets with the standard Memory Sticks.

Definitely a fair gain.

plevyadophy said:
However, I can sometimes be a bit weird and nerdy and I have to
admit to being in my nerdy/weird mode at present. You see I have a
collection of Memory Sticks which sort of cover the development of
the medium and is a reminder of the previous limitations of cameras
like the F707. So I have 32MB, 64MB, 128MB, and a 128MB x2 Card
(that's the one with the little switch that gives you two banks of
128MB, do you remember those cards?!).

LOL. I have quite the collection too. Heck, I paid $159 for a 64 MB plain vanilla (MagicGate) stick only a few years ago!

plevyadophy said:
So now that I want to upgrade, I want to do a similar thing by
getting all the Memory Stick Pro cards up to the limit that the
F717 can take. So that will be 256MB, 512MB, 1GB, 2GB.

Nice for a bit of history but I guess financial suicide given that
any future Sony camera I buy will not accept such larage sized
(i.e. non Duo) cards

A 2 GB SanDisk Extreme III Pro Duo will net you 114 TIFFs.

BTW, I don't shoot TIFFs with the 717. Never have seen any difference. Just my opinion though.

plevyadophy said:
6) One more thing

Since you give such good quality answers, I wonder if you could
help me with another question of mine. The question is posted here:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/readflat.asp?forum=1002&thread=20456940

Go ahead and edit your TIFFs in Photoshop. You'll have no probs.
R2

--
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.

http://www.pbase.com/jekyll_and_hyde/galleries

plevyadophy · Oct 18, 2006

R2D2 said:
plevyadophy said:

2) Card speeds.

The speeds I have differ from the details you have given. I have it
as:

SanDisk Extreme III Memory Stick Pro = 20MB/s
SanDisk Extreme III Memory Stick Pro Duo = 18 MB/s

Click to expand...

Extreme III Pro, and Extreme III Pro Duo both Read/Write at the
same speed: 18 MB/s.

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0409/04092806sandisk_extremeiii.asp

You might be confusing them with the Extreme III Compact Flash or
Extreme III SD cards, which Read/Write at 20 MB/s.

R2D2 said:

Sony Memory Stick Pro = 160Mbps (20 MB/s)

Click to expand...

More like 16Mb/s (2 MB/s).

R2D2 said:

Sony Memory Stick Pro Duo = ?????

Click to expand...

Exactly the same as the Pro.

R2D2 said:

So it seems that the SanDisk Duo card is slower than the full size
card.

Click to expand...

Nope. It is not. Your source is wrong.

R2D2 said:

The speeds you quoted, are they for the full size or Duo
card?
For I notice you qoute the same speed for the SanDisk card as
I have quoted above for the SanDisk Duo.

Click to expand...

They are both rated exactly the same.

R2D2 said:

If you are quoting Duo size speed then it seems that the Sony cards
are woefully underperforming yet they cost an absolute fortune (
Sony Duo Pro High Speed 1GB @ £196.99 -v- SanDisk Extreme III Duo
1GB @ £109.99 and even worse still there is the Sony Duo Pro High
Speed 2GB at a whopping £439.99, again the SanDisk variant is
around half the price)

Click to expand...

The Sony "High Speed" is certainly overpriced IMO. I've gone with
the SanDisk sticks and have never had a problem.

Yet again, thanks for your brilliant replies.

1) Memory Card Speed.

When I quoted the speed of the Sony Memory Stick Pro as being 160Mbps what I actually meant was Sony HIGH SPEED Memory Stick Pro.

One of the annoying things about this Forum is that you can't go back and edit a post. Instead having to make another post to point readers to the error.

So if the Sony HIGH SPEED Memory Sticks are rated at 160Mbps then it would appear that they are faster than the Sandisk Extreme III variants.

2) Memory Card Compatibility

One of the curious things is that I just had a look at the Sandisk site. Now according to them, the Sony F717 is compatible with their 4GB cards. Hmmm, interesting. But I thought that the F717 uses FAT16 to format the sticks and therefore can only go up to 2GB. And besides the Sony site does say that the F717 doesn't support the 4GB size card.

3) Finally - F717 TIFF and Photoshop

You advised me that I can go ahead with photoshop and edit my TIFF files.

Giiven that the F717 saves TIFF without EXIF data, doesn't Photoshop need all that EXIF data in order to work out what to with an image?

I mean will Photoshop perform just as well with our without EXIF information?

I am a total newbie to the whole PhotoShop thing. Having only just ordered it.

And part of the reason for my wanting to use faster data cards is that I wanted to try and work in TIFF for a while given that the images are uncompressed. Although I note with interest that you say that you can not see any difference. Which leads me to ask why all the enthusiasm for RAW files then? (Nearly everywhere I look people seem to say RAW is the way to go).

So if TIFF files and RAW files are both uncompressed, what's the difference?

Thanks again.

plevyadopjhy

plevyadophy · Oct 19, 2006

R2D2

I stand corrected.

I have just bought a 512MB Sony High Speed Memory Stick Pro and it clearly states on the box 80Mpbs/10MBs.

So my source that states in its catalogue that the Sony MS High Speed Pros run at 160Mbps/20MBs is talking nonsense. And the source happens to be the biggest photographic retailer in the United Kingdom, Jessops.

And two days ago I ordered a Sony 256MB High Speed Stick for around £25.

What do you think of those prices?

But clearly given that the Sandisk Sticks run at twice the speed and cost half as much as the Sony variants, they offer ridiculously good value for money. Or perhaps one could say that the Sandisk memory cards are all expensive and the Sony ones are just outrageously so.

Gadfly · Oct 19, 2006

I have enough chips now but have always bought what was on sale at the time. All the endless debates about the minutiae concerning computers, electronics, physics and whatnot is all pointless.
You do macro work.
Macro work by definition is slow and tedious as you know.
Do you really think an extra pico second will make a difference?

--
R1 and H5 photos here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/grossinger

Andrew · Oct 19, 2006

Lots of informaiton here that I've been looking for for days as my R1 is arriving any minute (acutally UPS just arrived) and I don't know what memory to buy. I've got plenty of sticks for my other cameras but speed will be an issue so the question is...what speed can the R! write to a stick at and then which stick is best matched for that speed. Thanks
Andrew

Richard Cooper · Oct 19, 2006

I have an R1 and use the Sony Memory stick pro 2GB.

I tried the Sony Memory stick "High Speed" 2GB but there was no difference between this and the pro regarding write times.

For RAW it's about 6-7sec per frame after the first 2 images fill up the camera buffer.

The reason is the R1 is not a "high speed device". Only high speed memory sticks write at high speed when used with a "high speed device".

Richard Cooper

Gadfly · Oct 19, 2006

LOL! If speed is an issue then send the R1 back. It's one of the slowest cameras on the planet. The entire notion of having an R1 goes against the notion of speed.

You don't shoot pictures with an R1. You make them. You explore angles and perspectives not possible with any DSLR. Hell, if speed is the issue send it back and get a Nikon or Canon DSLR.

If you already have sticks then use them and see what happens before worrying about buying faster ones.

--
R1 and H5 photos here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/grossinger

Andrew · Oct 19, 2006

No, speed really isn't an issue since I mostly shoot static shots like landscape and flowers but one never knows. Still have my 717 for quickies but looking forward to the wide angle on the R1.

plevyadophy · Oct 20, 2006

R2D2

Yesterday, I bought a Sony High Speed Memory Stick. I then did some tests myselfs.

The way I did it was to ensure that the camera had both exposure and focus lock before pressing the shutter. Once having pressed the shuter I would simultaneously start my stop watch.

I would then watch the disk activity light and wait for it to extinguish. As the light extinguishes I would simultaneously stop the stopwatch.

I conducted the tests twice to make sure the timings were correct.

And here is the timiings I got

I did the tests at the highest resolution in TIFF Mode:

Regular old Sony 128MB Memory Stick: 46 seconds.

Sony 128x2 Memory Stick: 41 seconds.

Sony 512MB High Speed Memory Stick Pro: 34 seconds.

.

R2D2 · Oct 20, 2006

plevyadophy said:
Giiven that the F717 saves TIFF without EXIF data, doesn't
Photoshop need all that EXIF data in order to work out what to with
an image?

Nope

plevyadophy said:
I mean will Photoshop perform just as well with our without EXIF
information?

Yes.

plevyadophy said:
I am a total newbie to the whole PhotoShop thing. Having only just
ordered it.
And part of the reason for my wanting to use faster data cards is
that I wanted to try and work in TIFF for a while given that the
images are uncompressed.

Good reasoning.

plevyadophy said:
Although I note with interest that you say
that you can not see any difference.

The highest quality JPEGs from the 717 are very good. Perhaps you'll notice some difference though.

plevyadophy said:
Which leads me to ask why all
the enthusiasm for RAW files then? (Nearly everywhere I look people
seem to say RAW is the way to go).
So if TIFF files and RAW files are both uncompressed, what's the
difference?

RAW is an entirely different animal. Not only is it uncompressed, but it is also unprocessed (in-camera). TIFFs are processed the same as JPEGs.
R2

--
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.

http://www.pbase.com/jekyll_and_hyde/galleries

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