Micro SD vs SD

[Andrew]

Went out to get some SD cards for a shoot this morning and all I could find quickly were micro sd's with adapters. As long as the micro's meet the same specs does it matter which you use in a camera as long as the micro is in an adapter?

Thanks

Andrew

 

[PJPfeiffer]

Went out to get some SD cards for a shoot this morning and all I could find quickly were micro sd's with adapters. As long as the micro's meet the same specs does it matter which you use in a camera as long as the micro is in an adapter?

Thanks

Andrew

I've used both micro with adapter and 'regular' SD without incident. One caveat - the adapter introduces another set of contacts - I haven't had problems.

 

[NearerNirvana]

I wondered the exact same thing earlier this year. To save you the same level of thorough researching I did, and if you'll take me at my word, I can 100% confirm it makes not one bit of difference.

 

[dwalby]

I wondered the exact same thing earlier this year. To save you the same level of thorough researching I did, and if you'll take me at my word, I can 100% confirm it makes not one bit of difference.

that is true, but I have found the adapters to be less than reliable over time. I think the symptom was the read/write speed suddenly slowed down, but it still worked. Since I have two tablets that take the microSD directly, I just used it directly in the tablets.

 

[qZar]

I've moved to microSD as the envelopes get crumbled from time to time. In case of microSD replacing the adapter is enough to fix it, while it gets tricky with normal SD.

 

[T3]

Went out to get some SD cards for a shoot this morning and all I could find quickly were micro sd's with adapters. As long as the micro's meet the same specs does it matter which you use in a camera as long as the micro is in an adapter?

Thanks

Andrew

That might not be a bad option for the future because as laptops keep getting slimmer and slimmer, many laptops are ditching the SD slot and only offering micro-SD slots. (In the case of the Macbook Pro, they give you neither, which totally suck.) I personally hate carrying a dongle so I have no interest in carrying an SD card dongle. I'll always get a laptop with either an SD slot or a micro SD slot. So if you use micro SD, you can use either kind of laptop. But if you're using a Mac, you'll still need a dongle, unfortunately.

 

[Mike_PEAT]

Writing to the card generates heat, and with a smaller surface (even with the adapter) it's harder to get rid of that heat. If you shoot a lot or do video I'd be concerned.

If I had my choice, cameras would still be using CF cards!

 

[T3]

Writing to the card generates heat, and with a smaller surface (even with the adapter) it's harder to get rid of that heat. If you shoot a lot or do video I'd be concerned.

If I had my choice, cameras would still be using CF cards!

Does heat really matter if heat has no effect on card performance? Solid state flash memory can handle plenty of heat. Think of all the heat going on in our smartphones. Flash memory in smartphones can handle it. I have a micro SD card in my LG G4 smartphone, and it's taking a lot of heat! So who cares about heat if flash memory can handle heat? Have had SD cards go through the laundry, through the intense heat of the dryer, and they've been fine.

 

[007peter]

Hi guys, it didn't work for me. My MicroSD came with a Micro to SD adapter but when I pop into Canon T1i, Canon T2i, and Panasonic GF6, none of the camera recognized the card.

This is my experience has anyone actually Tried the MicroSD in actual camera??

 

[PenPix]

I have had a higher rate of failure with micro SD, but it may be due to not using the top tier cards. I've had failure with both SD and micro SD, so I change them out every few years and carry ample extras

My bigger problem is with dropping them. I was moving one from my tablet when it popped out... I finally found it 2 years later when I was moving furniture.

 

[Mike_PEAT]

Writing to the card generates heat, and with a smaller surface (even with the adapter) it's harder to get rid of that heat. If you shoot a lot or do video I'd be concerned.

Does heat really matter if heat has no effect on card performance? Solid state flash memory can handle plenty of heat. Think of all the heat going on in our smartphones. Flash memory in smartphones can handle it. I have a micro SD card in my LG G4 smartphone, and it's taking a lot of heat! So who cares about heat if flash memory can handle heat?

But in the case of the cellphone MicroSD slot it's wrapped in a heatsink/shield:

The SD-MicroSD card adapter on the other hand is all PLASTIC:

The extra layer of plastic of the adapter acts like an insulator keeping the heat in the MicroSD card.

Have had SD cards go through the laundry, through the intense heat of the dryer, and they've been fine.

Intense heat of a hair dryer? Try the heat from a heat gun for a proper test. I used to do electronics repair, and we had a miniature heat gun to find a defective overheating component, and then used a can of freezing spray to then cool it to see if it started working again...a hair dryer would have been useless in that test since it doesn't generate enough heat that a component fails at when it reaches operating temperature.

 

[T3]

Writing to the card generates heat, and with a smaller surface (even with the adapter) it's harder to get rid of that heat. If you shoot a lot or do video I'd be concerned.

Does heat really matter if heat has no effect on card performance? Solid state flash memory can handle plenty of heat. Think of all the heat going on in our smartphones. Flash memory in smartphones can handle it. I have a micro SD card in my LG G4 smartphone, and it's taking a lot of heat! So who cares about heat if flash memory can handle heat?

But in the case of the cellphone MicroSD slot it's wrapped in a heatsink/shield:

The SD-MicroSD card adapter on the other hand is all PLASTIC:

The extra layer of plastic of the adapter acts like an insulator keeping the heat in the MicroSD card.

Nice try, but there's no real heat sinking of a micro-SD card in a smartphone when the entire smartphone is a hot brick! Hahaha. And the entire phone is an insulator keeping the heat in! Plus, a smartphone will generate far more heat than writing to a micro-SD ever will. So heat sinking any meager amount of heat generated by card-writing is easily eclipsed my the considerable amount of heat being generated by a smartphone's processor heating up the whole phone.

I think this is all just overblown paranoia. "OMG, writing to a micro-SD will create such an enormous amount of heat, the card won't be able to handle it!" LOL, no. Any trivial amount of heat generated by writing to the card is well within the tolerances of flash memory. Just think of all the non-removable flash memory embedded deep inside our high-heat-generating electronic devices (smartphones, tablets, laptops). It survives just fine.

 

[Bill-NM]

Pete...it's possible you bought a micro SD card of a higher capacity and/or density than either of those cameras can recognize.

 

[Charles McRobert]

Writing to the card generates heat, and with a smaller surface (even with the adapter) it's harder to get rid of that heat. If you shoot a lot or do video I'd be concerned.

Does heat really matter if heat has no effect on card performance? Solid state flash memory can handle plenty of heat. Think of all the heat going on in our smartphones. Flash memory in smartphones can handle it. I have a micro SD card in my LG G4 smartphone, and it's taking a lot of heat! So who cares about heat if flash memory can handle heat?

But in the case of the cellphone MicroSD slot it's wrapped in a heatsink/shield:

The SD-MicroSD card adapter on the other hand is all PLASTIC:

The extra layer of plastic of the adapter acts like an insulator keeping the heat in the MicroSD card.

Have had SD cards go through the laundry, through the intense heat of the dryer, and they've been fine.

Intense heat of a hair dryer? Try the heat from a heat gun for a proper test. I used to do electronics repair, and we had a miniature heat gun to find a defective overheating component, and then used a can of freezing spray to then cool it to see if it started working again...a hair dryer would have been useless in that test since it doesn't generate enough heat that a component fails at when it reaches operating temperature.

Nah. Those are wimpy tests. Hold the Micro SD card with a pair of pliers and immerse it in an open flame. The hotter the better. Bunsen burner, if you have one. Try to destroy the card. Good luck! The card doesn't burn (SD cards will melt) and after you have given up trying to destroy the card, all the data on it is still there.

Heat is not a factor. In a situation where you have to destroy a Micro SD card, I'd suggest a drill or a grinder. Why would you have to destroy one? Secret spy stuff, maybe?