[Leica] Max Card Speed

[pklein at threshinc.com (Peter Klein)]

Ric:

If the M8's speed is maxed out at Class 6, it is indeed probably a waste
of money to go with faster cards, unless download speed at the computer is
a big deal to you, or you want to use your cards with a different/faster
camera.

Because of the way the "classes" are speced, it doesn't tell the whole
story. For example, if you format your card before shooting and never
delete a file until you format it again, you will be dealing mostly with
contiguous rather than fragmented files, and things will be significantly
faster.  Also, the Class is "round megabyte" number, the miniumum write
speed under fragmented conditions, so it's a worst-case spec.  It doesn't
tell you how the card performs when not fragmented, or when reading.

I've been using 3 Sandisk Extreme III 2 GB cards in my M8, plus a slower
Ultra II that I bought in a hurry when I needed more storage for a trip. 
I believe my Extreme III's are Class 6, and the Ultra II is Class 4.
Absent hard evidence, I don't see much reason to go up to Class 10, no
less higher.

Of course, I will defer to anyone who's actually tested the faster cards
in an M8.

Without using a stopwatch, my experience has been that the Ultra IIs are a
little slower to write to the M8, and quite a bit slower (~50%)
downloading to the computer via a reader.  Since I don't shoot machine-gun
style, I rarely fill my buffer, so I rarely notice the difference when
shooting.  I do notice the download speed difference.  It all depends on
how much and how fast you shoot.

These days the 4 GB SDHC Extreme III Class 6 are $28.50 at B&H, and the
Class 10 are $42.50.  That's significantly more money, though hardly
breaking the bank.  My guess is that the Class 10 cards would perform
about the same as my older 2 GB cards shooting, and be quite a bit faster
downloading to the computer IF I had a reader that could take advantage of
the speed.

There are also Transcend 4GB cards that less than half the price of the
equivalent SanDisks, and at $12.39, their Class 10 card is only 40 cents
more expensive than the Class 6.  I'd be interested in any reports of
their performance compated to the equivalent SanDisks, and in their
reliablility.

See
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/search?ci=1097&N=4277998784+4291236412+4294955783+4294952453+4291132620

--Peter
Ric Carter wrote:
>Okay, digiwizards--

> What is the maximal card speed for an M8.

>Obviously, one wants a card that will accept transmissions faster than the
 camera can send them.

>Also, money spent on card speed over the speed that the camera can pass
the information would seem wasted money.

> One review I saw said the data transfer rate for the M8 was 4.1 MB/sec.
That would seem to me that a Class 6 card should cover that pretty well.

> Is moving up past Class 10 (66x) money for nothing?