Canon 5D MKIV dual memory card question

[SecureGSM]

Good one! where is the "BOW" smile on the forum. Priceless!

I recently purchased 32 GB 95MB/s SD card for A$29.00 - that is what? US$24.00?? people that consider this being expensive, in my opinion, deserve being professionally destroyed.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/SanDisk-SDHC-Extreme-Pro-95MB-s-U3-C10-32GB-Memory-Card-SD-HC-UHS-I-Class-10-A/281370106868

I would wager most people are using older generation left over SD cards from previous cameras as their 'backup', thereby compromising themselves in speed and reliability.

 

[pwp]

I may give it a try at some point, I almost never do burst shooting.

If you never or rarely shoot bursts, you're never going to notice. But go for the SD option. Redundancy may not save your shoot tomorrow, but it might next week.

-pw

 

[Frodo]

What is card failure rate for modern cards?
I've never had a CF or SD card fail, but have had many (>10) USB thumb drives fail.
From my experience, my memory cards have been the most reliable piece of gear that I owned.
My worst gear failure was when the mirror fell off my 5D.
I would rather have two cameras at a critical event than one with two slots.

 

[Valvebounce]

Hi Frodo.
Yes that kind of ruins the backup principle, I was talking to a chap that had the flying mirror issue on a safari, he thought that he might be able to get some shots by pointing it and praying it was pointing the right way until he found that focus and metering went away too!
Apparently it can be fixed in the field if you have some superglue available, he said it took him a while to get the glue and courage to go at it then it was fixed in a short time. Safari salvaged.

Cheers, Graham.

What is card failure rate for modern cards?
I've never had a CF or SD card fail, but have had many (>10) USB thumb drives fail.
From my experience, my memory cards have been the most reliable piece of gear that I owned.
My worst gear failure was when the mirror fell off my 5D.
I would rather have two cameras at a critical event than one with two slots.

 

[Ian_of_glos]

When I first bought my 5D mark 4 I set it up to write the RAW files to the CF card and the JPEGs to the SD card and I never noticed any performance degradation. I assume that writing the larger RAW files to the CF card will become a constraint before writing the smaller JPEGs to the SD card does, but in practice it was never a problem. The performance data I have seen suggest that you can write 21 RAW files to the CF card before the buffer fills up and I probably never reached that many, even for one of my longer bursts.
However, what really annoys me is that, if you write the RAW file to one card and the JPEG to the other then the Canon EOS utility thinks that it has two files with the same name and appends a _1 to the JPEG file name when it copies it to the computer. I don't know why it does this because the files actually have different names (FILE01.CR2 and FILE02.JPG). Bizarrely, if the files are both written to the same card then it does not rename either file and it copies them both to the computer with the correct file names. Having to rename all my JPEGs became so annoying that I now no longer use this feature and I write the RAW and JPEGs to the CF card and the SD card is never used except as an overflow.

 

[Valvebounce]

Hi Ian.
First of all did you mean "FILE01.CR2 and FILE02.JPG" or as mine are labled (different model of camera) FILE01.CR2 and FILE01.JPG?
Second, I import via card reader and use Windows to do the import (rather than some other software), I accidentally imported both cards to the same folder and they were all mixed together but kept the correct numbers as *.cr2 *.jpg, I'm guessing that file type being different is why that worked, but I did select to show file extensions when I set up my pc, I don't know if that would make a difference?
I normally keep mine separated by having a subfolder for the Jpeg images as I don't usually use them, they get deleted once I get to making the Jpegs from the Raw file.

Cheers, Graham.

the files actually have different names (FILE01.CR2 and FILE02.JPG). Bizarrely, if the files are both written to the same card then it does not rename either file and it copies them both to the computer with the correct file names. Having to rename all my JPEGs became so annoying that I now no longer use this feature and I write the RAW and JPEGs to the CF card and the SD card is never used except as an overflow.

 

[Ian_of_glos]

Hi Ian.
First of all did you mean "FILE01.CR2 and FILE02.JPG" or as mine are labled (different model of camera) FILE01.CR2 and FILE01.JPG?
Second, I import via card reader and use Windows to do the import (rather than some other software), I accidentally imported both cards to the same folder and they were all mixed together but kept the correct numbers as *.cr2 *.jpg, I'm guessing that file type being different is why that worked, but I did select to show file extensions when I set up my pc, I don't know if that would make a difference?
I normally keep mine separated by having a subfolder for the Jpeg images as I don't usually use them, they get deleted once I get to making the Jpegs from the Raw file.

Cheers, Graham.

the files actually have different names (FILE01.CR2 and FILE02.JPG). Bizarrely, if the files are both written to the same card then it does not rename either file and it copies them both to the computer with the correct file names. Having to rename all my JPEGs became so annoying that I now no longer use this feature and I write the RAW and JPEGs to the CF card and the SD card is never used except as an overflow.

Sorry - my typo. That's what happens when I try to reply whilst I am on a long and very boring conference call!
Just to recap - when I save the raw files to the CF card and the JPEGs to the SD card I can look on the two cards and see that they are named correctly - in this example FILE01.CR2 and FILE01.JPG. The problem occurs when I use the Canon EOS utility to copy the files onto the computer. The raw file is copied correctly and appears on the computer as FILE01.CR2. However the JPEG is renamed FILE01_01.JPG. This is also what happens when I inadvertently copy the files twice, so it looks to me as if the Canon EOS utility thinks that FILE01.CR2 is the same file name as FILE01.JPG so it decides to rename it. If I save both the raw and the JPEG to the same card then the Canon EOS utility does not do this - they are copied to the computer correctly with the names FILE01.CR2 and FILE01.JPG - that is what I want and that is how the camera is configured now. However I have lost the advantage of having a backup copy of each file on a different card. I suppose I could write the raw and JPEGs to both cards, but I am worried about the performance of the SD card limiting the number of shots I can take in burst mode before the buffer fills up. That is why initially I was only saving JPEGs to the SD card.
Is there a way of copying the files onto the computer without using the Canon EOS utility? I quite like the way that the EOS utility creates a new folder for each date as this allows me to go straight to the date I am interested in and work on the files for the event that took place on that day. Are there any other utilities that allow me to do something similar?

 

[Valvebounce]

Hi Ian.
I seem to recall that Windows can assign dated folders the same as the EOS utility but I'm not 100% certain of that.
Did the 5DIII have the same issue, also did you have to update EOS Utilty for the 5DIV? Maybe it was that update that knackered things?

Cheers, Graham.

Is there a way of copying the files onto the computer without using the Canon EOS utility? I quite like the way that the EOS utility creates a new folder for each date as this allows me to go straight to the date I am interested in and work on the files for the event that took place on that day. Are there any other utilities that allow me to do something similar?

 

[Rejay14]

I have both the 1DX-II and 5DIV.. I remove the slower card from each before I transfer with EOS Utility. Otherwise, they double-write

I have the program set up to rename on import. The naming structure is the date, time and consecutive shots within each second up to 999. That way it is impossible for any files to have the same names and you don't run into the IMG99999.jpg conundrum. Hope this helps.

 

[pwp]

Is there a way of copying the files onto the computer without using the Canon EOS utility? I quite like the way that the EOS utility creates a new folder for each date as this allows me to go straight to the date I am interested in and work on the files for the event that took place on that day. Are there any other utilities that allow me to do something similar?

There's always the oldest method of all...drag and drop, just as you would from any other drive or folder, to your chosen destination folder. Many professional photographers around the planet will use PhotoMechanic's "Ingest" function. This is highly customizable. I use a dedicated download program with a touch more customization available, BreezeBrowser Downloader Pro from Chris Breeze at Breezsys. It's PC only. You can test drive either of these for free for a generous period.

-pw

 

[Talys]

Is there a way of copying the files onto the computer without using the Canon EOS utility? I quite like the way that the EOS utility creates a new folder for each date as this allows me to go straight to the date I am interested in and work on the files for the event that took place on that day. Are there any other utilities that allow me to do something similar?

There's always the oldest method of all...drag and drop, just as you would from any other drive or folder, to your chosen destination folder. Many professional photographers around the planet will use PhotoMechanic's "Ingest" function. This is highly customizable. I use a dedicated download program with a touch more customization available, BreezeBrowser Downloader Pro from Chris Breeze at Breezsys. It's PC only. You can test drive either of these for free for a generous period.

-pw

If it's something where there's only a relatively small number of keepers (for example, birding), what I'll do is open the memory card directly from DPP, and drag files from the filmstrip at the bottom into an explorer window (with my hard drive) on a separate monitor. It's a first level of screening; let's face it, why copy over shots where I missed the bird completely, or it's so close to the edge of the frame that it's unusable.

Then I do a Lightroom import and quickly screen through again, deleting more generously, and if I missed any shots that I remember taking that should have been good, I'll hunt for them on the card, but this is pretty rare. Then, I reformat the card.

 

[Ian_of_glos]

Hi Ian.
I seem to recall that Windows can assign dated folders the same as the EOS utility but I'm not 100% certain of that.
Did the 5DIII have the same issue, also did you have to update EOS Utilty for the 5DIV? Maybe it was that update that knackered things?

Cheers, Graham.

Is there a way of copying the files onto the computer without using the Canon EOS utility? I quite like the way that the EOS utility creates a new folder for each date as this allows me to go straight to the date I am interested in and work on the files for the event that took place on that day. Are there any other utilities that allow me to do something similar?

On the 5D Mark 3 the performance of the SD card was so poor that I never used it. I shoot a lot of fast action sports so this was important to me.
One of the reasons why I upgraded to the 5D Mark 4 was so that I could write to both cards just in case one of them failed, but I cannot use my preferred option of Write Separately (RAW going to the CF card and JPEG going to the SD card) because the EOS utility renames the JPEGs when I copy them to the computer. Instead, for general photography I am now using Record to Multiple and when I am shooting sports I change to Auto Switch Card but I only save the JPEGs. This works quite well but it is not my preferred configuration.
I have reported the problem to Canon and they acknowledge that the EOS utility is not working as designed. They advised me to upgrade to EOS Utility v3.7 but this has not fixed the problem.
I will try some of the other options for copying the files to the computer that various contributors have suggested and see if any of them are suitable.

 

[bitm2007]

I exaggerated, Its probably more like 150,000 write cycles before 10% of them fail, but I'd avoid low level formats until they are needed, such as before a long video

With modern NAND memory - Wear Leveling protection aside as low level format is full rewrite of every single byte of information - expectancy of the life is:

5000 to 10000 cycles (!!!!) ONLY !!!

it used to be up to 100,000 but with modern high density chip architecture and diminished quality due to cost saving race to the bottom, it is now roughly 5000.

That still sounds huge to me. The 5D4's shutter is likely to fail dozens of times before that figure is reached (assuming the card isn't reformatted after a few images on a regular basis).

 

[SecureGSM]

correction: it has to be a low level reformatting as a quick format operation does not rewrite every single block. Nevertheless, I had a card failed on me before. call me a looser

That still sounds huge to me. The 5D4's shutter is likely to fail dozens of times before that fixture is reached (assuming the card isn't reformatted after a few images on a regular basis).

 

[littleB]

Today I did this experiment again and my results:

1. CF (Sandisk extreme pro, black one, rated 160/150): buffer burst = 7.4 fps; sustained rate = 3.6 fps;
2. SD (Sandisk extreme pro UHS-I, black one, rated 95/90): buffer burst = 7.6 fps; sustained rate = 2.8 fps;
3. CF+SD (same cards as above): buffer burst = 7.4 fps; sustained rate = 2.5 fps.

Many factors (ISO, exposure metering, focusing setting) influence the rate, even battery charge may have some impact on fps, so YMMV.
SD is obviously slower, but CF+SD is even more slower. My guess is that writing to both cards is not fully parallel, the processor has to do some coordination, so the dual card fps is a bit slower than SD.