Customer Reviews

SanDisk Extreme Pro 16 GB SDHC Flash Memory Card SDSDXP1-016G

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4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

Length:: 5:32 Mins

The SanDisk Extreme Pro SDHC UHS-1 is the fastest SDHC currently on the market. That being said, I must point out that this card uses the UHS-1 standard which most cameras in existence currently do not support. I have the Nikon D7000 and as far as I can tell, it is the only camera that supports this card. Currently you can pick these cards up for about 75 dollars for the 16gb and 150-170 for the 32 gb. However, I suspect that as more cameras are released that support this card, you will see the price go up.

This card writes and reads at a minimum of 45 mb/second. This is 15 mb/s than the former fastest SDHC card on the market, the SanDisk Extreme Class 10.

Even if you do not currently have a camera that supports UHS-1 this card will still work and is backwards compatible with SDHC and SHXC devices. However, the card will revert back to standard Class 10 speeds approximately.

I could go on and on about the quality of SanDisk but I won't. Simply put, they make some of the best memory for cameras out there.

This is a great card, but it is not for everyone. I prefer it because I only shoot RAW (NEF for Nikon) and the files are typically between 25mb - 30mb. The Nikon D7000 16.2MP DX-Format CMOS Digital SLR with 3.0-Inch LCD (Body Only) has a buffer of 10 RAW photos. When I get to the end of the buffer, this card starts with the magic. Where my Transcend Class 10 card would only allow me to shoot 2 shots per three seconds once I reached the buffer, the Extreme Pro allows me to shoot 2 shots per second when I run over the buffer. It also replenishes the buffer in about 4 seconds versus the 15-20 seconds the standard Class 10 cards would take.

So, this card may or may not be for you. If you shoot event photography, sports photography, or weddings, then I would suggest you buy a couple or more of these. If you are a casual shooter who never fires off a large burst of photos, I would save your money and buy a less expensive card like the Transcend 16 GB Class 10 SDHC Flash Memory Card TS16GSDHC10E that is one third the cost.

In the video I compare three cards, the Dane-Elec 8 GB Class 4 SDHC Flash Memory Card DA-SD-8192-R, the Transcend 16 GB Class 10 SDHC Flash Memory Card TS16GSDHC10E, and the SanDisk Flash 16 GB SDHC Flash Memory Card SDSDXP1-016G (Black). I start by shooting straight RAW photos until the camera's buffer is exhausted and then see how quickly the card can write to clear the buffer. I then shoot the cards again in Fine JPG mode. I do this to show that the three cards will all suffice if you are just shooting JPGs. I wanted to show this so that it would help others in deciding if this was worth spending three times as much as other Class 10 cards. Since the 8gb and 32 gb Extreme Pro are built to the same standard and architecture, the write/read performance should be the same and the capacity should be the only difference. As this is a SanDisk branded SDHC card, this is a rather safe assumption.

Overall, I would buy this card again.

-Cheers!

Introduced on January 17, 2011, the SanDisk Extreme Pro is the fastest SD card to date. At 45MB/s (45 Megabytes per second, read *and* write), this card is 1.5x faster than its predecessor, the SanDisk Extreme [8GB, 16GB, 32GB], which is rated 30MB/s (class 10). Like its predecessor, the SanDisk Extreme Pro comes in storage capacities of 8GB, 16GB, and 32GB.

- UHS Speed Class 1
This SD card is rated UHS Class 1 (commonly denoted as UHS-I or UHS-1). The UHS-I speed class rating was introduced by the SD Association in June 2010, and should not be confused with the older speed class rating that designates a memory card as class 2, class 4, class 6, and class 10 (for write speeds of at least 2 MB/s, 4 MB/s, 6 MB/s, and 10 MB/s, respectively). Memory cards that are rated UHS-I support data transfer speeds of up to 104 MB/s.

As an aside, on January 5, 2011, the SD Association announced yet another speed class rating -- UHS Class 2 (UHS-II or UHS-2) -- for memory cards that support data transfer speeds of up to 312 MB/s.

- Compatibility
This SD card is backwards compatible with any device that supports SDHC (SD, High Capacity) and SDXC (SD, Extended Capacity). SDHC cards are memory cards that have capacities that range from 4GB to 32GB (FAT 32 file system). SDXC cards are memory cards that have capacities that range from 64GB to 2TB (exFAT file system).

I have no trouble using this card on my older devices, such as my Canon Rebel XSi (introduced in January 2008), HP iPAQ 111 (introduced in September 2007), and a generic memory card reader.

- Performance
A faster speed rating does not mean faster performance. To take full advantage of the 45 MB/s speed, you will need a device that supports the new UHS bus interface (the Nikon D7000 is currently the only such device that I know of).

My rebel XSi is, not surprisingly, unable to take advantage of the UHS bus interface. I ran some tests to see how the SanDisk Extreme Pro stacked up to each of my class 4, class 6, and class 10 SD cards by noting the time it took the Rebel to write data from its buffer to each of the SD cards.

The results:
Class 4: ~9 sec (Kingston)
Class 6: ~10 sec (Transcend)
Class 10: ~6 sec (RiData)
UHS Class 1: ~6 sec (SanDisk Extreme Pro)

Conclusion:
There is no appreciable performance gain beyond Class 10 because at speeds upwards of Class 10 (i.e. >10 MB/s), the bottleneck lies with the speed at which my camera is capable of writing data from its buffer to the memory card.

---
To recap: although the SanDisk Extreme Pro is backwards compatible with devices that support SDHC cards, you will only be able benefit from the its 45MB/s read/write speed if your device is able to take advantage of the new UHS bus interface. Regardless, the SanDisk Extreme Pro is definitely worth considering as a means of "future proofing" your memory cards. Moreover, as of this writing, the SanDisk Extreme Pro 8GB, 16GB, and 32 GB cards are actually priced near or below prices for their SanDisk Extreme (30 MB/s) counterparts! Highly recommended.

Length:: 5:32 Mins

The SanDisk Extreme Pro SDHC UHS-1 is the fastest SDHC currently on the market. That being said, I must point out that this card uses the UHS-1 standard which most cameras in existence currently do not support. I have the Nikon D7000 and as far as I can tell, it is the only camera that supports this card. Currently you can pick these cards up for about 75 dollars. However, I suspect that as more cameras are released that support this card, you will see the price go up.

This card writes and reads at a minimum of 45 mb/second. This is 15 mb/s than the former fastest SDHC card on the market, the SanDisk Extreme Class 10.

Even if you do not currently have a camera that supports UHS-1 this card will still work and is backwards compatible with SDHC and SHXC devices. However, the card will revert back to standard Class 10 speeds approximately.

I could go on and on about the quality of SanDisk but I won't. Simply put, they make some of the best memory for cameras out there.

This is a great card, but it is not for everyone. I prefer it because I only shoot RAW (NEF for Nikon) and the files are typically between 25mb - 30mb. The Nikon D7000 16.2MP DX-Format CMOS Digital SLR with 3.0-Inch LCD (Body Only) has a buffer of 10 RAW photos. When I get to the end of the buffer, this card starts with the magic. Where my Transcend Class 10 card would only allow me to shoot 2 shots per three seconds once I reached the buffer, the Extreme Pro allows me to shoot 2 shots per second when I run over the buffer. It also replenishes the buffer in about 4 seconds versus the 15-20 seconds the standard Class 10 cards would take.

So, this card may or may not be for you. If you shoot event photography, sports photography, or weddings, then I would suggest you buy a couple or more of these. If you are a casual shooter who never fires off a large burst of photos, I would save your money and buy a less expensive card like the Transcend 16 GB Class 10 SDHC Flash Memory Card TS16GSDHC10E that is one third the cost.

In the video I compare three cards, the Dane-Elec 8 GB Class 4 SDHC Flash Memory Card DA-SD-8192-R, the Transcend 16 GB Class 10 SDHC Flash Memory Card TS16GSDHC10E, and the SSanDisk Flash 16 GB SDHC Flash Memory Card SDSDXP1-016G (Black). I start by shooting straight RAW photos until the camera's buffer is exhausted and then see how quickly the card can write to clear the buffer. I then shoot the cards again in Fine JPG mode. I do this to show that the three cards will all suffice if you are just shooting JPGs. I wanted to show this so that it would help others in deciding if this was worth spending three times as much as other Class 10 cards.

I hope you enjoy the video.

-Cheers!

I recently purchased a Nikon D7000 and planned to use the old memory card I had lying around until I could upgrade to one with more capacity. The old card I had was a sandisk ultra SD card, rated at 15 MB/s. I noticed that when shooting 14-bit RAW on the D7000, I could only get 10 shots in the buffer, which amounts to less than 2 seconds on continuous high. In testing the camera just to find its limits, I found that once the buffer was full, it took almost 3 seconds for me to be able to shoot another picture with my old card (this is based off of the EXIF data, so it's not exact). I wasn't terribly surprised, since the card was not rated to be particularly fast. Occasionally, when shooting sports, I could see myself hitting the buffer limit, so I decided that when looking for a new card, I needed to look at something that could write a little faster and make the camera's buffer stretch a bit farther.

I was looking at the Sandisk Extreme SD card, which was rated at 30 MB/s and was very well received, but came across this card, which uses a new standard to achieve speeds of up to 45 MB/s. There were very few reviews when I bought it, but since this card was actually cheaper than the tried and true Extreme SD card for the same capacity, I decided to spring for it. I also discovered that the D7000 actually supports the new (UHS-1) SD standard and thus could take advantage of the increased speed.

In my own tests, I found that the camera allowed me to continue shooting about 1 frame per second after filling the buffer. Unlike my old, slower card, I didn't feel like the camera had just stalled when hitting the buffer limit. I didn't time how long it took each card to completely empty the buffer once full, but I'm confident this card would do it much faster. Needless to say, I was very pleased with the increase in speed (and thus usability) this card added to the camera.

Obviously I can't comment on reliability at this point, but I suspect it will be on par with most other sandisk products--which is very good. My final verdict is this, if you have a camera that can support the faster speeds (like the D7000), this card might be a great choice for you. As long as it continues to be the same price as the older model, it is a no-brainer in my mind. If your camera doesn't support the faster speeds, or you never expect to fill the buffer on your camera, then these high speed cards may not be worth the expense to you. Hopefully my review can help you decide whether it's worth stepping up to the newer cards in your situation.

UPDATE: August 1, 2011
I've been using this card regularly for about 6 months now and am still just as happy with it as I was when I bought it. It works great with a d7000 and hasn't given me any issues. I still emphasize that you won't get the full speed out of the card unless your hardware supports it, but if it does, I think the card is well worth it!

I received this card as a gift after asking a friend to obtain one for me. I had seen the reviews for the SanDisk 8GB Extreme SDHC Class 10 High Performance Memory Card (SDSDX3-008G-P31) and wanted to be able to shoot at glorious speeds without having to worry about my card slowing down. My previous card is a Transcend 16G GB Class 6.

This card is indeed incredibly fast. I'm using it on a Nikon D90.

When shooting in .jpeg, the ISO setting affects how fast I can shoot before the buffer fills.

I've listed a couple testing shots below. All these shots were using Active D-Lighting. Slow down means that the card reduces its frame rate since the buffer cannot take anymore photos until it writes it to the card.

*At ISO 200 jpeg fine, The buffer NEVER fills up. It starts at 13, goes down to 10, then NEVER goes down below 10. Once I hit the 100 shot limit, I can immediately press the shutter again and start shooting another set of 100 without the buffer STILL never going below 10.

*At ISO 400 jpeg fine, I can shoot 45 photos at the full 4.5 fps before the buffer fills up and starts to slow down.

*At ISO 800 jpeg fine, roughly 25 shots before the buffer fills and slows down.

*At ISO 1600 jpeg fine, roughly 6 shots before the buffer fills and slows down.

*At ISO 200 Raw, I get roughly 10 shots before the buffer fills and slows down.

*At ISO 400 Raw, same as above, roughly 10 shots before buffer fills.

*At ISO 800 and 1600 Raw, 5 shots and the buffer fills.

For those who like numbers and file sizes:

*Jpeg files at 200 and 400 come out anywhere from 3.5 to 6 MB.

*At 800 and 1600 they start anywhere from 5-7 MB.

*Raws come out anywhere from 8.5-12 at all ISO settings.

Assuming file sizes, the card most likely writes a minimum of at least 20 MB. No matter what file type I shoot, after I shoot continuous, there is about 1 second lag before it completes all the photos in the buffer once I stop firing it.

Using my laptop's reader and CrystalDiskMark, I get an odd 21 MB Read and 21 MB write. I'm assuming I hit the limit of read/write on my laptop SD card reader, and since I don't have an external reader I can't really upload significant enough data for those who prefer benchmarks.

It should be noted that ISO will affect how fast the camera writes to the file. Since I'm assuming the camera has to process the extra data from the higher ISO to compensate along with the high ISO noise reduction ON, I have no doubt that this card is faster than the camera's processing. The card probably sits there wondering where the data from the buffer is since it's that fast.

All in all, I recommend this card highly. This card operates at least at the same speed if not faster than the SanDisk 8GB Extreme SDHC Class 10 High Performance Memory Card (SDSDX3-008G-P31), is 6 dollars cheaper (41 vs 47) and definitely shows a very good improvement. Sandisk has definitely shown me that a faster card makes a difference.

I bought this card for use in my Nikon D7000. When I bought the card (Febuary 2011), it was the fastest SD card available, having been released by SanDisk a month prior. Each RAW file on my D7000 is ~22MB. At 6 FPS, as soon as the 10-shot in-camera-buffer runs out, it only takes ~6 seconds for the files to be completely dumped to the card. Shooting large jpeg photos @ the fine setting, I can get approx. 45-50 uninterrupted shots @ a 6 FPS before it slows slightly. If you give the shutter release button a break, it's completely ready for another round in less than 3 seconds. Amazing.

For those of you who are picky, you'll notice the model number for this product is SDSDXP1-008G-X46. This is the international version of this product. The USA version is SDSDXP1-008G-A75. The only difference is that the packaging has a handful of other languages on the back (and inside the packaging). Cosmetically, the card is identical. It is exactly as Amazon's picture depicts. The card is exactly the same. Same speed, same look. Just different packaging and a bit cheaper.

The only downside to this card is that you need a UHS-I capable card reader to take full advantage of the transfer speed of this card. Otherwise any SDHC card reader will work no problem. Just don't expect to get 45MB/s transfer rates.

I bought this card for my Nikon D5000 because I wanted a bit more storage than the 8GB SanDisk Extreme SDHC card I already have (SanDisk 8GB Extreme SDHC Class 10 High Performance Memory Card (SDSDX3-008G-P31)). In the camera it works just as you would expect it to; I'm able to shoot at the maximum rate of the camera (~4fps) without any issues shooting in RAW + JPEG fine. In fact, I suspect the card can actually write data faster than my particular camera is capable of sending it. Transferring the images off the card to my PC is blazing fast, although I can't say that there's much of a difference between the Extreme Pro (45MB/s) versus the Extreme (30MB/s) card.

Supposedly these cards are waterproof, shockproof, and x-ray proof. I haven't really tested this out, but all of my other cards have passed through the airport x-ray machines without any loss or corruption of data, so I think this is more a marketing ploy than anything else.

I have always used SanDisk cards and have never (knock on wood) had any reliability issues with them. I'm only an amateur photographer, but nonetheless, the pictures I take on vacation and around town are priceless to me. As far as I'm concerned, this card is of excellent quality and performs just like it should.

While the card is very fast when used with my Canon Rebel T2i, I have had an issue with getting my Macbook Pro (Early 2011) to read this card. This computer supports SDHC cards up to 32GB and SDXC cards up to 2TB with a direct PCIe connection.

I contacted the SanDisk Extreme support dept. in February and was told that a fix was on the way for this issue and in the mean time to use the usb port on my camera to transfer my photos. They still havent come out with a fix(late June now), put up a knowledgebase article, written a disclaimer, or attempted to contact me further. In fact their site still says this product is "Compatible with all SDHC(tm) and SDHC(tm) UHS-I supporting host devices"

I paid for a high speed card so i wouldn't have to wait half an hour to transfer my photos over USB!! If i wanted to do that, I would have paid ~$5 for 8GB of slow storage instead of ~$40 for a high speed premium product!

Just my two cents, but I feel like SanDisk should take care of its customers who pay a premium for better products.

I feel as if I had been lied to by this company, as i do a fair amount of research on all my online purchases and when making important purchasing decisions, i do not like surprises. From now on ill go with high speed cards from other manufacturers.

This Extreme Pro at 45MB/s is truly fast in every sense of the word. I'm using it in my new Fuji X-100 and the first thing I noticed is near instant power-on using this card. My first card seemed to take at least 2 seconds to ready state from off. I'd say this is under a second, and that can make the difference between getting a shot or not. You don't put crap tires on a sports car, so spend a bit more than the discount cards and you'll love the results. Even transferring from card reader to my iMac is very fast. SanDisk, historically for me, has been very reliable. Reliability and speed. Need I say more? Best card period!

I ordered this after reading great reviews on it. I wanted a high speed card so we could do video and photos on my D7000. The first one I ordered errored after a day or so of using it. Thinking it was a bad card I contacted Amazon and got a replacement. It came very quickly and I tried out my new card last night. It errored not even half way into its first photo shoot and the camera deemed it unreadable. I had formatted both in camera before first use, and tried reformatting again to see if that helped. I'm really not sure why both of these errored, but I will obviously be trying a different card.