Customer Reviews

SanDisk SDCFH-256-901 256MB ULTRA II CF Card (Retail Package)

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Very fast read/write speed compared to my existing 256MB card -- Lexar Media 256 MB (CF256-12-251). You might ask if this high speed is required. And the answer is YES, especially the write speed. Otherwise you will be waiting for the image to be written on your card before you can take the next shot. When you want to take action photos, this card really help you out. I am very happy with card and strongly recommend it. By the way I am using this card with Nikon 5700 camera.

At first I was a bit hesitant to get Sandisk products because I've heard so many people complaining. But after doing thorough research, I found that the rest of the brands were being equally lambasted by users. So, I decided to choose based on technicals and not opinions. Well, this CompactFlash card is quite powerful and what was the bearing point for me to lean and buy this is its price. I've used it to record digital video clips, I've taken pictures of all sizes and with different visual effects, I've done high-speed shutter (~2.2 shots/sec @ 1024x768) and it works phenomenally and flawlessly. I have not had ANY of the errors people write so much about and I'm actually sure enough that I'm willing to recommend it to others.
The 256MB its sufficient for about 200 3.1-Megapixel high-quality pictures. Which can hold a weekend's vacation worth of pictures without having to erase or transfer them to your computer. However, if you can afford the extra $50, I suggest buying the 512Mb one. In short: good value, excellent performance, good price and good quality.

I purchased this product to use in a Sandisk Firewire CF card reader in order to transfer data files between the home and the office. I normally use 100MB Zip disks, but the transfer rate using a USB Zip250 for a 30 MB file is 3 min. 19 sec. which is incredibly slow. I had a Sandisk 128 MB CF card, but using the Firewire CF card reader, a 30 MB file still took 1 min. 9 sec. to transfer so I bought the Sandisk Ultra II 256 MB card since it was supposed to have a higher transfer rate. It did. It allowed the transfer of the 30 MB file in 15 seconds which is 4.6 times faster than the non-ultra Sandisk CF card and 13 times faster than a 100MB Zip disk in a USB Zip250 drive. I was pleasantly surprised. I would buy another one to use in my digital camera since I am pretty sure it will function faster than the non-ultra Sandisk CF card I use now. Plus, the Ultra II card was no more expensive than the non-ultra card and the Sandisk Ultra II CF card was comparably or better priced compared to CF cards from other manufacturers.

These cards are well priced and indead fast. I use mine to watch short films on my Toshiba e740 PDA so the speed of the memory is crucial. Now let me tell you something that may be the reason some have ragged on this card. "Irradiation" that USPS and some UPS offices use can not only erase this memory but actually destroy it. I know this because I work for a firm that puts out units with these cards built in all the time. We actually had to do a re-call due to all the irradiation going on during the anthrax scare. For this reason either buy locally or ship fed-ex or UPS air. Dont find out the hard way that your card has been irradiated and destroyed...just my advice.

I wanted a fast flash memory card. This guy is it. Compared to a "standard" Sandisk 256MB, this Ultra II is 5 times faster. Here are my results copying (writing) a 36 MB file to the card: 34 sec for the standard card and 7 sec for the Ultra II. Reading from the card was even faster. Great product. And the Amazon price seems very good too, based on my limited searching.

I'm just stunned ... I thought the SanDisk Ultra II I bought was defective as my Canon S50 DigiCam seemingly w/o reason had a disk error !

But Nooooo ... much to my surprise the SanDisk Ultra 256 card is not defective but operator error resulted in corrupted disk format ...
I found a free demo tool that revealed all the photos are still intact ... and, after purchasing the tool, I recoved all but a part of one photo!

Here is the s/w I used: (http://www.lc-tech.com/photorecovery.htm)

FWIW: Be very careful when using a CF Reader and swapping CF cards ... be sure to do an eject and don't manually pop a CF card out and pop another in!

Having read review after review on whether or not the flash card actually made a difference, I was sceptical when formating my newly purchased card. Took the first image (Nikon 5000) and had to double check that my image settings weren't changed. The camera wrote the image to disk faster than other cards I've used. To give an easy comparison, in 'fine' mode it writes as fast as it did in 'normal' with an older flash card.
Then while uploading the images to my Mac, the files transfered almost twice as fast. i haven't timed it but it is definitely faster.
Needless to say, I no longer use my other flash cards. I've missed too many shots in the past while waiting for the image to write.

I've known and happily used SanDisk CF cards before, high quality, good price. This Ultra II card comes with some worries. Since CF doesn't write at 9MB/sec, it uses a "buffer" to write a small amount (like 4 megs) to an ultra-fast buffer, then the image is slowly transferred to the main card. And there's the problem.

I lost every "last image" on my trip to Italy. When I powered on the camera, took say 5 pictures, it would record 4 and lose the last image. This is because I was turning the camera off after taking the 5th picture. I needed to leave the camera on another 20 seconds to be sure the memory card finished transfer of the images. So it's very fast, for a small burst of pictures, but LEAVE THE CAMERA ON. I did a lot of "that's cool!" pictures... you turn the camera on, take a picture, turn the camera off to save battery life. Mistake. Make sure you REVIEW the images (and not just the temporary image displayed after the picture is taken) before POWERING DOWN.

I was hoping to increase the write speed on my Minolta 7i which makes me wait for a full write before I can take the next photo. In this camera, the Ultra II is actually slower than a "regular" SanDisk 256MB card. Ran a couple of quick tests, using the Ultra II, a "regular speed" SanDisk CF and a 1G IBM CF Micro Drive:
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In the 7i, taking a macro photo of a catalog page with lots of colors, small images and text (5 MP):

UltraII - 13 seconds RAW : 15 seconds TIF : 4.5 seconds full size JPG.

Regular - 11 seconds RAW: 14 seconds TIF : 3.8 seconds JPG

1G IBM MD - 12 Seconds RAW : 18 seconds TIF : 4.0 seconds JPG
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Performance in my Nikon D-100 was better when taking the same (6.1MP) landscape photo:

Ultra II - 5.1 seconds RAW : 25 seconds TIF : 3.2 seconds full size JPG

Regular - 5.4 seconds RAW : 26 seconds TIF : 3.7 seconds JPG

1G IBM MD - 11 seconds RAW : 29.3 seconds TIF : 4.2 seconds JPG
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When I purchased this card, Amazon was having a GREAT sale on it, I paid a dollar more than what a "standard" speed card would cost, so I am not irritated. If I had paid the normal retail price though, I'd be upset with its less than stellar performance in the intended application.

So, make sure that your camera can take advantage of the increased write speed of this card before you spend the extra money on it over a "standard" speed card. I'll be using it as backup on the Nikon rather than as a primary on the Minolta.

When I purchased my Canon A70, I installed a Kodak 256 card. I thought, "A card is a card is a card." When I took a 30 second high res video clip (640x480), the camera needed about 5 seconds at the end of the video clip for "processing". I am not sure what it was actually doing (If the image was not already in memory, where was it?). Regardless! With this card installed, the camera needs less than one second to "finish processing" a 30 second hi-res video. It is clearly a much faster camera all around now. I was suprised that I noticed the difference, but it is real.