Please help a newbie choose a CF card

E Ben G · 06-10-05, 12:51 PM

Hi all,

I just made the switch to PPC from Palm. Hopefully my x50v will arrive today! This forum seems great and I've already learned alot reading about which programs I should get for my Axim once I've got it in my grubby little paws.

Anyway - Dell is offering some specials on high capacity memory for the CF slot. Here are the options I'm considering

Hitachi 6gb microdrive - $225
Sandisk 4gb CompactFlash - $224
Sandisk 4gb Ultra II CompactFlash - $277

So, from reading the forums here I'm familiar in a general sense about the tradoffs between the three options:
1. Microdrive is a good price/GB, but it uses more power and will therefore reduce the amount of time I can listen/watch media on the Axim.
2. Most on the forum have said that if I'm using flash (not microdrive) that the speed difference b/t normal and Ultra II won't come into play. (That is of course if I'm not also using the memory in a dSLR, which I'm not)

So, I have two questions
1. If go for the 6gb Hitachi microdrive, will I be super disappointed with battery life?
2. If I choose the Flash memory, should I pay $50 extra for the high speed?

I'm really hoping to get feedback based on experience, not so much technical read/write or mA values. These specifications admittedly don't mean much to me.

Thanks for any feedback,
Ben

Gigi · 06-10-05, 01:08 PM

Welcome to Aximsite!

I've never had a Microdrive so cannot comment about that. However re your second question: I think high speed cards may be worth it if you have other devices that can take advantage of the increased speeds (e.g., digicams, card readers). With the larger cards, extra speeds will make a big difference.

Lancaster · 06-10-05, 01:25 PM

Originally Posted by Gigi

Welcome to Aximsite!

With the larger cards, extra speeds will make a big difference.

But not in the Axim...

Martin

medevo · 06-10-05, 02:16 PM

Originally Posted by E Ben G

Hitachi 6gb microdrive - $225
Sandisk 4gb CompactFlash - $224
Sandisk 4gb Ultra II CompactFlash - $277

So, I have two questions
1. If go for the 6gb Hitachi microdrive, will I be super disappointed with battery life?
2. If I choose the Flash memory, should I pay $50 extra for the high speed?

I will start with the second question, its simple.
Own just axim->regular card
Own other CF devices->Ultra II card

As for the microdrive, the biggest power consumption is always when writing, (280mA * 3.3VDC) versus idle (18mA *3.3VDC). Reading will be somewhere in between (no published data, sorry). If we assumed a consumption of 50mA*3.3VDC which might be still high, your looking at a extra 165mW of consumption. Assuming you were getting about 4 hours of runtime without the card (275mW) your looking at about 60% extra power consumption, or a reduction of runtime to 2.5 hours.

This is based totally on my assumption of the read power consumption, but I would expect between 60%-80% runtime compared to without the microdrive.

Medevo

Gigi · 06-10-05, 02:45 PM

Originally Posted by Lancaster

But not in the Axim...

Martin

Yes, that's right...that's why I also said:

Originally Posted by Gigi

I think high speed cards may be worth it if you have other devices that can take advantage of the increased speeds (e.g., digicams, card readers).

right before that.

radish28 · 06-10-05, 02:47 PM

flash cards are better than microdrives in my opinion, a little higher cost per megabyte but if you drop it or nail it to a tree or whatnot it'll still work perfectly.

**psionandy** · 06-10-05, 02:49 PM

I'd probably go for the CF card (battery life and less fragile), and probably the cheaper one (as I wouldn't really need the high speed)

mn5829 · 06-10-05, 03:52 PM

i'd so go w/ the cf, not only b/c of the power issue, but writing to cfs is faster than microdrives (such as if u put it in a card reader), if u plan on transfering movies to ur cf card, it's def best to go through a card reader and a high speed cf to get it done the fastes, in the axim, the speed is fine, i've got a cf regular speed, but i wish i had high speed cuz it takes some time to transfer large files, plus the solid state is reassuring as others have said, plus it's pretty hard to really fill up a cf card with that much data unless u've got a good amount of movies that you want on a card at once

Lancaster · 06-11-05, 06:51 AM

Originally Posted by Gigi

Yes, that's right...that's why I also said:

right before that.

Yes, I knew exactly what you meant. However it could have been misunderstood by the uninitiated, as it could have been interpreted as a bigger card in the Axim would benefit from being higher speed.

I think we are actually in violent agreement!

Regards

Martin

E Ben G · 06-11-05, 11:13 AM

Thanks for all the help, everyone.

I think I'll go with the ultra II compact flash. I'll spend the extra 50 on the chance that I'll also want to use this card in a camera in the future.

The 6gb microdrive is still very tempting, but I think I will take the advice you guys gave me.

By the way, my x50v arrived yesterday, and I'm blown away. Not to bash Palm, but surfing the web on a LifeDrive was a JOKE. The screen and PIE on the x50v is awesome.

Thanks for the advice,
Ben

medevo · 06-11-05, 07:04 PM

Originally Posted by E Ben G

Thanks for all the help, everyone.

I think I'll go with the ultra II compact flash. I'll spend the extra 50 on the chance that I'll also want to use this card in a camera in the future.

The 6gb microdrive is still very tempting, but I think I will take the advice you guys gave me.

By the way, my x50v arrived yesterday, and I'm blown away. Not to bash Palm, but surfing the web on a LifeDrive was a JOKE. The screen and PIE on the x50v is awesome.

Thanks for the advice,
Ben

Sounds great, the X50v really is a powerful and useful device.

I will be the cynic and will state the one disadvantage of the CF-FLASH card solution, write cycles. A couple of weeks ago I figured out that based on MTBF write cycle numbers, that the BIS should fail after about 2-3 years of constant writing. CF cards have faster transfer rates in general, and this number will be smaller. Assuming you do huge amounts of writing (which also sucks batteries like mad) Microdrives do not typically have a limited number of write cycles. That said, the physical compontents of the microdrive (heads, rotor, motor, controller) would likely fail long before you had hit the limit of writes on the flash card.

Medevo

High-Fidelity · 06-20-05, 08:36 AM

Originally Posted by medevo

Microdrives do not typically have a limited number of write cycles. That said, the physical compontents of the microdrive (heads, rotor, motor, controller) would likely fail long before you had hit the limit of writes on the flash card.

Microdives don't have a limited number of write cycles. But they still have an MTBF, which is really what you should be comparing. It's just that MTBFs are measured in different ways for different devices.

Manufacturer specified MTBFs are really just a best guess anyway. There is no way that they can test some of these devices for the actual time periods as specified in the MTBF figures, so they take a sample, figure out how many fail and after how long, and then they extrapolate those figures based upon some fairly likely scenarios. Then they specify an MTBF that fits with those scenarios, and is also on the conservative side (normally).

So... you should end up with devices that generally outlive the figures as specified in the MTBF... and you'd expect some of them to anyway, since it's just an average failure rate.

Ben.

Metahunter · 06-20-05, 10:32 AM

Hope this isn't redundant. I recently bought an x50 (mid) and am looking for memory. Although the stuff on this thread was helpful, I've heard/read some less than favorable reports on Sandisk flashcards. So, I guess my questions are basically:

1. Any advice on brands (cf and sd)?
2. Is the x50 mid compatible with the same memory cards as the x50v?
3. How high (Gig-wise) can I go (with the x50 mid)?

Thanks.

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