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General discussion

Compact Flash vs SD Memory Cards

Dec 19, 2006 6:24AM PST

Im alittle confused.

For the Canon SD600 camera, what are the compatible memory cards?

I was looking into the Sandisk UltraII cards, but at the store the salesperson was looking up Compact Flash but they were out of stock. Online it appears that in fact compact flash is not compatible with the sd600. I would like to get the faster acting cards, of course.
So confused!

Discussion is locked

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dont use CF
Dec 19, 2006 6:59AM PST

They are different, the salesman must have been confused. SD is the better memory IMO because of the design. It uses bent pins and has a safer connection design.

Compact flash uses pint like a hard drive and is easy to get out of alignment and you can bend or break a pin loose from its connection. IMO the most scary thought is wo own an SLR camera with a bad CF connection because they put the CF card in upside down or at the wrong angle and a pin is bent or damaged.

Does this happen with CF memory? you bet your sweet *** it does. And those that have had it happen to them will NEVER forget it. Ive seen it happen on an older A60 powershot camera and i have actualy repaired it. After i noticed the design flaw with CF memory i no longer remove the memory and i take more caution with it.

The better design would be to reverse the design. Put the pint on the memory insted of the camera. then if there is a problem the simple solution would be to use a new memory card. They did it wrong.

I dont know wich is faster or "better" but all i know is that CF memory is a bad design. IMO go to SD memory. It is more safe.

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I have never experienced problems with CF
Sep 16, 2009 9:22AM PDT

I've been using CompactFlash for over four years and have never had the problems mentioned here. The connectors on CF are internal for a very good reason. Compare this to the exposed contact points on SD which can easily be damaged by mishandling. Also it is virtually impossible to insert a CF card the wrong way into the slot (if the device is properly designed).

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Compact flash card design for Bower 64 and others
Sep 4, 2011 1:44PM PDT

CF cards have holes that match multiple fixed pins in the camera rather than the revese because the cost fo make millions of cards with pins is infinitely more costly tghatn producing cards with holes that match pins in the device. Also, extensive testing proved that card pins have a much greater proclivity for becoming bent or malaligned than pins in the camera or device. I t is impossible to make products idiot proof, so people who insert the cards backwards and bend the pins are fortunately infrequent, based on the number of pin bases replaced. Yes, there are such fools, but be thankful for them since they provide work for repair people.
Stan