SanDisk 8 GB Extreme III CF Card SDCFX3-008G-A31 (Retail Package)

Since I've started shooting more RAW images, the behemoth CF memory cards that used to hold 1000's of JPG's have suddenly gotten very small. I have 24GB of storage now, but that's still not enough for a busy weekend with the EOS 50D and good subject matter...

I need at least the 30MB/s speed of this card to keep it from being the limiter on rapid fire shooting of sports scenes (like soccer). Rapid bursts of 5 or 6 images each are common if you want to try and catch just the right action shot. This card keeps up.

Just make sure you format the card on your camera, not on your computer, and same goes for deleting images - do this only from your camera and not from the computer. Canon and MAC and Windows don't seem to always agree on formatting. I tend to simply reformat the card (less than 5 seconds) on the camera each time I clear the images off. If I want to leave some images on the card, I "SELECT ALL" on the camera menu and then unselect the ones I want to keep before deleting. There are also umpteen file/folder managing procedures for doing stuff like this. Bottom line - let the camera manage the formatting!

No issues retrieving over 10,000 shots from any of the SanDisk CF 30MB/s memory cards. Each card comes with a file recovery program, but I thankfully have not had to resort to that yet...

One more piece of advice - the $/byte on 2GB, 4GB, and 8GB cards is roughly the same. You want to trade off minimizing the number of times you have to change cards (lost shots, dropped camera/cards, etc.) with the number of critical pictures you EVER put on any one memory card. The more important the shots, the more important this rule. Why? These cards WILL fail, someday. All memory devices do. Also, cards can be dropped/lost. Static discharge is a known card killer. And so on. How many shots do want to lose from an important shoot? All? Half? 30%? By using multiple cards (even if they are not yet full), you are improving your chances of at least having something if a card fails or is lost. The cost of the 16GB cards is roughly 2X the 8GB, so I'd buy two 8's instead of 1 16, for this reason. I can put just over 200 RAW+JPG mode images from my 50D on one 8GB card. If I'm shooting only JPG, the number of shots tops 1,000.

Lots of good reviews out there on SanDisk cards. I'll stick with this brand given my positive experiences.

Good price. Lots of storage. Faster than my Sony a350 DSLR. You can pay more and get a faster card, but I don't mind if it takes a couple minutes longer while copying them to my pc.

As a wedding photographer, I cannot afford the possibility of a memory card suffering a catastrophic failure. I've used several other brands of cards (not in a commercial sense thankfully) that have failed me. From flat out not being recognized, to images being captures with a 1/4 of the image missing! These were from other "big name" companies. I have never had an issue with a Sandisk card.

Transfer times are exceptionally quick, just not through your camera. I didn't think much of an hour for downloading all of the images initially until I got a firewire 800 card reader Sandisk Extreme FireWire Reader. My image downloads for that same amount of data takes no more than 5-10 minutes! I literally shaved hours off of my workflow from that one improvement!

I had to give the product four stars though as they include what is allegedly great rescue software. Although for those of us with slot loading optical drives (macs), the included mini-disk cannot be used!

Ive owned various sizes of this card, and for years, Ive never had a single problem with them. They are fast, reliable, and work perfectly in My Nikon D700.

This is one of the best cards, if not the best card out there right now.

I purchased the Compact Flash Unit. I have used four other lower capacity units made by the same manufacturer in my Canon Rebel XT. When I put this unit in I received an error message. Subsequently, I had to have my camera repaired at a cost $154.72 . San Disk replaced the Flash Unit but has refused to reimburse me for my cost to repair the camera. I am extremely disappointed.