Sufficient But Nothing Like High Speed
Written: May 14 '06 (Updated Mar 28 '09)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Cheap, Good for GPS, MP3 Players, PDAs, cell phones, and old cameras, easy to find
Cons: Not high speed, very small capacity on new cameras
The Bottom Line: This is a good quality card for most uses with the exception of use with newer cameras. Durable and cost effective, this is a great memory card.
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| noangels's Full Review: SanDisk (SDSDB-256) (256 MB) SD Card |
I have 4 of these cards laying around my house right now. I originally had an old 2 megapixel Kodak that I was using it with and bought a few more when I purchased a 4 megapixel Kodak. It was a decent memory card.
Memory Card Type
This card is a Secure Digital (SD) type card. This is the most widely used of all the types, being used in Kodak, Dell, Gateway, HP, Panasonic, Nikon, Vivitar, and current Canon camera models. It is also used in Mp3 Players, PDAs, and cell phones. Several brands of GPS systems use this card. Since so many brands use this type of memory card, these cards are the easiest to find and the cheapest to obtain.
Price
These cards are dirt cheap at this point in time. The average price of these cards used to be $39.99 but they recently dropped in price. The regular retail price at Best Buy is now $29.99. Occasionally they go on sale for $14.99 but this is now rare. The amount of memory on this card doesn't make it popular enough (or profitable) for retailers to put this one on sale.
Storage Capacity
Pictures:
256 megabytes of memory was a huge amount of memory for older cameras. My 2 megapixel Kodak would record over 200 pictures on this card. My 4 megapixel Kodak would record over 150 pictures on this card. Today's cameras are relatively useless with this card.
The average number of images that this card will hold today is 120 images (assuming around 2 megabytes per picture). With Kodak cameras, this is true due to higher compression than other brands. On my new 6 megapixel Canon, I would get 80 pictures at the highest quality of shooting (superfine compression, 6 megapixels) and this is the real average number of pictures with today's cameras. Don't waste your money by buying a small card for a new camera when you will end up having to buy a bigger one later anyway. If you are using a mobile phone that has the capability to take pictures, 256 megabytes is more than sufficient. The cameras built into these phones are equivalent to an older camera, usually ranging from 1-3 megapixels. These cards will hold 150-250 pictures on these phones and since a camera isn't a phone's main function, that would be fine for most people.
When purchasing a memory card, you want to buy one that will hold enough pictures for your most camera-hungry vacation. Usually a good practice is to think of how many rolls of film you would need, add 2, and multiply it by 30 (usual capacity of a roll of film) to determine how many pictures you would take on a trip. I say add 2 extra rolls because I find that a lot of people take more pictures with digital cameras because they can see the results immediately, even though you'd expect the opposite. The instant gratification of seeing the photograph you just took turns a lot of people into amateur photographers. The card I recommend for most people is the 1 gigabyte. This will hold an average of 500 images, although on most of the newer cameras it averages closer to 300. A 1 gigabyte card holds 331 pictures on my new camera. This will cover most vacations and that's your goal. You want to buy the biggest card you will need so you aren't wasting extra money on cards you won't even use in the future. Also, you want to avoid purchasing cards in vacation spots. Airport stores normally charge $40-$60 above regular retail price for the cards. We have a lot of dealers come into our store when they are on sale to buy them for this purpose. Don't let them add to your already expensive vacations.
Music:
The average size of a music file is 4 megabytes. The size varies depending on the length and quality of the recording. This 256 megabyte card will hold approximately 60 songs (think 3-4 albums worth of songs). This is a good card for someone who wants to use their MP3 player for exercising (this will do well for someone who needs it to keep them busy on a 30 minute treadmill walk) or for someone who wants to use their cell phone as an MP3 player for those moments spent waiting for a bus. If you are looking to use your MP3 player to store your entire library of music, you will need a much bigger card.
Video:
Video on a camera or camera phone is low-quality. On a camera phone or an old camera, 256 megabytes of video should hold about 45 minutes of video. On my new camera, this would hold 4 minutes of video at the highest quality. If you plan to do both video and pictures, I definitely recommend a bigger card. If you have an old camera, this should be good for a short vacation on which you'll be taking mostly pictures and a few 30-second video clips.
Documents and Maps:
On a GPS, a 256 megabyte card can store 3-4 states worth of maps. My fiance has a 256 megabyte card on his GPS and it stores New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey. On his 512 megabyte card he was able to include New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia. Think about what you need to store then decide on a card for your GPS.
As far as documents are concerned, 256 megabytes is fine for anyone not writing multiple books or looking to archive every document they've typed since elementary school. I use a 256 megabyte flash drive to store my documents for school and in 3 years of college, I haven't even written 25 megabytes of documents.
Speed
This is a standard speed card which is fine for storing documents from a computer or PDA, storing maps on a GPS, or using with a cell phone. If you plan to use it with a new camera or MP3 player, I recommend using a high speed card. These have higher write/read speeds. On an MP3 player this means less time putting songs on the card and less time between songs. On a camera, this means less lag between pictures, less time transferring pictures, higher quality video, and more effective burst modes. High speed cards, such as San Disk's Ultra II, are a must for those of us who want the camera to take a picture immediately when we hit the button.
Durability
These cards have been very durable. I've accumulated 4 of them over about 4 years and all are fully functional. I've dropped them many times and although I don't recommend doing so, the cards are fine. They are supposed to be able to survive a 10 foot drop. I've never dropped them this far but I'm sure most people aren't 10 feet tall and won't have a problem with it. The card does come with a plastic case to carry it in and I suggest using it both to help you not lose it and to protect it.
The card did the job it was supposed to do well and will continue to do that on old cameras, phones, PDAs, MP3 players, and GPS systems, but isn't sufficient for today's cameras and camera users. If I could rate it for camera users I would give it 1 star and I would give it 5 stars for those who will use it for the other uses I've mentioned. The result, is an average of 3 stars.
Recommended:
Yes
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noangels
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Member: Jamilynn
Location: Staten Island, NY USA
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So glad to almost be done with Christmas shopping!
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