This is the trouble with artificial intelligence – it can feel like you’ve got two people working the camera, not one. Video Updated 10/12/2023: With the onset of USB 4.0 and CFexpress 4.0, a lot has changed. The guide below includes both new 4.0 cards as well as the older 2.0 cards, but the new peak read and write sections have been re-tested using a USB 4.0 reader — the same one for all, the ProGrade Digital Type-B single Slot reader. The reason for this is twofold. One, it allows older cards to perform better when connected to a host computer than before simply because of more bandwidth. Two, there is only one CFexpress 4.0 card reader available on the market at the time of publication, and this is it. SD Express also arrived three years after CFexpress, giving the latter a significant head start. What kind of CFexpress cards are there?

Digital Camera World Sony A7R V review | Digital Camera World

Video (XAVC S): 3840 x 2160 (4:2:0, 8bit, NTSC) (Approx.): 120p (200Mbps), 60p (150Mbps), 30p (100Mbps / 60Mbps), 24p (100Mbps / 60Mbps); 3840 x 2160 (4:2:0, 8bit, PAL) (Approx.): 100p (200Mbps), 50p (150Mbps), 25p (100Mbps / 60Mbps); 3840 x 2160 (4:2:2, 10bit, NTSC) (Approx.): 120p (280Mbps), 60p (200Mbps), 30p (140Mbps), 24p (100Mbps); 3840 x 2160 (4:2:2, 10bit, PAL) (Approx.): 100p (280Mbps), 50p (200Mbps), 25p (140Mbps) There are mic and headphone ports and a full size HDMI port under an adjacent flap. But while the A7R's 8K video looks good on paper, but it's not really a video specialist. (Image credit: Rod Lawton) The SD Association, the organization that administers SD card standards, has come up with an alternative to CFexpress. It’s called SD Express, and uses the same PCIe 3.0 interface while offering similar max speeds of 4GB/s.Maximum read and write speeds can give us a reasonable picture of one card’s speed compared to another, but sometimes the important specification is the minimum sustained write speed. This is particularly important when recording video or shooting long bursts of high-megapixel photos at a high burst rate. CFexpress type B cards are faster than type A, and you'll find them being used in a greater number of modern cameras. Nikon's Z line and Canon's R line, for example, both take CFexpress type B cards. But the other half of the story is that the smaller size of Type A means that a CFexpress Type A slot can also be used as an SD card slot where the camera manufacturer has included a combi slot for SD and CFexpress type A. So users of the Sony A7S III can use its dual card slots with SD cards or CFexpress Type A cards. They ca n be used in any combination (though you can’t use both in one slot at the same time), giving a lot more flexibility. Which cameras are CFexpress-compatible? CFexpress has finally come into its own and multiple companies are now producing a wide variety of capacities at a range of prices. But with so many choices, which one should you buy?

CEA-G Series CFexpress Type A Memory Card Sony CEA-G Series CFexpress Type A Memory Card

We’ve looked in detail at the Type A and Type B CFexpress cards, but there is also a third standard called Type C. You might not have heard about this type of memory card because currently, there are no cameras on the market that support this format. As you can see from the diagram above, CFexpress Type C will theoretically offer maximum speeds that are twice that of Type B. Other than read and write speeds, CFexpress also has one certification worth noting right now: VPG. VPG stands for Video Performance Guarantee and was first created in 2011 by the Compact Flash Association (CFA) with Profile 1. Profile 1 guaranteed sustained write performance of up to 20 MB/s but as video quality has increased, demands have grown. As a result, the CFA has published additional profiles for VPG, the most recent being VPG 400. What this means is that a camera designed today for XQD cards would only need a minor firmware update to accommodate the new cards. What other format of cards this may also apply to remains to be seen. For now, anyway. Things can move pretty fast in the digital photography world. Even if a card doesn’t even come close to the promised peak read or write speeds seen on the side of the box (which none of them did, by the way), it doesn’t matter. For video, Acer, which promised the least when it comes to read and write speeds, performed identically to Angelbird which promised the most.Almost all cameras that originally supported XQD cards have now been firmware-updated to also work with CFexpress Type B cards, so cameras like the Nikon Z6 and Z7 are no longer restricted to XQD cards alone. This used to be more important when memory cards were generally much slower, but these days while you’ll still come across it on some modern cards, it’s largely unhelpful. Speed Class has been effectively replaced by either UHS Speed Class or Video Speed Class, and either is going to be better to determine the capability of a card. UHS Speed Class The rear screen, however, works brilliantly. The vari-angle pivot is very welcome, but you can still tilt the screen if you want to and have it stay on the lens’s optical axis. The EVF, which has the highest resolution currently available, is excellent. As for the kinds of photographers who will adopt CFexpress in the next couple of years, pros and enthusiasts with money to spend are likely to increasingly choose CFexpress, while SD will still be there for those with a lower-end camera, or those who don’t need top-tier write performance. Who makes CFexpress cards and how much do they cost?

What Is a CFexpress Card? - How-To Geek

Sony's video continues to impress in its overall quality, with the processed video straight out of the camera being sharp with good color balance and fantastic dynamic range. Although the footage still requires a little tweaking to get it perfect for social media or any other direct use as it is a little drab in color. Serious videographers do have the choice of more codecs for precise editing. Storage size capability with XQD is huge. Already announced in a 1TB size, a 2TB size is likely coming to market soon. Current storage sizes already available are 32GB, 64GB, 128GB, and 256GB. Sony has been the major manufacturer of XQD cards for a couple of years, and Nikon is also entering the field as a supplier of XQD cards.Sensitivity range: Stills: ISO 100-51,200 expandable to ISO 50-102,400, Movies: ISO 100-25600, expandable to ISO ISO 51,200 A small handful of XQD cards were produced by Nikon, Sony, Sandisk and Delkin, but they all have significantly slower speeds and smaller capacities than CFexpress Type B cards. All cameras that use XQD cards can now also use CFexpress cards, so there is no good reason to buy an XQD card anymore. You should buy a CFexpress Type B card instead. CFast Vs CFexpress Frequently Asked Questions Are CFexpress cards more durable than SD Cards? All of the same specifications of SD cards apply to MicroSD cards, with the same nomenclature. Both UHS-I and UHS-II microSD cards are available, ranging from V30 to V90 — though only Delkin Devices and Kingston produce V90 cards, so the selection is significantly thinner than SD for high-speed options.