Sony's CompactFlash cards in the flesh

Hey, don't beat yourself up too much, as you probably weren't the only one heavily doubting Sony's ability to churn out a non-proprietary flash card, but nevertheless, it looks like the company has delivered as promised. The 1GB, 2GB, and 4GB CompactFlash Type I cards are purportedly aimed at filling the slot in the outfit's DSLR lineup, but of course, will play nice with any other CF-accepting device out there as well. All three editions tout 10Mbps (66x) transfer speeds, while the 2GB and 4GB flavors come in 20Mbps (133x) versions as well, and while we can't imagine why having a Sony logo on your CF card would truly lead to fantasies being fulfilled, the entire trio should be shipping within a few days for a currently undisclosed price.

[Via AkihabaraNews]

[Wonderboy @ Feb 1st 2007 2:40PM]

In other news Amazon.com reports a record-high order for blankets and space heaters... although the order is unable to ship due to an incomplete address. Amazon.com employees aren't quite sure what to make of the order, the shipping address on file is merely "Hell".

[Ellianth @ Feb 1st 2007 3:46PM]

lol, hell froze over? :P

[LuckyCharm2007 @ Feb 1st 2007 2:47PM]

Im pretty sure that they will be more expensive than non Sony branded CF cards.

[Anthony @ Feb 1st 2007 2:49PM]

Please someone explain to me why Compact Flash cards still exist. When SD can go 8+mb & mini/microSDs are moving up quickly, why the big card?

Write times?

Plus- is there margin in storage cards? I mean, Topram's so cheap. Why'd Sony want to get into this field. Might as well go into book sales too. Oh, wait.

[Jon Acheson @ Feb 1st 2007 3:08PM]

My guess is, CF still exists for a couple reasons:
1) People who invested heavily in CF a couple years ago, say for their $10,000 professional level digital SLRs, don't want to throw all their cards out. So when they buy a new camera, they want it to use CF as well.
2) While it's not the smallest out there, it's small enough. A dozen CF cards take up no space.
3) It's not so small that you're likely to lose it. This is a big plus when you're shooting outdoors. You drop a microSD in grass and even if you saw where it went, you might never find it. You can also handle CF easily wearing gloves, which isn't true of the tiny ones.
4) In theory, CF should always be able to hold more data than the smaller formats.

[Anthony @ Feb 1st 2007 3:24PM]

Great reply. Thanks. I'm still somewhat surprised that Sony didn't just come out with a "Sony brand" CF adapter for their memory sticks, but hey- accepting the other formats exist is certainly good. They do have the new Reader accepting both memory stick & SD.

[Dan F @ Feb 1st 2007 3:45PM]

so...we live in a world where 8gb sd cards are being sold for under 150 dollars with similar right speeds...and sony finally releases this...in a cf card? I dont think they will EVER get it

[Mike @ Feb 1st 2007 3:53PM]

The article mentions transfer speeds of 10 Mbps while the card shows its transfer rate at 10 MBps. The difference is megabits per second and megabytes per second; 10 Mbps = 1.25 MBps. Just so people don't get confused.

And to contribute to Jon's comment, there is quite a markup for memory cards. Not online, at least, but going into a store to buy a name-brand card can cost significantly more than buying one online. And I do agree with Jon- people have made a big investment in their DSLRs and as long as they're around, there's going to be CF cards. Though, a couple of the newer DSLRs do actually use SD, I've noticed. Maybe it will eventually get phased out in the long run, but there's nothing stopping Sony from making a little money before that happens.

[guilt+1 @ Feb 1st 2007 4:15PM]

Bah it's a photoshop job.

February, March and April Fools.

[paul irwin @ Feb 1st 2007 4:25PM]

i'm sick of you guys messing up megaBITS vs megaBYTES! Megabits = Mbps = Mb/s... Megabytes = MBps = MB/s. the image you posted clearly says MB/s!

[Zebulunite @ Feb 1st 2007 4:28PM]

“as you probably weren't the only one heavily doubting Sony's ability to churn out a non-proprietary flash card, “

Uh, I'd say that the Memory Stick line is non-proprietary, given the fact that SanDisk and others produce memory sticks products. The 1GB MS:PD in my PSP is made by SanDisk, for example.

[Paul L @ Feb 1st 2007 6:25PM]

@ Zebulunite

You can only use Memory Sticks on Sony products. That's proprietary.

Sure, SanDisk may make Memory Sticks as well, but they are still only compatible with Sony products.

[maledin @ Feb 1st 2007 6:34PM]

@ Zebulunite

You can only use Memory Sticks on Sony products. That's proprietary.

Sure, SanDisk may make Memory Sticks as well, but they are still only compatible with Sony products.

[John @ Feb 1st 2007 10:24PM]

Has Sony finally realized all their proprietary formats have failed? (umd,betamax,bluray...)

[Zebulunite @ Feb 2nd 2007 12:12AM]

Paul L,

There were at least a couple non-Sony products that used memory sticks (the only one I can think of off-hand is this: http://palminfocenter.com/view_story.asp?ID=3836)

In any case, the definition of proprietary is “manufactured and sold only by the owner of the patent, formula, brand name, or trademark associated with the product: proprietary medicine.” While memory sticks all almost exclusively used in Sony products, Sony does not restrict others from manufacturing either memory sticks or compatible devices (case in point: all the X-in-1 flash readers that are compatible with memory sticks).

John,

“Has Sony finally realized all their proprietary formats have failed? (umd,betamax,bluray...) “

Betamax: obviously proprietary and partially the cause of its failure.

UMD: Failed as a movie format due to price more than anything else, still used for games.

Bluray: Are you kidding me!? Bluray is supported by MORE companies than HD-DVD, and supported by SIGNIFICANTLY MORE movie studios than HD-DVD. Bluray is by no means specifically a “Sony” format-for instance, the first Bluray player was not manufactured/marketed by Sony. And in any case, how can you possibly call it (or HD-DVD) failures by this point?


From all that I've read, Sony always seems to fail when they market a proprietary formate (Betamax, Mini-Disk, UMDs for video, etc), but has always succeeded with open formats that they helped develop (3.5 inch floppy disk, CD, DVD, etc). Thus, I'd say that, at least from a historic standpoint, Bluray seems more likely to be a success than a failure.

[ScooperJay @ Feb 2nd 2007 8:59AM]

What no PIO Mode 6 and UDMA Mode 4?

Junk

[Jason Brown @ Feb 2nd 2007 9:54AM]

It says in the article its for the dslr line of sony. if you put out a line of product would you not want to also put out a line of accessories. people go into a store and they buy based on name recognition. if someone buys a sony dslr and see that out of all the possible compact cards sony is listed as one of them; then they will either buy based on price or name.

also, the sd mini line is not sony it is sandisk rebranded by sony. they are called magicgate. if you have ever used them they are very good cards especially when used with the walkman line of products.

Someone please answer me this, why does engadget have to post duragatory comments in every sony article they write? It may be a joke to them but many of us are sick of having to read the flame wars that ensue.