New camera - new card ?

OK this might possibly get a bit heated as I know there's more than one view .

Here goes

1) I got the K-x and with it came a nice big 8GB card - so used that for it

Then started my College course - removed the 8GB card and put a 2GB one in [ was brand new ]. Filled that card and put in another new one [ 4GB PNY card which is still in the camera ] Now once the present card is full I'll take it out and return to the 8GB card .

2) Got the Optio P70 and put in a new 4GB card - now this is not full by any manner of means BUT since I have terminated that camera I now have a problem .

In my card case the only split new card I have is a Lexar Professional 4GB 133x speed card . I need some more cards methinks .

So if the new red [ ] Optio P70 arrives this morning - do I

a) put in the partially used 4GB PNY card [ from the white P70 ] and use it without re-formatting

b) hastily take everything off the 4GB white P70 card , re format it and use it in the red P70

c) put in this 4GB high class Lexar card

My plan had always been to use a card till it was full and then archive it . Not being a 'pro' I didn't reckon I'd be filling cards up very often so reckoned this was was as good as any to ensure that cards didn't get corrupted by being swapped from camera to camera.

OK so now - what do I do re card for my new red P70 ? New or used ?? Answers and easily understood reasons please.

Tomorrow I'll obviously need to get some more cards [ well 2 should do me for now I think ]

You shouldn't use cards as an archive because the information on them will eventually be unreadable - see the instruction book on SD cards.

Always format a card in the camera it is to be used in, so first download all your images to your computer.

Backup can be on an inexpensive external drive, or burned to CD or DVD.

Doing what you are planning will cause grief eventually, maybe immediately.

I would be very nervous about using cards as anything other than short-term storage. Too easy to break / corrupt / get lost or stolen. Let alone hitting the wrong button and erasing the lot!

For anything digital that's important (e.g. your college course), copying to more than one place is vital. HardDiscs and Cards die, for no obvious reason, completely at random, and always at the worst possible moment!

An external harddisc is very cheap (far cheaper than cards!) - for ultimate security, £50 buys you something you can leave in another house to be totally safe.

BUT - and I do take on board what you have said re storage / corruption etc

should I be using a new card in the new camera ? Certainly I know one friend that never re-uses a card - but he's kind of super fussy

TT - I use the same cards in both K10 and Kx - formatted in each before use of course. No problems. Ditto with my daughter's LX3 - there have been card swaps between that and my Pentax gear too, pre and post her Europe trip. No problems to date.

I agree with i-Berg, I have swopped between Pentax P&S and my K10 with no problems.

I always download from the card to the computer ASAP after I return home, or to a laptop if away for a longer period.

I only use 2GB or 4GB cards, then if lost or data corrupted not lots of shots that could be never repeated lost forever.

Regards

oh, no I wouldn't worry about that, you can reuse the cards quite happily.

In fact, taking them in and out occasionally would be a good thing - helps keep the contacts clean.

Over time, your "old" cards will be small & slow compared to newer versions (which will probably be cheaper, too, but that's progress...) but you will get several years out of a card before this becomes important.

One of the big attractions of SD cards is that you don't have to buy new media every time you buy a new gadget! Obviously this isn't very popular with certain manufacturers (e.g. Sony!)

Re downloading - yes I do it ASAP though next month I'm not taking the lappy with me so I can't .

I've just heard from SRS - the new P70 will be sent as soon as they have received the white one - so it looks as if it will be here tomorrow .

i-Berg and Weldingblues since you swap cards from camera to camera do I deduce that you wipe them each time ? I have always just left the pics on the card .

You don't need to wipe them, an SD (etc) card works just like a disc, could have anything on there not just pictures... different cameras will store their files next to each other quite happily.

Obviously it might make it a bit confusing when you come to copy them off, so its not best practice, but it will work.

Ditto formatting - every card is formatted the same way, you don't need to reformat a card in each camera.

I use all my cards across three Pentax cameras and I always wipe them once I've downloaded the images and occassionally format them.

OK - I see a few hours of fun ahead then

Still think I'm a tad short on cards - so will do a hunt for some [ that always takes time

thanks all

Just to add to the debate, each time I return from a shoot/trip I backup my images immediately to three separate hard disks, cataloguing as I go. ie images are backed up to disk 1, sorted into respective folders, then disk 1 is copied in it's entirety to disks 2 and 3. Then all three disks are compared to ensure they are identical. If all are ok, then finally the SD card is re-formatted in the camera it's to be used in next.

Hard disks are so (relatively) cheap these days Vs. losing an irreplaceable image there really is no excuse for going a bit OTT with multiple back-ups.

I appreciate that the HD's are vulnerable too, so am planning archiving to archival quality CD/DVD media.

The reason behind all this? I once lost some photographs of my children with my Mum on her 70th, which turned out to be three days before she died unexpectedly. That really brought home the value and vulberability of memories.

When travelling I (a) back up the SD cards to a SmartDisk storage device, (although this needs to be repalced as it is only 40gb capacity and won't accept SDHC), plus (b) keep the SD cards unused and locked until I get home.

As I final piece of belt and braces, I normally only use maximum 2 or 4gb cards to make sure that images from a shoot/trip are not all in one basket.

Maybe I should run a poll to see whether I'm the most OTT Forum member when it comes to image storage? Somehow I doubt it

Precautions (ie backups) are good, undoubtedly.

TT - there is no drudgery in 'wiping' cards, it takes little time or effort, and certainly no particular expertise. I'm lazy, and tend to wipe the cards ('delete all') while the card is still in the camera. I do this after every upload, to ensure the card is ready to go for the next time.

With the Kx, just press the blue 'play' arrow icon to display any image, then press the MENU button once. Look at the bottom of the LCD screen, and there you will have an option to 'delete all images'. Select it, press OK and you're pretty much done. Easy.

Yes - re the K-x - I had discovered that one

I think - but not sure I could do that with the P70 as well - but at present I've just got the card not the camera

It's just that I know that on both cameras cards there are images that haven't been downloaded as they , on first sight , were not giving me what I wanted . So really for my peace of mind I need to get all these off and make a final decision re keepers / binners and then delete the card.

If I stick them into iPhoto it will be a 2 stage process really - download all then tell it not to download those already in iPhoto then tell it to delete from card - so I really do need to pay attention while I do it

My recommendation: Never use an SD card or memory stick as permanent storage.

If I have access to my computer, I always download images to the harddisk every day, then copy to an external disk. Then I delete the card (or format it), ready for next shoot. I also copy to my laptop, which also has an external drive, so in fact I have all my images stored on four different media. (I don't trust CDs or DVDs as a permanent backup).

I would imagine that two different cameras don't like the card to be swopped from one to the other without being formatted first. Even if they are both Pentax (one DSLR, one P&S), there may be differences.