Question about Compact Flash and Battery Charger?
 

Thanks to the advice from many of you, I finally bought a digital camera for my trip to France, a Canon s500. Now, I need a compact flash. I've been called out of town unexpectedly so I need to go pick one up today. Circuit City has a SanDisk 512 for $89.99. Target has a Dane-Elec for $79.99.
1. Are all compact flashes the same or is one manufacturer better than another?
2. Considering my camera, is there any reason to buy an "Ultra" cf which I guess stores images faster? The Sandisk Ultra is $119.99
3. My camera came with a battery charger. It say 100v-240V ac 50/60 Hz. Is this dual voltage, or do I need another kind of charger? (I have an adaptor)
4. Finally, I need to get another lithium battery. Once again, will any one do, or do I need to pay attention to a particular manufacture?
Sorry, if these seems like silly questions, I'm a bit of a neophyte to this.
Thanks, Annie

I can only comment on the charger issue.
Since your charger was made for use worldwide (not just in the U.S.) all you'll need is the plug adaptor. DO NOT buy, or USE, a converter with it..just plug it in.

Are you a Costco member or know someone who is? Just bought that same SanDisk 512 there for $64.99.
Or maybe Sams Club might be competitive?

Don't bother with with Ultra. It's faster, but it doesn't do better pictures. I'm shooting with a high speed Digital SLR camera and I've been able to save bursts of 7 pics in 10 secs on a regular card. A point and shoot would never actually take advantages of the ultra cards.

Charger is fine on voltage as TopMan said.

They say the manufactures battery is best. Could be a crock, I don't know. SterlingTek.com has cheap generics if you want to take a chance. I did - so far, so good but I don't know if the generics will recharge as many times. Time will tell.

All digital media is not the same. I would only buy a name brand as it is not worth the risk of finding out that you have a "bum" card. Too much downside just to save a few bucks.

Re: the ultra compact flash card.

It depends on how many megapixels you have and what resolution you choose to take your photos. I have a 5 megapixel camera and took some pics(that I expected to frame) in a very high resolution mode. With the ultra, I noticed a real difference in the time it takes for the image to be recorded onto the compact flash. This alllows you to take the next photo faster.

These are GREAT questions, and you probably won't get the best answers from CC.

First of all, there are good names in CF: SanDisk, Kingston, Viking are better names than Dane-Elec. Lots of people are OK with no-name brands, but I'd pay a few extra dollars and buy the better names.

Yes, a slower card will add a second or 2 between shots. That doesn't make that much of a difference to me. Card speed is really important if you record movie clips with your camera. If that is something that you plan on doing, get the higher speed card (40X and higher ) is recommended for movies, and again, the no-name brands tend to lie more about their speed.

The good news is that the CF cards are pretty reasonable, especially if you are willing to buy on-line. CC prices are only good when combined with rebates. Shop prices at newegg.com or amazon.com to get some prices.

If looking for a 512 MB for pictures only, you may want to get 2 - 256 MB cards, depending on price.

Your charger is dual voltage and that with the correct plug adapter is all that you should need.

re: "I need to get another lithium battery. Once again, will any one do, or do I need to pay attention to a particular manufacture?"

Canon Elph cameras have pretty good battery life. You may not need a spare battery, especially if you "top off" charge it every night.

The manual should have guidelines as to how many pics you can take between charges.

If you still need a spare battery, I'd stay only with the Canon brand -- quality & fit is consistently good; IMO worth the $10 or so extra price over a generic battery.

Your charger is dual-voltage, so all you'll need is a plug adapter.

Don't bother with "ultra" cards. Yes, they're faster, but the regular ones are fast enough.

Our camera came with a lithium battery and a spare. We take lots and lots of photos, and review our photos all day long in the viewer, and have never needed the spare.

What size card came with your camera? Somewhere in the manual, there should be a chart indicating how many photos it will hold at various resolutions.

It is well worth the time to experiment at home. Take a few photos at various resolutions of something close up, a person, a house, the scenery in the distance. Then, test print your photos at various sizes. The higher resolutions are not usually necessary for excellent prints and enlargements, but gobble up space on your card.

We tend to view most of our photos on our PC and copy them to disc to send to others (for viewing on their PC), for which the lowest resolution is just fine. If you wish to print your photos, lower resolutions are generally just fine for 4x6. You don't need to go much higher for sensational 8x10 prints. But, this depends upon your particular camera.

Here's a reason to stick with genuine manufacturer's batteries:

http://www.eet.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=47900158

Fake batteries blow up in the industry's face

By Rick Merritt
EE Times
September 20, 2004

Rising reports of incidents in which counterfeit batteries have overheated, caught fire or blown up are dogging a portable-systems industry ...

Isn't a lithium battery just another option sold by makers such as Energizer or Duracell? My Pentax uses a lithium battery but it isn't a "proprietary" battery (Clifton mentioned sticking with manufacturer's battery).

Travelnut,

Some cameras take standard size batteries like "AA", whether they are lithium or not.

Some take very strangely shaped batteries designed to fit one type of camera. For instance, mine takes this one:

http://www.sterlingtek.com/nikendigcamb.html

Expensive in this case, but rechargeable and mine has been lasting through approx 250 shots or a month of being left turned on without a recharge. So it all depends on the camera really.

to clarify ... the main text of the "exploding battery" article I cited above, emphasized it is mainly the Lithium-ion, proprietary, purpose-built batteries that are being counterfeited.

ie, the battery types found in cell phones, notebook PCs, and many (but not all cameras).

Proprietary batteries are much more expensive than generic AA's, hence it attracts counterfeiters.

I think cameras using AA (NiMH or Li-ion) are vastly less at risk, particularly with namebrand batteries. There isn't enough illicit profit potential in AA counterfeits to make it worthwhile.

Thank you - now I understand more.

i bought a canon elph awhile back. The store threw in a camera battery. I haven't seen a difference between the generic and the canon. But I would recommend you buy a second battery that way you dont have to worry about losing power midday. You can also not worry about using too much power by looking at the screen during the day etc. Finally, the canon gives you no real warning when you are about to lose power.I would also but the name brand cf. Bght a sandisk and have had no problem.

eCost is showing a Kingston 512 CF for $32 and a 256 for $10.

1-2: It is true that the ultra-cards does write faster than the standard ones, but usually the camera has a decent buffer hence you can actually take like 2-3 pictures without pauses before the buffer is full and it HAS to write to the card. On my A70 if you take a picture it writes it to disk, and shows the picture after you've taken the picture, but if you then immediately focus again by lightly pressing the release it will focus and be ready to take a new picture while the camera is emptying the buffer.
As a comment on picture size, buy a decent size card and use the largest picture size the camera has and the lowest compression. That way when you get a very good picture you can crop as much as you want and still print it out in fullsize letter or similar. Otherwise you might as well have bought the older model with the lower resolution.
3: As has been said good for the entire world with an adapter so the plug fits.
4: If the difference isn't large I would go with batteries from reputable dealers and preferably from manufacturer.

Sindre

As already stated above...stick to the manufacturers batteries.

Stick to name cards...Sandisk or Lexar. Go to amazon.com and you'll find the best prices. I've purchased many from www.mydigitaldiscount.com. They are reliable and fast.

In my opinion, the "Ultra" cards are worth the extra $$. They not only write faster, but transfer to your computer faster. If you buy from one of the places I mention, the difference will only be a few dollars.

I like the 512mb cards. They are perfect for filling up a CD with a little room to spare.

Your battery charger will work fine with an adapter, as others have suggested.

Hope you have a great trip!

If you <u>really</u> want a &quot;name card,&quot; you should check out Kingston:

<b>http://www.kingston.com/company/marketshare.asp</b>

They are the #1 manufacturer of aftermarket semiconductor memory chips in the world.

They have been in business since 1987.

I have used Kingston RAM with 100% success for well over 10 years. I cannot say the same for either SanDisk or Lexar.

If you move fast, you might be able to score a free 64mb SD card from eCost.com