No Logic to SD Card Leica Madness

[Ponsoldt]

I bought a new 4gb Ridata supreme card. It did not work in the M8. I have a cheap Sandisk 1gb SD it works fine. i get 98 pictures on the counter. I have a sandisk ultra II 512mb card. it gets 125 pictures on the counter. Does anyone see any logic to this?

 

[cmedin]

Not sure about the picture count, but the 4 gig card was most likely SDHC -- does the M8 support that?

 

[sleeek]

up to 2 gig only

 

[neelin]

I bought a new 4gb Ridata supreme card. It did not work in the M8. I have a cheap Sandisk 1gb SD it works fine. i get 98 pictures on the counter. I have a sandisk ultra II 512mb card. it gets 125 pictures on the counter. Does anyone see any logic to this?

If the Ridata is one of the NON HC ones, try formatting FAT (not FAT32) in Windows XP (you have to use controlpanel/admintools/computermanagement/diskmanagement to get at the FAT option (instead of FAT32).

Failing this, try formatting in other devices (than the M8) and putting it into your camera. You may be pleasantly surprised & as befuddled as I was. My 4g card (transcend) works FAT32 (format in the M8) BUT it is 60%? faster writing (there's a thread here I posted about it) if I format FAT in an XP machine.

r

 

[amateriat]

This is interesting, because the lone digital camera in my possession (Casio EX850), handles 2GB SD cards just fine, but there's a firmware upgrade for handling up to 6-8GB cards. Can't say I'm that interested in upgrading, since (1) the camera only writes files in JPEG, which allows up to around 400 images on a 2GB card (and this is with an 8.1MP camera), and (2) I'm worried about any "interesting" side-effects from the upgrade, i.e. if it ain't broke, don't "fix" it. Since 2GB SD cards are relatively cheap these days (unless you insist on the "fastest" cards, which my Casio doesn't really need), why not just buy a fistfull of those?

And, I can't imagine Leica not having an upgrade for compatibility with larger-capacity SD cards. That would count as a major boo-boo in my book. If Casio can manage this (with a discontinued camera no less), why, oh why can't they?


- Barrett

 

[jaapv]

I bought a new 4gb Ridata supreme card. It did not work in the M8. I have a cheap Sandisk 1gb SD it works fine. i get 98 pictures on the counter. I have a sandisk ultra II 512mb card. it gets 125 pictures on the counter. Does anyone see any logic to this?

Yes- you probably had the camera set to Jpeg on the 512 MB card. No way are you going to get 125 10.3 Mb files on a 512 Mb card.....
Is the Ridata card in the list of supported cards supplied by Leica? I doubt it.

 

[Ben Z]

I have four Sandisk Extreme-III 2-Gb SD cards, four Kingston Ultra 2-Gb SD cards, and 2 regular Kingston 50x 2-Gb cards. All of them give me 187 shots on the counter after in-camera formatting and all of them work fine. In fact I can't detect any slower or faster action in the camera or downloading to my portable HD, but the faster cards download to my desktop computer a little quicker.

I also have a 64-Mb "Leica" SD card I got used for $5, which I formatted in the M8 and loaded the firmware .upd file onto it (and flipped the write-protection tab to "lock" because the M8 will delete it after installing otherwise). I carry it in my bag always, in case I would encounter a problem where I'd need to reload the firmware. I carry a similar CF card with my 20D.

 

[RingoHung]

I bought a new 4gb Ridata supreme card. It did not work in the M8. I have a cheap Sandisk 1gb SD it works fine. i get 98 pictures on the counter. I have a sandisk ultra II 512mb card. it gets 125 pictures on the counter. Does anyone see any logic to this?

Try to re-format the old cards first. There may still be some hidden files made by your previous camera but M8 cannot recognize.:angel:

 

[georgef]

...And, I can't imagine Leica not having an upgrade for compatibility with larger capacity SD cards. That would count as a major boo-boo in my book. If Casio can manage this (with a discontinued camera no less), why, oh why can't they?


- Barrett

They will soon: you send the M8 in, they download and install the software, you get it back. Cost for the upgrade: $600 😀

 

[Rafael Macia]

up to 2 gig only

Leica has a list of "approved as working with an M8" on their
website. I downloaded it, and went shopping for a card for my new M8.
**There are 4MB cards on the list
here is the link:
http://en.leica-camera.com/service/downloads/rangefinder_cameras/m8/index.html

Rafael

 

[M. Valdemar]

Your instructions may work but they will befuddle 90% of the posters here.

Besides, not having SDHC capability in the M8 is gross negligence and short-sightedness.

If the Ridata is one of the NON HC ones, try formatting FAT (not FAT32) in Windows XP (you have to use controlpanel/admintools/computermanagement/diskmanagement to get at the FAT option (instead of FAT32).

Failing this, try formatting in other devices (than the M8) and putting it into your camera. You may be pleasantly surprised & as befuddled as I was. My 4g card (transcend) works FAT32 (format in the M8) BUT it is 60%? faster writing (there's a thread here I posted about it) if I format FAT in an XP machine.

r

 

[jaapv]

SDHC has very little advantage for cameras that don't have machine-gun like burst rates.

 

[bottley1]

I bought a couple of Hama 4GB cards, as recommended by Leica. Works great on the camera, but not supported by the epson p-2000 storage device.......sigh