No more 8GB or 16GB SxS cards
 

I've just been informed that as of today Sony are no longer doing the 8GB or 16GB SxS cards.

Source please.

Source was a vendor in the UK where I was going to buy my EX3 from. Just spoke to him again and the 16GB is definitely being stopped, but stocks of 8GB are still obtainable. I've managed to purchase an EX3 from another vendor who has stock which includes an 8GB SxS card.

Thanks. My guess is that Sony is moving to the 32 / 64 GB realm as quickly as they can.

I just had a call from Sony and the guy was surprised at the information the vendor had given me and he asked me the name of the vendor. Sony have promised to get back to me by tomorrow with an answer to exactly what is going on. I'll post any update here.

It may just be that the vendor was misinformed or that he no longer wanted to include a 16 GB card with the EX3 at that particular price. I hope I'll know more tomorrow.

Dave

FYI...
-B&H lists the 16b as discontinued.
-There are 22 8GB still in stock, unsure if they can get more.
-32GB is not in stock but you can order as much as you want.

I had heard a rumor that the 16Gb was to be discontinued as the price of the 32Gb was coming down to the point where it will be almost the same as the 16Gb, so Sony not expecting to sell 16's when you can get 32's for the pretty much the same price were going to drop the 16. I did not hear any mention of the 8Gb being dropped.

It seems SANDISK does not display SxS media on their website anymore.Someone should get a responce from SANDISK corporate offices. I was told they are being discontinued by a SANDISK distributer.

How can you tell how many units are in stock at b&h? That could come in handy.

fill up your basket till it says to select a smaller quantity.

Just don't hit 'Place Order' be mistake!

Ya, I guess that is kinda important. :)

Not true
 

When I saw this thread I sent an email to the Sony business manager for Professional Media in the the U.S. His domain includes tape, SxS, and XDCAM optical disks.

Here's a quote:

"This is not correct at all. Sony is still carrying the full range of SxS PRO memory cards including the 8,16 and 32GB capacities."

Obviously, that might not be true for other parts of the world, but that's as close to the source as you can get in the U.S.

Hope that helps.

I hope it's not true. An 8GB card equates to about 25 minutes which can be a very useful size for (say) a single interview, comparable to a 30 minute tape.

So for many people 8x8GB cards may be a lot more useful than a single 64GB card (assuming a similar overall cost) - shoot a 20 minute interview on card 1, then keep it intact as backup until editings over. And still have 56GB on the other seven cards.......

I had previously heard that a big perceived advantage of SxS over P2 was that it didn't have anything like the high fixed unit cost per card of P2 - the expense was far more proportional to size. So small cheap SxS cards remain more viable versus the bigger sizes than with P2.

If I could get five 8GB SxS cards for $1,000.00, I would buy them in a heart beat.

I currently have 3/16, 1/8 SxS and 4/16 SDHC cards with adapter I never use (don't really trust them and I like overcrank) and I have a PHU-60 that also sees very little use.

What is the current street price for 8GB SxS, still around $400.00?

Hold on there. You might want to wait a couple of months for the PXU-MS240.
With one of these, most people could get by with only two or three SxS cards.

PXU-MS240 Mobile Storage Unit From Sony

Something else to put in the camera case, must get a bigger case.

I have been using 16gb SDHC Transcend cards without any problem, and they are a lot cheaper than SXS cards.

At a recent Sony seminar I did question Sony on the high price of SXS cards and pointed out that I made my EX3 purchase decision based on the fact that I could now purchase media at a realistic price, I am sure many others have too. Why hasn't Sony been quick of the mark to market their own SDHC cards and reader combination?

Been using the SDHC cards (more specifically, my single sandisc 16gig class II) for all of 09 without a single failure.. I'm good.

As far as I know you cannot undercrank or overcrank to SDHC cards. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

Dave

I went to a Sony seminar that stated that the cameras and their full functions are based on the spec of SxS cards. Future products with enhanced features are in the pipeline and the SxS spec is needed for these. I see that SxS prices are coming down and so it will be possible to have peace of mind on important jobs by owning more of these cards. Having said that I have been using mainly MxR with Transcend 16gb class 6 since February for standard HQ recording (no slomo) without any problems.

Ok, you're wrong. You can undercrank fully, and you can overcrank to 40fps -42fps.

Interesting to know...thanks.

I've just been told by the UK EX product Manager that the 16Gb cards will continue to be sold and there are no plans to discontinue them.

Since I don't shoot using 24FPS, I have full functionality with the SDHC. I can overcrank without problem. The one thing you can not do with the SDHC is overcrank from 24FPS to 60FPS. Overcranking from 30FPS to 60FPS works just fine.

Thanks -- this thread should be re-titled then. I'm open to suggestions.

And the cards can be backed up to DL-DVD at $0.XX each in their pristine originalness, preserving the all important BPAV structure.

There may come a point where an 8 GB SxS card could cost the same as a HoodMan 16 GB SDHC with adaptor. And at that point, given a clean slate, I'd be tempted to go the 8 Gig card route having had absolutely no issues whatsoever in shots spanning cards.

Yes, I know, sounds like heresy from Mr SDHC-supporter, but having worked with 16x 16GB SDHC cards with the record currently standing at one shot over 5 cards, backing up to optical is a little cheesy. Was it Mr Seaman who pointed out the DL-DVD route? It's getting mightily appealing!

Why not backup to a hard drive? 1.5TB hard drives go for about $120. DVD-DL is far less reliable that one would imagine. Do you backup to DVD-DL with a verify? I found this to be a very unreliable process with Sony, Plextor and Pioneer drives when the verify revealed a few write errors. The only DVD-DL drive that worked perfectly for me was the BenQ, and that is no longer made.

I do. Twice.

I currently archive stuff that I or my clients really don't want to lose onto Blu Ray too. And it's handy for off-site backups.

Try giving a Mac formatted hard disk with EX rushes on it to a PC based Avid editor. A DVD-ROM of the BPAV plus ClipBrowser for Mac & PC on an ISO is a 'safe' option.

The 'how to back up EX footage' has been debated elsewhere so let's not hijack the thread.

Nonetheless, talking of off-site backups, the place I stored mine got involved in an arson attack. All the backup CD-ROMs and DVD-ROMs were melted. So 90% of my archive is only on hard disk now.

I've been using DL-DVD since I first started using the EX. It so simple and I have found it to be reliable but you do need to verify your backups. I tend to use a mix now of DL-DVD and Blu-ray for my long term backups and USB drives for short term. The beauty of DL-DVD is that the discs can be read by the vast majority of PC's and Macs without having to add any additional hardware.

This is very good news for me doing location work. Thanks for bringing it up. I'm sure it will be simple and reasonably fast. Exactly what I want on location. And since it's Sony it should be reliable and work happily with EX. I don't want to play with laptops or hook up USB devices on location. Great news.

I saw somewhere the list price for this is in the $2k's!! More than the price of a laptop. Why does SONY kill it's technology with such high prices? If the cards were cheaper we'd all be buying them. If this was cheaper, I'd buy one, instead, I'm all over the MxR route. SONY, it's a new financial world out there....price accordingly and you may move some units.

Max, that's exactly what I was thinking.

I'm even toying with the idea of using the cartridges as my long-term archive. At around $400 per cartidge, that might seem expensive, and I wouldn't argue with anyone who disagreed with that approach, but for me, I think it makes sense. Time is money. Peace of mind is priceless. This is my business, my reputation, and my livelihood. Saving a few bucks on media does not appeal to me. That's why I don't shoot on SD cards, either. That's just my two cents.

I have been assured that the street price of the unit will be $1500 or less including one cartridge.

As a side benefit, now that 13 MBP seems like it makes sense. It was disheartening to hear the announcement regarding the expresscard slot going away from the 15. Now with the Sony MS-240 I won't have to lug around my 17" MBP. The bloom has been off that rose for a long time. Thanks for the update Doug.

Dave

Amen Doug.

On MXR, I think it can serve some purpose as replacement media when shooting in remote locations or foreign countries. If for some reason the SxS are stolen, lost or destroyed while on a job SD cards are more available. So I keep one MXR adapter on hand.

8 gig SxS going away?
 

I just looked on B&H this morning and it shows the 8gig SxS card as "Discontinued". Could this be true? I realize that there the 16gig cards might be dropping price due to the availability of the 32's, but losing the 8's would make my archiving to DVD-DL a bit more clumsy. Anyone else heard anything about this from Sony or is it just poor labeling by B&H?

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...B_SxS_PRO.html

False
 

I checked with my contact at Sony who oversees tapes, discs, optical media, etc. and he says the rumor is false. The 8GB cards have not been discontinued --- that is, as of today. Anything can change at anytime.

As both the EX1 and 3 are still being sold world wide, i would be hard pressed to believe sony would discontinue both the 8 and 16 gig SxS cards.

Then again, i have seen sony do some strange stuff in the past.

Interesting thread.. what about hoodman's adapter?
 

Who would even buy Sony SXS cards anymore though? when they have this:
RAW SxSxSDHC Memory Adapter-Hoodman Corporation

We've done extensive testing with the new memory adapter and the SDHC 16GB, class 6 chip. We found that 1920x1080 30p, 24p work fine for extended periods of shooting up to 1 hour on the 16GB.

- People doing 720p60 and 720p50
- People shooting slomo at 720p
- People who find it easier to give client (or archive) a BPAV burned to a DL-DVD-R
- People who have been spooked by SDHC
- People who find that 8 GB SxS are cheaper per megabyte than 16 GB SxS

Not everyone will find themselves in one of those categories, but hooray for choice, eh?

Good points.. It's up to you to make the choice.
Its worked great for us and our workflow. We do mostly corporate production and don't really need the pass raw files to clients or shoot in over and under-crank modes.
If your looking for a cheap alternative to SxS its the way to go.