Thanks again Marcus. That makes sense about the HD.

Hoodman cards are coming to the UK soon,in a few weeks, i've been told by a source/supplier already.

Paul.

Good news Paul.

Hopefully it will be within the rules for you to post who the supplier is (Hoodman being a forum sponsor) when it happens as it will enable us in the UK to buy the cards without all the hassle of importing from Hoodman directly.

Hopefully we won't have to suffer the Apple trick of the dollar price just having a Pound sign stuck in front of it!

Please tell me all the USA places that have the ATP ProMax cards. I see a few "no name" places but not the usual reputable places.

My understanding of the forum rules is that we can't post details of retailers who aren't sponsors here. Please correct me if I am wrong.

I don't have any idea who is reputable on your side of the pond, but I did look at a couple of (what appeared to be) USA based memory specialists who had the ATP cards in stock. The MXM pages have links to a supplier they recommend.

As a more obscure brand I'd wager that counterfeit cards are less likely than the Transcends or other major brands. With those I am very careful where I buy from.

I have 8 red stripe transcend 16g cards. so far so good.

I now have the ATP cards and have tested both on one run through. The test consists of recording long and short clips as well as overcranking at 40fps. When overcranking I ensure movement in the shot to keep the VBR codec working.

The good news is they seem to work. Red to green varies between 4.5 to 5.5 seconds on both cards. Significantly better than my newer Transcends which take 8 seconds.

The cards will happily overcrank to 40fps and go on for well over 5 minutes without error. Would be interesting to see if I could fill a card like this. Going up to 42fps resulted in an error after about a minute. Didn't need a media restore on either card though interestingly. Tried this on a Transcend and it needed to be restored.

Could it be that at 42fps the camera hits the USB transfer limit and therefore the camera gives up and writes the TOC whereas the Transcends just error because they aren't fast enough?

Either way, from initial impressions these cards are worth a closer look. They certainly give me more confidence than a Transcend that takes 8 seconds to finish writing the TOC.

But the proof of the pudding is in the eating, so I guess I'll use them and see how I get on.

Marcus try a straight through record. Load a card in each slot and do one long record so that it crosses cards and fills both in one shot.

BTW my 32GB Sandisk Ultra II Class 2 (yes, Class 2 NOT Class 4) can do 720p24/44 without error (although it's been a while since I tested that).

Thanks Marcus. This is promising. Now to find a RELIABLE USA distributer. Neither B&H nor AbleCine (DVInfo sponsors) carry the card. Nor do my "non sponsor" source, J&R (where I got my Sandisk cards) (sorry for mentioning them but I've had to buy from non sponsors since the sponsors didn't carry the above Sandisk either).

B&H and AbelCine, do consider carrying 16GB and 32GB ATP ProMax cards, PLEASE.

Marcus, are those ATP cards 8gb or 16gb and what card reader are you using? Will they work with the Kensington reader?.

Well I've done a straight record through onto both cards and it seems have worked. XDTransfer can see and play both clips.

No idea how to join them up but apart from that everything seems good with them.

I think the next stage is to see if some of the old hands can get their hands on these cards to see if in their opinion these are a viable alternative.

I've also spent the afternoon trying to repeat the errors on my two Transcends that went wrong. No matter what I try, I just can't.

I guess these are dark arts but I would have perhaps preferred it if I could have made that card from Friday go wrong at the 20 minute mark again.

They are 16gb cards. I'm using the Mac Book Pro reader as well as a USB expresscard reader plugged into a Mac Pro.

No idea about any brand other than MXR (although I believe from elsewhere on the forum that MXM and Hoodman are just the same adaptors with different labels).

Ok, thanks.

Just back from my shoot. Used both the ATP cards with no drama at all. The red to green time is consistant as well. Always 5 seconds.

One thing I have noted with my "dodgy" Transcends is that the red to green time can vary depending on how much of the card is used. One of the cards takes 10 seconds to clear at the start of the card but gets better a few minutes in. That suggests to me some kind of manufacturing inconsistency on what is already a slow card.

If I get any problems with the ATP cards I'll post again, but I'm certainly looking at ordering more on the basis of two test runs in the office and a real life run today.

With all the problems I've been reading here about Sandisks and Transcends, I wonder - Has anyone had a problem with Hoodman cards yet?
I haven't seen any posts that mention it. Perhaps that's because fewer are out there, or maybe they were right and they are worth the extra $50. A small price to pay for security - if its true.