What RAM

[bodmin636]

Have just got a new IPAQ 2210 and need to get a memory card. Which is best CF or SD? Is one better for certain things than the other?

[omikron.sk]

SD surely! I've bought a CF in the times when SDs were 2 times more expensive, but CF is really quite slow (even though I've bought a "FAST" PQI CF, that should be 40x faster than ordinary CF! ). Now in the times when SDs cost almost as much as CFs, your decision should be clear.

But ...... think about what accessories you would like to buy (some of them are only for one of those slots).

[Darius Wey]

Remember to think ahead...

CF expansion cards for non-memory expansion features such as WLAN, Bluetooth, Radio, Cameras, etc. are more abundant (and prolly cheaper) than SDIO ones at the moment.

My recommendation would be to use the SD format for expanding your memory and using the CF slot to expand your other options (particularly WLAN). However, what you do is up to you :wink:

[Janak Parekh]

It really depends on how much memory you need.

For larger amounts of memory (e.g., 512MB and greater), you'll find that CF is much cheaper than SD. Otherwise, using the SD slot leaves your CF slot free.

Contrary to omikron.sk's experiences, I've found that my SD cards are decently-performing, but not that different than CF.

--janak

[omikron.sk]

It really depends on how much memory you need.

For larger amounts of memory (e.g., 512MB and greater), you'll find that CF is much cheaper than SD. Otherwise, using the SD slot leaves your CF slot free.

Contrary to omikron.sk's experiences, I've found that my SD cards are decently-performing, but not that different than CF.

--janak
Janak, I will be more concrete: for exchanging files via ActiveSync the speed is good - USB 1.0 will not handle more anyway. When exchanging files between CF and internal memory/iPaq filestore the speed is not as much as you would expect, but you will probably not copy large amounts of data between each other while main memory/iPaq filestore are quite limited in space. I haven't tried copying CF <-> SD, but I'm waiting to recieve one SD in a few days and then I'm gonna tell. The biggist problem is when you use a cLaunch, tdLaunch, ProgramMenu or anything that works with icons. Most of these programs try to "load" icons of programs into cache, where they're stored until next soft reset. While I've got about 150MB of programs on my CF it takes app. 1-3 minutes (!) to load them and in this period PPC is completly unusable (doesn't response to anything except Power button and reset) and I found this quite confusing, I've also tried Pocket Mechanic to test my CF speed and it pulled back awful results for something called "low level read/write": under 0.1 MBps (!). Actually card is of coarse much faster than that, but really, loading icons os the biggist problem. I tried to test the time required to load one icon and different icons produced different results: from 0.3 to 4 secs. I don't completely understand it, but my friend (also having h2210) has the same problem using compeletly different CF. However SDs are looking to perform much better in this. And therefore I recommend SD instead of CF. However if you want REALLY much storage, there's only one option: CF (or Microdrives or something like this). But I think that 256-512MB is enought for average PPC user and also, as mentioned, CF accessories are (at least for now) somewhat cheaper than SD ones, while storage cards cost almost the same.

[DigitalD]

well I’ll add my 2 cents...

with my equipment (see below) via Ativesync over USB 1.0

Transferring a 1.37MB file

CF averaged 31.6sec
SD averaged 33.5sec

CF --> SD averaged 10.2sec
SD --> CF averaged 5.3sec

also retreating same said file

CF averaged 34.1sec
SD averaged 33.4

my advise would be to go with a SD (256)

I only have the CF because i use it in my Canon A70, and i can dump mp3 for boring afternoons

[Kowalski]

for most of situations CF is better than SD
SD could be faster than CF but if you store only mp3 s this doesnt bother you.
CF is cheeper than SD
plus CF has much more capacities.

[omikron.sk]

Today I recieved KingSton 256MB SD and as I promised I'm here with new result. Generally copying from/to SD is generally about 1.2 - 1.4 times faster than from/to SD. However you can get realistic speeds only if copying from/to external card to/from Main memory. If you try to copy from you card to another (no matter if CF->SD or SD->CF), copying gets almost 8 (!) times slower! This is probably because PPC (at least my h2210) seems that it cannot handle both cards at the same time. I think that generally no Pocket PC will be able to do this faster, but if you want to copy large amounts of data between 2 storage cards, that's shame to see that slowness.
Problem with loading the icons (as I mentioned previously) seems to be, not clearly, but solved using SD. SD is somewhat faster in loading them, but you still won't get Main-Memory-like speed.

[Mark_Venture]

I agree with DJ Apod. I use SD for memory expansion and CF for Wi-Fi and add ons...

I leave the SD card in my iPAQ all the time. I install all my software to it and leave the CF slot free for my Wi-Fi card and to exchange the CF memory card with my Digital camera.