SD Cards Longevity question

T

thedoc46

n3wb
Jul 20, 2015
26
5
Hi,

So i've read that SD cards are notoriously unreliable in DashCams and IP camera's, being the heat and constant writes. Apparently Sandisk make one that's somewhat more durable to the higher / colder temps.

Just wondering, what has your experience been with an SD card's longevity. I'm currently running a sandisk 32gb in my Cobra DriveHD, that i picked up from Costco... It's hardwired in and stays put in the blazing SW Floridan sunshine all throughout the day, even to the point that the dashcam is too hot to touch.. and its been fine thus far.. mind you, i've only had it in the car for a couple of months.
 
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I don't think I have ever had an SD card fail, though the most demanding place I've ever put one is in my cell phone (behind the battery) where it no doubt gets warm but not too hot. Either that or in the Hikvision camera in my Kitchen. It records on motion only and has written hundreds of gigabytes in its lifetime, about a year so far. It is only a 16 GB microSD and only holds about a week of data before overwriting old clips. Though to be fair I have not checked on it since January so for all I know it has stopped working since then.

I have never run an SD card in a hot or constant-writing situation.
 
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When it comes to micro SDs, I buy cheapo no-name brands on sale. After almost two years I haven't had one tank on me yet. I run 64gb in three Axis cams — IP cameras, not dash cams— but two of them record a continuous 24/7 low-res stream + high res motion clips and are mounted in windows exposed to direct sun a substantial part of the day. So far, so good. Even if one of them turned out to be a clunker, I think the money I've saved thus far versus buying expensive SanDisk High Endurance cards, for example, still makes it worth it. I check the cams daily to make sure they're all still recording okay. That's just my experience. Your mileage may vary ...
 
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The Sandisk Extreme and Panasonic Gold seem to be highly recommended for longevity but they are expensive. I use Sandisk Extreme Pro in my DSLR but don't know that I could justify the price premium for a cctv camera, especially when they can cost half as much as the camera, and I get good mileage from the no name brands.
 
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SanDisk cards not not real popular in a lot a dashcam forums but the main reason for this is that they are faked all the time and people have issues. Then you try and run down the issues and find out it was a fake purchased from ebay or somewhere. I have yet to kill a SD card, they are lasting longer than dash cams in many cases lol. I have used at least 6 brands and no issues yet.

I've been using Samsung EVO cards mostly and some others with no issues.
 
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Razer said:
SanDisk cards not not real popular in a lot a dashcam forums but the main reason for this is that they are faked all the time and people have issues. Then you try and run down the issues and find out it was a fake purchased from ebay or somewhere. I have yet to kill a SD card, they are lasting longer than dash cams in many cases lol. I have used at least 6 brands and no issues yet.

I've been using Samsung EVO cards mostly and some others with no issues.
Click to expand...

This x2

Samsung EVO my go to card nowadays.
 
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Ive had good luck with sandisk ultra and extreme cards. i have had a sandisk regular one fail on me, and a PNY. both failures were likely due to high volumes of writes from being in a dashcam. the pny didnt last very long at all though. both gave me warranty replacements though with no issue. the sandisk was about 4.5 years old (not all in a dash cam), the pny only a few months.
 
SD cards only seem to fail, if removed while being inuse by the device.
If you have to remove it power it down 1st.
 
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Some dashcams don't like sandisk cards at all, they'll probably work for a bit then just stop. I believe it was the G1W that had issues, although I've run sandisk in my G1WH with no issues. However, I run a transcend card as I don't want it to fail when I need it.

There are soo many fakes, and copies of copies it's unbelievable, don't know what's real anymore. I go on ebay and look at a few sellers who have sold thousands of sandisk cards for half the price of what you pay in the shops. No idea if they're real or not.

Cams can be picky, so one card might work for one and not for the other, even though it's the same camera.
 
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Michelin Man said:
Some dashcams don't like sandisk cards at all, they'll probably work for a bit then just stop. I believe it was the G1W that had issues, although I've run sandisk in my G1WH with no issues. However, I run a transcend card as I don't want it to fail when I need it.

There are soo many fakes, and copies of copies it's unbelievable, don't know what's real anymore. I go on ebay and look at a few sellers who have sold thousands of sandisk cards for half the price of what you pay in the shops. No idea if they're real or not.

Cams can be picky, so one card might work for one and not for the other, even though it's the same camera.
Click to expand...

I'll second that. Sandisk are great quality but my mini 0805 kept locking up after about 10 mins of recording and then rebooting with a Sandisk Ultra Class 10 UHS-1 128GB card. Swapped in a Samsung EVO Class 10 UHS-1 128GB card, no issues at all. I tested both cards with H2testw and they both passed the 128GB test, so I don't think they are counterfeit cards.
 
digging up 6mo old threads huh? ok i'll bite.

Ive got stacks of dead flash chips, Samsung Pro's are giving me the best results lately.. often hear advice in reviews: this card is too fast for older devices, ignore that nonsence.. your going for the higher quality flash memory and the better seek and random speeds are well within your devices capability to utilize.

SanDisks give me the most Grief.. but then again I run most of these in embedded micro controllers with more random write loads than a camera will have
 
Like a few of the others above, I found my mini 0803 didn't like Sandisc cards, but works faultlessly with Kingston cards. Makes me wonder if the Sandisc ones are dodgy, as counterfeit SD cards seems to be big business at the moment
 
I have samsung 64gb micro sd card in a hik 2120 cam.cam is under a porch.sun hits it in the morning.temps Been 80-88 last couple of weeks and so far so good.bought the Microsd from walmart online.


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I've had 3 scan disks mess up on me within 1.5yrs. I only use samsung evos in all of my cameras (trail cams, dash cams, etc..). Work fine for me.
 
Memory card manufacturers now sell purpose built memory cards for dash cams and surveillance cameras. They use MLC technology which has higher durability than the typical cheaper TLC technology.

The memory cards you want are generally listed as 'High Endurance'. Such as linked above, Sandisk and Transcend have their own versions as well.
 
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I run a few dash cams. I was a fan of Sandisk until I had one of their Ultras die on me- it's permanently write protected (which is apparently what happens when they die.) Bought from Amazon and sold by Amazon so it shouldn't be a fake. It could be 3 or more years old.

I do live where it gets over 40 degrees C regularly in Summer- so they are tested in hot conditions. I've swapped to some Lexars, a couple of their high endurance variety Amazon.com: Lexar High-Endurance microSDXC 64GB UHS-I/U1 Card with SD Adapter (LSDMI64GBBNLHEA): Computers & Accessories and I'm also trying a Samsung EVO Select.
 
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You need a high endurance card.

There are 2 types of SD Flash chip:

TLC (cheaper and less durable, found in most SD cards) and MLC (more expensive but more durable and more suited to constant writes as it wears less)

Some info here: SD Cards We Recommend for Dash Cameras

(Just noticed Michelan Man also mentioned this).

Also, for HD cams, you need UHS-1 memory (minimum) rated as high as possible on write speed. (Tests reviews can help here as not all cards appear to test the same speed in some camera use as in the manufacturers lab conditions)

Another factor to consider, the larger the card, the less time it overwrites in any given time period as it takes longer to fill. Therefore it makes sense to buy the largest card the camera takes / is economical to buy in cost per megabyte, as the larger the card, the longer (in theory) it will last.
 
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