Blackmagic Forum

Hey guys, I was out of town so I just got my Pocket Cinema camera today. Tried it with the PNY Elite Performance 32GB UHS-1 SDHC (P-SDH32U1H-GE) card and it's dropping frames like crazy. I can record maybe 2 seconds before the light starts blinking and I review the footage and it's garbage.

It's one of the approved cards on the official Blackmagic FAQ and rated on the package at 90mbs.

Is it a bad card, or a bad camera or am I doing something wrong?

In case it matters, I've been shooting at 23.98 fps, ProRes 422 (obviously), the Film dynamic range and varying ISOs and shutter speeds just in case. None of that should matter, but again, just in case.

Thanks for your help!

-Paul G

If you had formatted it for mac use, try formatting it for windows - this has cured the problem for at least one other user in this forum (different card though).

Mac Jaeger wrote:If you had formatted it for mac use, try formatting it for windows - this has cured the problem for at least one other user in this forum (different card though).

Forgot to mention, I did format it it in exFAT. I read that earlier. I'll actually try formatting it for Mac too just in case.

I had the same problem. Now I'm using Sandisk Elite Pro cards, and it's been flawless with those.

I have not had any problem with my PNY Elite Performance card. It was my major recording medium used for my "Worst Case Scenario" test I put up on Vimeo. I shot scenes for several minutes at a time without issue or dropped frames.

Asking the obvious, have you updated the camera to the 1.4.2 software? I understand the earlier version had a lower threshhold of tolerance with cards. Also, have you tried formatting with a different software program? A few times with several of my SD cards from various manufactures and speeds, the Mac disk formatter seems to hiccup before it gets the format right. Retrying seems to work eventually. I've downloaded a few formatters to test out as well.

It is a new card from PNY and their quality control might be missing a few bad cards. But it is supposed to work and it does for me is all I can tell you.

Christopher Schiller

That's interesting to note, because the first time I shot with those cards, they worked most of the time. I only noticed them dropping frames a few times in two days of shooting. The second time I used them however, they dropped frames every few time I started the recordings. I do have the latest firmware (verified with BMD's firmware updater), and I did even try reformatting them after the frame drops started becoming more prevalent, but after an evening of start, slate... oh crap, second sticks, I gave up.

Thanks for the replies!

I'm overnighting a SanDisk card to see if that helps.

I downloaded some other software to format the PNY card, no improvement.

I haven't touched the firmware, because Blackmagic wants me to register the camera to download it and I'm not exactly 100% sure I want to keep it yet. So far it's an underwhelming experience, but who knows, if it works well with the new card I may change my mind.

-Paul G

My Sandisk Extreme 32GB came in, works great. Lesson learned, stay away from the PNY cards.

I don't think you need to register the camera to download the firmware? I believe there are direct links around. Also registering it doesn't do anything, that I'm aware of, in terms of returning the unit.

The card should work if you've updated your camera to the newest firmware.

Tony Rivera wrote:The card should work if you've updated your camera to the newest firmware.

I got this card based on Blackmagic Design's recommendation and Tony Rivera's comment above and it does not work! I have the latest firmware (1.4.2), I formatted my PNY Elite Performance 32GB 90MB/s card to exFAT and used a fully charged official battery but I get dropped frames on every recording. It starts dropping frames around the 4 second mark every time no matter what I'm recording in every configuration.

I want to know why Blackmagic Design is recommending we purchase a card that is clearly not working, obviously they added approval without performing proper tests but more importantly I would like to know why these cards are failing to record ProRes HQ at 220Mbps (27.5MB/s) when these cards have more than enough bandwidth to write sequential data at that speed.

Why is it only the premium priced Sandisk cards that are working? What makes their 45MB/s and 95MB/s work better with the Pocket Cinema Camera than everyone else's cards? This PNY Elite Performance 32GB card can write 227Mbps (avg) on the EOS M with Magic Lantern without dropping frames but the Pocket ProRes HQ (172Mbps Avg) is dropping frames.

It's most likely because only Sandisk's quality assurance is sufficient. PNY cards are probably cheap because PNY skimps on QA, and as such is probably shipping wildly inconsistently performing cards.

I'm sorry to hear it's not working for you. I was told that this should work but I have no personal experience with it or the camera or that card.

Even with the best brands there are bad cards, try returning it as faulty and get a new one.
Try to run the Disk Speed test program on the card before sending it back.

I only use Sandisk 95mb/s on the BMPCC, but when I ordered some other CF cards to use on the Canon 5DII for raw video, I had to go through a few, as there were quite a bit of sample variation on some brands.

I has the same problem with 2 of these so called recommended cards. I even tested the newer pny 100mbps cards out of curiosity and they were worse

Yes Same here. I will keep the post short because I have a couple other things to tend to at this moment, but I have tried two of these cards with the exact same results. exFAT and HFS+ and 1.4.2

Tony Rivera wrote:I'm sorry to hear it's not working for you. I was told that this should work but I have no personal experience with it or the camera or that card.

Tony, could you run this up the chain to figure out why so many of these cards aren't working when they should? Is there somehow something we are all missing that Blackmagic did in their tests of this card to get it to work? At the very least an amendment to the recommended list should be made.

m0fe wrote:I has the same problem with 2 of these so called recommended cards. I even tested the newer pny 100mbps cards out of curiosity and they were worse

is that the PNY "Elite Performance 100MB/s" 64GB card with a rated 60MB/s write? How were they worse than these 32GB ones?

haavard wrote:Even with the best brands there are bad cards, try returning it as faulty and get a new one.

I checked with a friend that got the same 32GB card for his Pocket and he is also reporting dropped frames, I have another on order but I doubt it will be different.

UPDATE: got the second one, still drops frames.

no go on the Komputer bay 600x 90mbs 128GB card. dropping frames like crazy. i will continue to use sandisk 16GB 80mbs cards for now.

I've passed this along and will do my best to keep you folks updated with any info passed down to me.

the PNY SDHC Elite Performance 32GB (SD32G10ELIPER-EF with 100 read, not the 90), very good, no droopped frames.
test:
http://www.chip.de/bestenlisten/Bestenl ... ex/id/802/

the PNY Elite Performance 32GB UHS-1 90mb is too slow.
PNY "Elite Performance 90MB/s" 32GB 90MB/s write ($24.99) holds 19 mins (Approved by Blackmagic)(3 copies independently tested all dropped frames)
list here:
http://www.blackmagicuser.net/topic/445 ... ma-camera/

best kroky

As BM is officially supporting the PNY Elite Performance 32 GB 90MB/s SD card for RAW, I bought one to test it out. I've formatted the card using Disk Utility using EXFAT.

Once in my BMPC the card drops frames like crazy. I'd like a response from BM regarding this. Should I send the card back?

I'm curious how many cards they tested, using what utility for formatting, in what format (EXFAT, Mac Journaled,...)

Anyone having success with this card and RAW?

Prores works no problem. But thats not why I bought this card.

Yeah I have three of the sandisk cards. No problems. Just curious how BM can say these cards work.

Vapourtrail,

Can you post an image of the exact card you're using?

Tony,

I purchased off amazon. I copied and pasted what is listed on the BM website.

PNY Elite Performance 32 GB 90MB/s SD card

This is the item that came up and that I purchased.

PNY Elite Performance 32GB UHS-1 SDHC Flash Card (P-SDH32U1H-GE)
http://amzn.com/B00DX5D9I4

Sorry I can't post the picture as I'm at work.

Vapourtrial, i think Tony is probably interested in a picture of your very card to find out if you might have a fake one; there's a lot of money to gain by faking highend sdhc cards, especially as most people don't have the knowledge to detect the fakes. Even renowned, reliable vendors have been fooled in the past.

Hmmm ok. Ill pics when I get home. The card looks in my memory exactly as it does on amazon.

I buy all my cards off amazon. If it's a fake at least I can send it back.

Would I be able to tell by pulling it up in disk utility or the system profiler?

If you can, you could do a speed test with something like H2Testw on windows, that's the tool that many people use to check for fake cards that either have not the capacity or the speed stated.

Check the back of the card and give us the number you see there. We seem to have a different labeled card here in our lab and we want to double check this with the one we have here to make sure there's no conflicting information we're giving out.

Guys really, just stick to the Sandisk Elite Pro cards and call it a day.
Saving a few bucks on media, isn't worth to risk drop frames IMHO.

Happy New Year.

Frank

Frank Glencairn wrote:Guys really, just stick to the Sandisk Elite Pro cards and call it a day.
Saving a few bucks on media, isn't worth to risk drop frames IMHO.

Happy New Year.

Frank

+1

Frank Glencairn wrote:Guys really, just stick to the Sandisk Elite Pro cards and call it a day.
Saving a few bucks on media, isn't worth to risk drop frames IMHO.

Happy New Year.

Frank

You're half right Frank. Stick to the Sandisk cards. But I went with the Extreme rather than Extreme Pro when I bought the BMPCC. Gave me twice the capacity (128GB) which was very handy when shooting bands, and works perfectly with ProRes.

This 'SanDisk Extreme Pro or you're being cheap' attitude I see around a lot is just wrong. If a card is on the BMD approved list you're not being cheap buying an approved card that suits your workflow IMHO.

Of course trying to get your $20 class 10 card working is another matter...

Let's not make this thread about cards in general. It started out because the OP has a problem with a PNY card he bought because it is on list of officially supported cards.

Now the questions are:

Did he buy the right card at all?
Did he order the right card, but got a fake?
Or is the PNY card not as reliable as BMD thought?

I had a fake (Sandisk) before - can happen even at big trusted shops.
They took it back and gave me a real one - no questions asked.

But the chance you run into a fake, is always there, especially at the more expensive cards.

Ryan Jones wrote:This 'SanDisk Extreme Pro or you're being cheap' attitude I see around a lot is just wrong. If a card is on the BMD approved list you're not being cheap buying an approved card that suits your workflow IMHO.
.

If like 95% of all users have no problems with a certain card/SSD I don't care what else is on the list.
If I see problems with cards popping up everywhere with other cards (on the list or not) I avoid them. It's that simple IMHO.

Regarding "cheap" - it's not so much about the price, but Sandisk seem to be the most reliable and stable (SD and SSD), when it comes to data rate. Maybe they do speed tests before shipping and sort the slower ones out, or have better overall quality control.

Tony,

Here is the back of the cards. Please let me know if I ordered the wrong ones or if they are fakes so I can return them asap.

I would like to make a suggestion to BM regarding how they list the cards on their FAQ... Perhaps linking to the manufacturers website so people can see the actual product would help.

When I ordered these off Amazon, I searched the exact name listed on the BM FAQ and the cards I ordered were the only ones that had the correct name/size. There are a lot of other PNY cards that show up when you search. Perhaps I ordered the wrong ones even though it showed the right name??? Having a link to the PNY website would have taken care of that confusion... If its what happened.

Regarding the 'stick to sandisk/stop being cheap' thing.... Really? I own three Sandisk cards. Yes they just work, however if BM is going to say these PNY cards work, I'll take their word for it.

Front of cards...

I got eager and labeled them right after unpacking... Should have tested first. Ha.

OK... Googled 'PNY Elite Performance 32 GB 90MB/s SD card' which is what is listed on BM FAQ.

Which led to this on the PNY website:

http://www3.pny.com/32GB-Elite-Performa ... 6C442.aspx

Which is the cards I supposedly ordered.

I don't believe that the ones you purchased are counterfeit but might be different from the ones we had tested with here. We're currently in contact with the company about this subject and will pass along the information we receive from them ASAP.

I don't know if that is good news or bad news. Fake cards can happen to everyone, but once you found out you usually have a way to deal with it and get real ones. But if you can't trust all cards with the same label to be the same inside, then you just can't trust labels at all. Until that's clarified you (BMD) should probably not list the PNY cards as compatible...

In any case: i consider my footage to be more valuable than the money i could save not buying sandisk cards, so i'm going to buy a couple sandisk 128 gb cards in spring for my upcoming summer projects, even if there should be newer, cheaper alternatives.

I'm suspecting that their cards aren't consistent performers. I had a pair of PNY Elite cards that actually worked fine for ProRes the first time I shot with them, but the 2nd time (after copying the footage and formatting them again) they dropped frames on pretty much every single take. We ended up taking them back and getting a pair of Sandisks, and those have been flawless.

I just wrote a little article, why SD cards and other flash memory, may or may not drop frames.

http://frankglencairn.wordpress.com/201 ... -like-mad/

Can you shoot Raw on the PNY Elite cards?

Did anyone ever answer this?

Are the PNY Elite Performance SD cards, do they work in the BMPCC shooting RAW without dropping frames?

I just bought one, waited a week for delivery and it is dead on arrival! PNY were no help at all, they said, "oh yeah, you should just send it back", meaning back to where I bought it from (Amazon, not prime, so I'm going to have to wait another week WTF)

I want the 128GB card, or bigger, so I can shoot longer, and I want to shoot RAW. As well as the PNY cards are lower priced. And I don't see why, according to their advertised speeds, they shouldn't work?

I just got my BMPCC a bit over a week ago and I've been using a very low cost 32GB SD card that I didn't expect to work at all, it's actually a "Polaroid" SD Card! But it lets me record ProResHQ at 23.98 with no dropped frames and I can shoot RAW for about 5 seconds before I get dropped frames. This is a slow card. I tested with the AJA System Test application and it shows around 28mbps write and 50mbps read. So, the PNY at their 90mbs read and 60mbs write, should have not problems with any ProRes and RAW. But, is that the case?

Do I just need to order 10 of these to get one good one!?

I'm also thinking I'd like the 256, or even 512 cards, for the longer shoot.

So... who has the answer!?

Where's that Blackmagic guy?

This is like the Apple website, where Apple NEVER gets involved and answers questions...

Thank you, if you're out there and could please answer this Q!

Sincerely,

JohnAvatar.com
Santa Monica, CA 90402