Compact Flash

Compact Flash is a memory card format that is perhaps most used in portable electronic devices such as mobile phones and digital cameras. Compact Flash memory cards (also referred to as CF cards) typically use solid-state flash drives with standardized enclosures. The Compact Flash format was first designed and launched by SanDisk in the year 1994.

The Compact Flash format became a popular storage medium for portable electronic devices, especially digital cameras. Though in recent years, Compact Flash memory cards have been largely replaced by SecureDigital ones, Compact Flash cards are still the preferred format for Digital Single Lens Reflective (D-SLR) cameras, courtesy their larger capacities and reliability.

It must be noted that the Compact Flash format is one of the oldest and most successful memory card formats. This is largely so as the format of Compact Flash is said to have a better cost-to-memory size ratio than the other formats. Further, the maximum memory capacity of the Compact Flash format is much higher than the other formats.

There are many ways in which Compact Flash memory cards can be used with computers: they can be directly connected to a PC Card slot via a plug adapter, used as an ATA (IDE) or PCMCIA storage device through a passive adapter or reader, or can be externally attached to other types of ports such as USB or FireWire by means of a specialized adaptor.

It must be noted that as Compact Flash memory card is much larger than newer and modern memory cards, most memory cards can be directly plugged to a Compact Flash adapter. The following memory card formats can be plugged directly to a CF adapter: SD/MMC, Memory Stick Duo, xD-Picture Card in a Type I slot, and SmartMedia in a Type II slot.

The most popular choices, currently, in the European and North American markets seem to be Compact Flash memory cards between 512 MB and 8 GB. CF cards with lower memories are becoming rare. Though 64 GB Compact Flash memory cards have been announced, the 32 GB cards are the mainstay of the higher-end market.

Among the more popular cards are the SanDisk Extreme III Compact Flash memory card and the 64 GB and 32 GB offerings from Samsung. The SanDisk Compact Flash Extreme III memory card is available in 16 GB. Note that almost all cards with capacities higher than 2 GB require the host device to support the FAT32 file system, provided the camera uses the FAT file system.

One can buy Compact Flash memory cards from online trading and shopping sites, and also from photography sites. Photography sites often offer good advice on photography related issues such as photography framing, choice of a camera cases, camera reviews, the many camera brands (such as Konica Minolta, Nikon, Cannon, etc.) etc. It must e noted that Compact Flash prices do not remain stable and do fluctuate. Though the retail prices are uniform, prices of Compact Flash memory cards vary from store to store, especially online.