Bridges Loc: Memphis, Charleston SC, now Nazareth PA

These are about 4 x the price of an SD card. Any chance they will be going down in price? To not invest in a card or two plus a reader, is equivalent to having only a single SD card slot.

tradio Loc: Oxford, Ohio

I've had mine for about a year and a half and I don't think they have come down in price since then. I'm not sure how popular they are or, how popular they will be. I thought I'd seen where they was on the way out..?
They are very fast though, a lot faster the the SD format.

tcthome Loc: NJ

I have read somewhere a while back they weren't going to be the future meaning they were already planning on the CF Express move. Is it true , I don't know. If your shooting with a Nikon, I believe they have firmware updates so you can use the CF Express card in the XQD slot. Maybe the other camera manufactures with XQD slots will or have done the same.

billnikon Loc: Pennsylvania/Ohio/Florida/Maui/Oregon/Vermont

When you compare the price of the XQD card to our old film processing and printing camera's, it's a bargain, and you can reused it over and over and over and over again. Prices may come down, but to be honest, I could care less, it is still one of the cheapest accessories I buy for my digital camera. Besides, they are much faster than SD cards and my a9 at 20 fps could really use this card. My SonyXQD card reader only cost $29.00.
My Nikon D500 loves this card, as does my D850.
Some things you just have to buck up and fork over for. You'll be glad you did.

cedymock Loc: Irmo, South Carolina

It's the CF express Type-B cards that can be use after the Nikon firmware update. I believe Sony is the only manufacturer of XQD cards currently other manufacturers are moving to CF express from the information I have been seeing.

DaveO Loc: Northeast CT

Check B&H for the new Type B cards...such a deal!

cedymock Loc: Irmo, South Carolina

Didn't purchase because of cost difference in CF express type XQD there is little difference. Purchased because future cameras may not be compatible with XQD.

DaveO Loc: Northeast CT

Agree, but some feel more satisfaction with the faster speed. I personally have no need. After many thousands of wildlife shots, I'm just fine!

Bridges Loc: Memphis, Charleston SC, now Nazareth PA

I will have to do my shots different than in the past. I don't reuse cards -- keep them as backup similar to how we used to store negatives. I guess I could download from an XQD card to an SD card and reuse the XQD. I also backup shots on external drives. Just a little paranoid when it comes to losing photos after a couple of drives froze up. I have one external drive set up by month and one by subject. All my shots are saved to those drives under the appropriate heading.

larryepage Loc: North Texas area

I have found that memory card pricing pretty much follows speed, regardless of format. Price decreases are generally based on what is called the economic "learning curve." As accumulated volume increases and development costs are amortized, the price can come down. Unfortunately, with the overall decline in the popularity of photography using dedicated equipment, sales volumes of memory cards in all formats are decreasing just like those for cameras. Price decreases have correspondingly slowed.

There is no reason to expect that CF Express cards are ever going to be less expensive overall than XQD cards for the simple reason that they are faster. It is also not a given that XQD cards are going to disappear completely in the immediate future. Even though Nikon is updating some of its cameras to use CFExpress, there is no indication that Sony is doing the same for its products that use XQD. That said, Sony has also never been bashful about spontaneously obsoleting products by simply eliminating the availability of dedicated peripherals.

By the way...even though the overall reliability of flash memory is much higher than it was initially, they are still a relatively poor choice as an archival storage method. The relative ease with which they can be lost or physically damaged just doesn't recommend them for that purpose. Additionally, they remain a relatively expensive form of storage on a cost per byte basis, and using them in this manner also requires you to continually maintain a working card reader (including working device drivers) that is compatible with your oldest card. It's much better to have a storage plan that moves along with developing technology.

Bridges Loc: Memphis, Charleston SC, now Nazareth PA

Good thoughts. I will eventually transfer everything over to SSD drives once the price of those units come down. It is happening but slowly. I currently have two 250s and a 500gb drives. I have maybe 4 2tb and 2 4tb hard drives that are full (not SSD) and two 500tb units which are filling now. That is a lot of tb to convert to SSD and would require up to 1000.00 to do that. Once I have enough SSD space I will download all my SD and CF cards and reuse or sell off the majority of them.

cameraf4 Loc: Delaware

Just a random question; Has anyone updated their Nikon that takes XQD cards to make it compatible with CF express Type-B cards? Is there any improvement in performance? Once the update is complete, is it OK to switch back-and-forth between the two formats without wigging out your camera?

larryepage Loc: North Texas area

I've updated my firmware, and everything still works fine. XQD performance is fine for me. I do not plan to move to the (more expensive) CFExpress cards until XQD availability becomes a problem.

jonyrot

i updated the firmware in my D850 and have not had any trouble. I thought the CF express cards were a bit less expensive than the xqd because more manufacturers were supporting the cf express?

wapiti Loc: round rock, texas