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Elektron Gear Octatrack
#44

I’ve been using the 64gb version of that for about a year and I’ve had two projects give me errors when I tried to load them because bank 16 was corrupted,but I have no idea if the card is the issue. It seems to perform really well, I’ve never had any issues with static samples clicking when I or anything, and I have a feeling the trouble I had with corrupt files was something else it was too specific to just be bad sectors on the card IMHO, always the same file.

I have a 512MB Sandisk CF card that’s probably close to 20 years old, was used when I got it, and has been permanently living in the card reader of my MPC since 2010 and hasn’t given me a bit of trouble, even when I was using the MPC really heavily (as much as 8-10 hours a day a few days a week for most of 2013) and I’d go for SanDisk again next time.

I’ve also had good luck with Transcend cards over the years but I’ve never used one in the OT and when I used one in the MPC I had problems with it freezing if I tried to save into a directory that was more than two levels deep, which was a known bug in the MPC2000xl OS but never happened once I switched to SanDisk.

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#45

64GB is not enough for me… was wondering if I could buy a fast 512gb memory card and store everything on there rather than having multiple… what’s the max cap without error?

#46

The OT Mk 2 manual says:

Cards supporting UDMA and at least 133x (~20MB/s) for both reads and writes are compatible with the Octatrack MKII. Cards must be FAT16 or FAT32 formatted, preferably FAT32. Up to 64 GB Compact Flash cards are supported.

You might be the first person to try a larger card and test the addressable limit.

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#47

hi everyone… I have a question
I just bought a 32 GB card… just to be safe, as I only have the original card that the OT came with.
what’s the safe way to exchange them?
Save Project > Sync to Card… that’s it? then it’s safe to eject and switch them?

#48

If you haven’t done so already, I strongly recommend that you copy each Set on the card to a computer using the OT’s USB Disk Mode before you eject the card.

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#49

Generally, a Cfast card is better than a Compact flash card
It looks better in terms of performance.
So I try to buy a Cfast card.
ot mkii is able to recognize Cfast card?

#50

We’ll have to wait to hear from someone who has tested a CFast card in an OT, but in the meantime keep in mind that any performance gains will be exclusively on the computer side of read/write performance and not on the OT side.

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#51

From what I have read CFast cards are not physically or electrically compatible with CompactFlash cards. Maybe Elektron could confirm compatibility?

Anyone tried SD to Compact Flash adapter cards with Octatrack? This would be far easier to swap out SD cards.

#52

CF fast (or CFast) definitely NOT compatible.
It will DESTROY the pins in your OT if you try to force one of those in there.

As for brands, and being in the photography trade for 27 years, I started out with Sandisk but moved to Lexar about 10 years ago after the release of some independent industry data on read/write cycles before failure. But that was a while ago, things change and most photographers use both from what I see. I still used old Sandisk cards in a pinch and the only failure I ever had was due to the camera, not the card.

The ‘best practice’ is always double backups, format the card (overwriting and filling CF cards is death), and take advantage of downloading that free recovery software that comes with a new card.

The data rate limiting factor and largely the card dependability factor rests on the OT (or camera) drivers, hardware etc. Also, it gets weird, a device may work perfectly with CF cards up to 16GB, then fail or struggle with 32GB cards, then work fine again with 64GB, and not work at all with 128.
So best stick with what Elektron advice on card capacity.

Anyway, my Nikon’s now use XQD cards (PCI based) so I’ve got a stack of CF cards waiting for an OT :wink:

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New Cfast card Memory
#53

Card still clicking? Was thinking about buying this one for OT mki.

#54

Oh, I have sold my OT already a few years ago… Sorry, I’m afraid, I cannot provide long-term experience.

#55

Hello guys

I know this topic is been talked around for a while, but everytime I read I found diferent opinions on the subject, my cf card broke and I nedd to get one today,

would you please be so kind to recommend couple of brands? and speed / capacity?

for OT MK 1

thanks!

#56

@audiofreak , I have zero issues with Sandisk Extreme CompactFlash Memory Card - 64 GB (SDCFXS-064G-A46)

$45 on Amazon

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#57

thanks a lot Jay… for the MK 1 right?

#58

works without issue for both the MK1 and MK2.

Plenty of reviews/details already here on Elektronauts.

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#59

thanks a lot Adam :slight_smile:

#60

Hey Adam

Amazon have no idea when they deliver haha, just like that :smiley:

will this work as well?

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1000363-REG/sandisk_sdcfxps_064g_a46_64gb_extreme_pro_compact.html

thanks

#61

Just got an MKII, looking for the most compatible CF card-
hasn’t been a new post on this in a bit
is bigger better with the OT?

any other newb tricks welcome as well-

THX

#62

The largest card the OT can accommodate is 64GB. I’m using the SanDisk Extreme Pro 64GB without issue.

Is bigger better? I see it as having a lot of space for preloading samples, saving recorded samples, and saving projects.

If this an opportunity to self impose restraints by limiting what you can load? That’s for you to decide :slight_smile:

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#63

tnssub said that everything faster then 35mb/s is a waste of money

I was planning to buy this one but now im not sure any more… https://www.amazon.com/Sandisk-SDCFXPS-064G-A46-ExtremePro-160MB-150MB/dp/B00F3BLN02/ref=mp_s_a_1_6?keywords=sandisk+extreme+pro+64gb+flash&qid=1565876490&s=gateway&sr=8-6

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