The new Nikon mirrorless system

[Birna Rørslett]

One has to use the remedies nearest at hand. I got bags of genuine Nikon stock screws from my friendly Nikon tech, and nail polish is always at the standby these days

My approach works reliably. That is what matters to me.

[golunvolo]

Wonders of the Z system.
 Z6, 50mm 1.8 @1.8, 8000 iso, 1/25th handheld with ibis on. Piece of cake.

[golunvolo]

Because of the big impact the card type and speed has on the Z9 buffer, I tried with the z6 out of curiosity. I only had two cards at hand today, same 64gb capacity, both sony xqd G, read 440mb/s write 400mb/s. Exact same card.
  On h*, raw 14 bit the results were
Z61, card1: 55 shots
Z62, card2: 35 shots

  Kind of weird...I switched cards and the results were

 Z61, card2: 34 shots
Z62, card1: 55 shots

  I was worried about a lesser camera but the difference is the card performance. They both come from kits, already in the camera box so I mostly reject the possibility of a fake card.

  I have heard of sample variation on lenses but not on memory cards, and not by this huge margin.

[Ilkka Nissilä]

Because of the big impact the card type and speed has on the Z9 buffer, I tried with the z6 out of curiosity. I only had two cards at hand today, same 64gb capacity, both sony xqd G, read 440mb/s write 400mb/s. Exact same card.
  On h*, raw 14 bit the results were
Z61, card1: 55 shots
Z62, card2: 35 shots

  Kind of weird...I switched cards and the results were

 Z61, card2: 34 shots
Z62, card1: 55 shots

  I was worried about a lesser camera but the difference is the card performance. They both come from kits, already in the camera box so I mostly reject the possibility of a fake card.

  I have heard of sample variation on lenses but not on memory cards, and not by this huge margin.

Have you tried contacting Sony about it? It seems like a faulty card.

[golunvolo]

They are old cards. Never fail me and I have never fill the buffer but today for the test, so most likely no but if ultimate performance is your trait, be aware.

[Jack Dahlgren]

Have you tried contacting Sony about it? It seems like a faulty card.

If the lower number meets the specification, then the card is not faulty. One would think that semiconductors would all be the same, however, they are actually a bit like cookies. Fabrication processes while tightly controlled are still not perfect and some chips from the same wafer and batch come out with different characteristics. Some are faster, some slower, some are more power hungry, some have defects. The resulting chips are "binned" - meaning separated by characteristics, not thrown into a trash bin - and are used in different products at different price points. Ones which have defects can often be partially used as a lower capacity chip by fusing off the non-functional areas.

Now, sometimes, there are more good chips than planned, and there is less demand for the premium chips than there is for lower performance chips so manufacturers will sell the top bin product in a lower bin product. While I have no idea about this particular situation, it would not be unusual for something like that to have happened here.

[Jan Anne]

Because of the big impact the card type and speed has on the Z9 buffer, I tried with the z6 out of curiosity. I only had two cards at hand today, same 64gb capacity, both sony xqd G, read 440mb/s write 400mb/s. Exact same card.
  On h*, raw 14 bit the results were
Z61, card1: 55 shots
Z62, card2: 35 shots

  Kind of weird...I switched cards and the results were

 Z61, card2: 34 shots
Z62, card1: 55 shots

  I was worried about a lesser camera but the difference is the card performance. They both come from kits, already in the camera box so I mostly reject the possibility of a fake card.

  I have heard of sample variation on lenses but not on memory cards, and not by this huge margin.

I’ve recently bought a second Sony G 64GB XQD card which was faster than the “same” card from 2018, bought at the same trusted shop locally. With D500 I went from the low 40 to mid fifty with RAW 14bit +JPG and with the Z6 from 25 to around 35.

The cards have different labels and model numbers, the one on the left is the older QD-G64E and the newer one is QD-G64F which was produced last August.

[ColinM]

  I have heard of sample variation on lenses but not on memory cards, and not by this huge margin.

Sorry if technology has moved on, but I've heard several,people (inc Birna I think) warn that the life and usable areas of memory cards is finite.

I found this to my cost with an SD card in a phone where the entire card became corrupted when I tried to write a huge file to it. I realise this was discussed when SSDs became more popular though, and isn't believed to be an issue with them, so my suggestion may be out of date.

[golunvolo]

Those are some variables: card production finesse, date of production differences, finite life, etc... thank you all for the information.

   Just one more point of data, both of the cards I tried have the same labels in the front.

[Jan Anne]

On the rear you should find the model number of the card, are they the same?

Here’s a snapshot with the iPhone 13 Pro using the new macro lens of the latest QD-G64F iteration.

[golunvolo]

Yes, they are both QD-G64E