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Value for Money
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Quality
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Performance
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Packaging
What is the best Micro SD card for shooting 4K on the Go Pro HD Hero 4?
I have been using a Sandisk Ultra 32GB class 10 card but kept getting “card error” messages when filming in 4K or 2.7K at 48/60fps. This is a pain, especially when you are using the Go Pro on a drone which you generally don’t check until the end of the 10-15 minute flight.
It is fine for most HD video work and I will still use it with my Go Pro HD Hero 3 Black Edition but for the 4K/30FPS footage from the Go Pro HD Hero 4 Black Edition, I needed something super fast that I could rely on, regardless of cost.
After hunting around the web, I found, bought and had delivered today, the:
SanDisk Extreme PRO 64GB microSDXC UHS-I/U3 Memory Card
It has to be this “Pro” card I recommend because after reviewing a whole heap of other microSD cards (and this is something you may not be aware of), most manufacturers hit you with marketing that says:
“Up to 95mb/s transfer speed!”
…which sounds amazing BUT what they don’t tell you is that this is the READ speed and not the WRITE speed. Bad news and I hope this is something they stop soon because too many people are being ripped off.
Many cards, even some “professional ones” with this emblazoned across the packaging actually have read speeds, at best, of around 40-45mb/s with many falling WAY slower than that.
This just won’t cut if for fast frame rates or full 4K/30FPS shooting.
The SanDisk Extreme PRO 64GB microSDXC UHS-I/U3 Memory Card
- Pro video performance with both Class 10 and UHS Speed Class 3 (U3) ratings for capturing Full HD and 4K Ultra HD video
- Industry-leading UHS-I data read speeds up to 95MB/s and write speeds up to 90MB/s
- Capacities from 8GB up to 64GB to shoot for high resolution videos and stills
- Durability tested: waterproof, shockproof, x-ray proof, temperature proof
Many other reviewers have tested the speed of this card and confirmed WRITE speeds of between 65mb/s and 90mb/s depending on the camera and footage being shot. Perfect!
My Quick Test
To ensure the card was capable, tonight I set the Go Pro HD Hero 4 to:
- 4K Video
- 30FPS
- ProTune on
…and powered it from an external battery pack and started recording. After one and a half hours, it was still going strong so I figured the card was absolutely fine and stopped recording.
I had 1h:30m 4K footage and had only used 2/3rds (66%) of the card so I recon on about 2h:15m record time at 4K before the card is full. Whatever, the card clearly works perfectly at the highest settings so confidence resumed, I will be out flying as soon as the weather improves.
Note: 4K (or 2.7K) is best for filming on the drone because I can correct the distortion and crop in and still have some amazing video output to 1080p.
Highly Recommended (especially for drone/quadcopter/UAV work).
SanDisk Extreme PRO 64GB microSDXC UHS-I/U3 Memory Card
