The information below was obtained from the www.photoreview.au website to create this single web page.
How Many Images Can Be Stored:
The table below shows the approximate number of pictures popular memory cards can store for digicams of different resolution levels. The figures provided are based on JPEG images from compact digicams, taken at the highest resolution and quality settings.
| Camera Resolution |
256 MB |
512 MB |
1 GB |
2 GB |
4 GB |
8 GB |
| 5 megapixels | 95 | 195 | 395 | 800 | 1595 | 3160 |
| 6 megapixels | 88 | 178 | 343 | 698 | 1400 | 2744 |
| 7.1 megapixels | 80 | 160 | 320 | 640 | 1280 | 2560 |
| 8 megapixels | 69 | 143 | 290 | 582 | 1164 | 2320 |
| 10 megapixels | 53 | 100 | 205 | 410 | 821 | 1640 |
| 12 megapixels | 37 | 75 | 152 | 305 | 606 | 1214 |
The actual number of pictures that can be stored on a card will depend on the camera model and how much the JPEG files are compressed.
Some cameras apply higher compression ratios that others. Card capacities will be significantly higher when lower resolution/quality settings are used.
Photographers who use DSLR cameras will find they need higher storage capacity - especially if they shoot raw files.
For this reason, we recommend at least a 1GB card.
The table above gives the approximate capacities for high-resolution JPEG files at a compression ratio of 1/4 from typical DSLR cameras.
| Camera Resolution |
1 GB |
2 GB |
4 GB |
8 GB |
| 6 megapixels | 330 | 660 | 1320 | 2640 |
| 8 megapixels | 266 | 532 | 1064 | 2128 |
| 10 megapixels | 202 | 409 | 804 | 1700 |
| 12.8 megapixels | 147 | 294 | 588 | 1176 |
Compression ratios vary for raw files, although all manufacturers provide lossless compression.
For example, 10-megapixel raw files can range in size from 17.66MB to 9.8MB, depending on the file format used and the degree of compression applied.
TIFF files, which are usually uncompressed, are roughly three times the resolution of the camera's sensor in size (e.g. around 30MB for a TIFF file from a 10-megapixel camera).
How Much Video Can Be Stored:
When memory cards are used for storing video clips, capacities are measured in time, rather than number of image files.
The compression ratio applied by the camera will dictate the size of the video files.
Most camera manufacturers put a limit of 4GB on video capacity - or up to one hour of video recording.
The table below shows typical video recording times for three different video formats with three card capacities.
| Format |
1 GB |
2 GB |
4 GB |
| MPEG4 | 2 min 33 sec | 4 min 68 sec | 9 min 38 sec |
| Motion JPEG/ stereo WAV (VGA@ 30fps) | 3 min 49 sec | 6 min 59 sec | 13 min 58 sec |
| AVI (VGA@ 30fps) | 7 min 31 sec | 15 min 19 sec | 30 min 36 sec |