How to get faster download speeds with a CF Card

In the past we have conducted speed tests on a variety of card readers with a 3.0 USB interface for our new MacBook Pro Retina Laptops. Our attempt to see which reader had the fastest download time revealed to us that they all performed the same. In fact, there was no difference in download times.

Since the Blackmagic Cinema Camera only accepts Solid State Drives, we have been using this type of memory storage a lot. Because of this, we haphazardly discovered that our SSD Reader with a Compact Flash to SATA Adapter, downloaded data up to a minute faster for ever 6 GB’s of information transferred. We found that this only worked with our Transcend Compact Flash Card. These are commonly used CF cards and this means for guys dumping multiple 32GB cards onto their computer, this download time can add up.

I don’t know why the download rate is faster with the adapted SSD reader, as the USB 3.0 connection should perform the same for SSD or CF cards. Anyone know the answer to this? If you have a Tuesday Tip suggestion, let me know we will try to get yours published!