# Two digital camera questions **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 21, 2005, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-digital-camera-questions/336553 "2005-12-21T01:20:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![KlondikeGeoff](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3e96dc/32.png) [@KlondikeGeoff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KlondikeGeoff)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-digital-camera-questions/336553/1 "2005-12-21T01:20:30Z")
My old digital camera died, so just got a new one, along with a 512MB SD card. 1. Both the included card and the new one work just fine in the camera. Is it necessary or advisable to format them anyway? 2. I think I read somewhere that they should be formatted only in the camera. True? Could I put them in my card reader and format them from Windows? ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-digital-camera-questions/336553/2 "2005-12-21T01:30:27Z")
There is no need to format them in Windows. Older cards like those in the SmartMedia format and maybe others would sometimes get ruined if they were formatted in a computer reader. I don’t think that happens that often with most formats these days. However, if they work, that’s all there is. There are no more hidden features or benefits by doing it differently. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-digital-camera-questions/336553/3 "2005-12-21T01:46:28Z")
Never format your camera via Windows, only do so in the camera. There are formats that your camera won’t recognize and it can be a royal pain in the ass to get the cards back into the right format. I reformat my cards (in the camera) once every few months. No particular reason to, but I haven’t seen any evidence that it hurts anything. ---
**Author:** ![postcards](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8e8cbc/32.png) [@postcards](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/postcards)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-digital-camera-questions/336553/4 "2005-12-21T04:43:28Z")
'Tis best to format the media through the hardware that writes to and reads from it. I also format my cards before **every** use. ---
**Author:** ![Nanoda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Nanoda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nanoda)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-digital-camera-questions/336553/5 "2005-12-21T05:57:30Z")
While the number of read/write cycles you can do on secure digital media is somewhere between 10,000 and 1,000,000 (really big), I avoid excessive formatting for voodoo reasons. Every now again is fine though. BTW, **Telemark** is wrong about formatting in Windows; sometimes it’s a royal pain in the ass, and you _still_ [don’t have a working card after](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=303612). 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Mindfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mindfield/32/19759_2.png) [@Mindfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mindfield)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-digital-camera-questions/336553/6 "2005-12-21T14:52:57Z")
FWIW, every device that I have used that takes SecureDigital (SD) and/or MultiMedia Cards (MMC) (and, by extension, MiniSD and MiniMMC) cards have used a standard Windows-compatible FAT16 format in every device I’ve used them in, and I have never experienced any problems formatting them either in their devices or under Windows. There may have been devices that used their own peculiar format, but I would imagine these are pretty rare, as the vast majority of devices that use SD/MMC cards use the same FAT16 format in order to be more or less universally compatible with all devices and with all media card readers. There’s always the chance that a poorly designed reader could muck up your card, though. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-digital-camera-questions/336553/7 "2005-12-21T15:08:37Z")
> [@postcards](#): > > 'Tis best to format the media through the hardware that writes to and reads from it. > > I also format my cards before **every** use. Why, almost no advantage that I know of?