**DIY CFexpress Type B Cards – Better Than the Real Deal?**
Since switching to my Nikon Z, I stumbled across the idea of "modding" memory cards. Fancy talk for grabbing a standard 2230 SSD core and an NVMe 2230 to CFexpress Type B adapter (what we reckon as the "shell"), slapping 'em together, and boom – you've got a ripper CF-B card on the cheap.
Cheap as chips, mate. These 2230 SSDs are miles cheaper than off-the-shelf cards. Back before chip prices went haywire, a 1TB Gen4 SSD was around 3-3.5 mil VND. A proper card with similar specs? Over 10 mil. That's four times the price! Now, both have jumped 1.5-2x since last year – bloody nightmare!
Modded cards get a bad rap for not being as good as the branded ones. I thought that too. I built a 1TB modded card for about 4 mil (core plus shell), but shelled out over 10 mil for a branded 1TB as well. Naturally, I favoured the official one at first, even though the modded version smoked it on overheating resistance and 8K60 12-bit RAW recording (turns out, mods use Gen4 cores, while branded are often Gen3).[1]
For big shoots, I stuck with the branded card. Until one day, data vanished (shot a studio session, plugged into the PC – nothing. Recovery software failed). Being under warranty, I headed to the distributor for help. They tried recovery too – no dice. Official policy is just a replacement, no data recovery. I kicked up a stink, and they caved: swapped it and promised to ship the old one to their Taiwan HQ for recovery (note: this ain't standard for any official cards!). Vietnam regs make exporting storage devices a pain, so they jumped through hoops (cheers to the legends who sorted it ^^).
Three months later, word came: Taiwan recovered everything, uploaded to the cloud, and I downloaded it all (magic!). It took ages, but I got my shots back. That shook me – branded cards aren't bulletproof. So I dove deep into modding.
The heart of a modded card is the 2230 SSD core. Pick a quality one, and you're golden? SSDs have a board, controller, and flash chips. Flash rarely fails – usually the controller or board packs it in. SSTC (where I get my cores) confirmed: swap the flash to a new board/controller, and data's back.
Bonus: Big-name SSDs in Vietnam (SSTC, Samsung, WD) offer data recovery warranties, done locally with proper gear. No overseas drama, way faster than my three-month wait!
Go for branded, warranted SSD cores – still dirt cheap compared to official cards. For shells, I use Jeyi's copper ones (500-800k each off Shopee). Slap on some thermal paste (100k tube lasts forever), and you're set. After all this, I built a 2TB mod last year for 5 mil and ditched branded cards forever.
Performance? All my Gen4 mods nail 8K60 12-bit RAW on the Z8, no overheating. Two years in, zero failures or data loss.
Word is SSTC's ditching loose cores for full CF-B cards soon ("factory modded" with warranty and recovery). Fingers crossed for a 4TB at 10 mil – I'll snap one up! Who buys cards in GBs these days? Stone age stuff 😛
P.S. Not modding for ya – DIY it to toughen up, legends 🙂
#TranDuyWay #CFB #memorycard #CFexpressTypeB
Cre: Tran Duy
P.S. Admin's soaked up this gem.
