Differences between compact flash cards?

[__Maad__]

I will be buying a canon 350d (the rebel xt) from someone this weekend and suddenly find myself in the market for a storage type I know nothing about, that being compact flash.

That said, can someone explain the differences between CF cards to me? I am looking at probably getting a 1 gig card for now (to keep things within budget). Some of the vendors I've been looking at locally (toronto, canada) offer 1 gig CF cards that are sometimes twice as expensive as others .. What are the likely differences between these products? Is it safe to just grab the cheapest one or will I get bitten?

 

[cburwell]

The more expensive ones have a higher transferr rate. This means they can get the image/information from the cameras buffer to the card faster. This will enable you to take another picture in less amount of time and it also reduces the risk of the camera buffer from filling up. This not only works well for when you are shooting at a rapid rate, but also when you are shooting in RAW mode (since RAW files are LARGE).

The more expensive card are without a doubt worth the money with a DSLR. The performance difference between the slower card and the faster ones is very noticable at this level.