ru32day,
First of all, welcome, and yes, thank you for taking the time to read the posts and trying to understand the correct protocols here. That is appreciated.
Regarding the protocols: Birddog is an accreddited dealer from Maxwell's (amongst others) meaning that he can arrange for the purchase of genuine Nikon products ex-Maxwell. Because of his extensive knowledge and contacts, he is also able to arrange for the purchase and delivery of many other products too, and always at attractive prices. The primary - the only - motivation here is to secure the best deal for members of this fforum, and these deals are only for members of this forum.
While you are always free to buy whatever you want from whomever you wish to deal with, the service and prices available through Birddog are simply execeptional, and are well worth investigation.
Having said that, please also respect Birddog's time - he needs to spend time in his business and with his family too. Do your research on the net, visiting stores, and asking here. Keep an eye on the Bargains forum for special deals that turn up from time to time.
And then use the d70gear email address when you're about ready to buy.
Regarding the Astone cards ... while the numbers on the cards are a marketing issue more than anything else, they can be somewhat representative of performance you might expect, but only up to a point.
There's one factor that nobody in this thread has mentioned to date, and that's the camera. It doesn't matter if your card says it's 1000x, if your camera only supports 40x, that's the performance you'll see.
And the situation is that the D70's performance seems to be perfectly matched to the Astone card. In JPG
mode you can just shoot and shoot and shoot and shoot and shoot until your card is full. It's slightly slower in raw
mode, but so too are other cards, and this is per the D70's specs.
If you want to spend your money on a better name, then by al means, get the better name, and enjoy it.
But we're using the Astones here with no issues whatsoever, and can highly recommend them.