SD card quality

Hi there.

Would microSD card quality make a difference in the amount of recordings that gets picked up by the unit? Right now I’m using these Kingston SD class 10 cards to pick up frog calls at 32khz.

https://www.amazon.ca/Kingston-32GB-micSDHC-Canvas-SDCS2/dp/B07YGZ7FY7/ref=asc_df_B07YGZ7FY7/?tag=googlemobshop-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=390197453003&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=8789412664254004869&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1002249&hvtargid=pla-835303784365&psc=1

Im in the trial run phase right now and am deploying my audiomoths beside a Wildlife Acoustics SM4 to compare the differences in recordings. I’ve noticed that the audiomoths pick up significantly less calls and was wondering if it had anything to do with the SD cards Im using.

Would there be any other settings I could play with to increase the number of calls being picked up?

Thanks!

1 comment

1 Comment

Alex Rogers

Jun 10, 2022

Yes. SD cards differ in how much electrical and mechanical noise they generate. This will generally show up a regular interference on the sonogram rather than background noise. We use Sandisk Extreme 32GB or 64GB cards which are quiet and energy efficient. The lower the sample rate the better the signal to noise ratio as the AudioMoth will do more software oversampling. If you can use 16kHz or 8kHz the recording quality will improve proportionally.