I've asked this before, but I haven't seen an answer:
Has anyone had problems with a card on the *approved* list?
If so, I understand the skepticism and anger.
If not, I simply don't get it. Tascam says their machine only works with *some* and not *all* cards.
If this is a problem for you, don't buy a DR-70d.
Unfortunately for those of us that have been involved with this saga, it's not as simple as your summary, but your summary is the bottom line of where we're at today.
You said you don't get it. I'll explain and hopefully it will help you to understand the anxiety being expressed in this thread.
Tascam released the DR70D around the early part of February of this year. When it was released, it apparently worked fine with all of the cards people threw at it. (For me, it worked fine with the card I always used in it then at some point it started having issues.) Nobody reported issues at first and there was no 'approved cards list'. It quickly became very popular here on ts.com.
In late June, Tascam released v1.11 of their firmware and, whether by coincidence or not, people started reporting glitch problems around the same time. Pretty soon, the floodgates opened and over the next month or so there were lots of users reporting the same issues. As I recall, there was still no 'approved cards list'.
Tascam told users that the issue was the cards they were using by saying that four track recorders tax the data throughput of cards. This didn't seem logical to most users that already owned their 70D since a) many had already successfully used cards in the unit, but then they didn't work, and b) many had stated that they'd used the same cards in other multi-track recorders without issue, c) there were a few other reasons why this explanation didn't seem to add up. A simple question was asked...please explain to us WHY to a) and b)? No answer was provided...but users were reminded by Tascam that we shouldn't expect pro results from using non-pro cards. Lots of people expressed their concern with Tascam's unresponsiveness to the basic question WHY?
On August 1, Tascam published the current 'approved cards list' which is showing on their page. I can't remember if a previous list was posted prior to August 1. After the 'approved cards list' was published, Tascam's response to the glitch issue is simply to refer users to the approved card list and that's been what's come to be known as the 'stock response' since.
Tascam's marketing information from Day One has stated that the unit accepts SDXC cards up to 128gb. Not only is the 'approved cards list' very small, but surprisingly there aren't any SDXC cards on the list. So, a new question for Tascam...how can you be marketing a unit as accepting SDXC cards, when there's not even a single card on the list? True to form, Tascam comes out after the fact and only last week were we informed of two or three SDXC cards that they'd tested and put on the list.
Can you start to see a potential pattern here of Tascam covering up after users uncover issues? Or maybe Tascam is simply late rolling out all of the media support materials.
I can't speak for others...I'm glad Tascam updates the list, but these things need to be done proactively. Doing these things IN RESPONSE to customer comments is at best, shoddy product roll out, and at worst covering up for potential design flaws/limitations that users are discovering in the DR70D. Which is it? I don't really know but I know what it feels like to me.
Hope this helps explain to you why the issue isn't as simple as 'buy an approved card or don't buy the DR70D' for those of us that have had a 70D since the start.