UKC

A lexar professional 400X 16 GB UDMA CF card (approx 125 Euros...something about fast data transfer and shooting video), and a Kenko Pro1 Digital Protector (again about 100 Euro), for new camera & lens(EOS 5D Mark II with the 24-105 kit lens).
Salesman was being a bit pushy methinks but i'd appreciate the collective UKC photographers wisdom. Presumably he was flogging me the premium stuff but if i do at least need them, are there cheaper acceptable alternatives.

Ta.

In reply to Professor Bunsen:

You can get the same card from Amazon for under £50 or the Sandisk Extreme (same speed) for under £40, if you don't mind their tax avoidance policies.

A lot of people would recommend not using a filter for protection, unless you are using your camera in an environment where the lens is likely to get scratched.

In reply to Professor Bunsen:

If you're going to get a filter I'd just go for the Hoya 'HD' ones. They're not too bad price wise if you look online, and they pretty much the best of the market for actual photography (as opposed to spectrum analysis).

€125 for a 400x seems crazy. I didn't paid that for a Lexar 16GB 1000x!
I'd go online and get a 1000x card, very useful for cameras like the 5D3 that produce a lot of data.

In reply to Professor Bunsen: If a salesman tried doing that to me I'd walk and buy the camera from somewhere else too. Hate pushy salesmen. Do you have any other camera shops in the area?

In reply to deacondeacon:

Well it was the best price I could get on the camera. I resisted the final hard sell as I figured he was trying to squeeze some extra cash out of me but I thought I'd run it by the UKC photo crew for input.
Is there a minimum speed CF I need to match the camera in order to get the best from it?
Ta for the other replies.

In reply to Professor Bunsen: Depends to an extent what you'll be using the camera for I'd have thought. If something like sports action photography with lots of rapid-fire large RAW files or hundreds and hundreds of files which you need to transfer quickly then a beasty card could be advantageous, but something more modest should still do the job in a lot of situations. I'd suspect that part of the salesman's thinking was that people with the readies or the need to buy a 5dii are a good target for pushing top-end cards as well.