So I've been thinking about my making my next purchase (after a DVD-RW and a telephoto lens) some kind of portable storage solution for on the road. Right now, I've got two 512MB CF cards and a backup 128MB, normally in my Elph. I rarely run them all dry when shooting locally, but when I take a weekend trip or something, I have to do some deleting, which I hate hate hate doing in the field.
So, I was considering one of those portable storage units like the Delkin PicturePad or the SmartDisk FlashTrax. However, I haven't found a user review yet that's really stellar for any one of these things.
The Apacer Disc Steno -- a battery-powered CD-RW -- looks fairly good, but seems a waste when my long-term storage solution will be copying them to my hard drive and backing them up to DVD anyway. Plus, it's not so portable, especially when having to keep several CDs on hand.
I'm considering just buying more of the reliable CF cards, but when you can get 20GB of portable storage for the same price as 1GB of CF, it seems silly.
Anyone have any experience with one of these storage units or know of another solution that might be more reliable?
That doesn't look bad. Right now, I'm considering the X'S-Drive if I can ever find one. (Don't ask me how to pronounce it.) I've been reading good things.
Apparently, you can buy it with or without a drive, so you can install your own laptop drive if you want.
One year ago at this time I was ending a two month sujourne all over the UK: Great Britain, Wales and Scotland. I had an Olympus 3030 (3MB) with a fair amount of 128 an 64 MB cards that usually would fill up in 3 to 4 days with deletions each evening or on the fly.
My original plan was to find internet cafes, but I found it takes time to find a place, be it an internet café or photo shop, to upload image files onto their computer & then burn CDs plus the time consumed doing the task & the cost. Most internet cafes exist to surf the web, word processing or playing games & do not have the equipment or will not permit it due to fear of copy write law.
To be safe, I felt the need to burn a second back up CD just in case the original is lost or damaged in shipment.
I had to factor in the additional time taken in packaging and shipping the CD back home along with the cost.
So upon my return I discovered 20GIG and up small hard drives the size of a double thick palm pilot. This is the solution to the problem! A solution to burning CDs along the trip can be eliminated by purchasing a Delkin Memory Bank or a portable CD burner, both of which became available less than a month before I left or upon my return. Seven months after our return I purchased a less expensive 20 GIG straight Hard drive without the viewing and editing bells and whistles of the Delkin. It is an I/OMagic Digital Photo Library 20 GIG portable HD. You can download most any card except xD or whatever it is. It uses a rechargable Lithium battery that last quite a bit of time. The only thing it doesn't have is a preview window and editing ability, but it is a hell of a lot cheaper than the Nexview and efilm versions. I ran a battery of tests and it never screwed up so it seem reliable. I treat it like fine china, so haven't dropped it. I usually beat the heck out of equipment, coming from the old days of the 50's and 60's mechanical cameras when everything was mechanical and your could take a camera apart out in the field and repair it in a few minutes. Not so today! 20GIG is a lot of space! You can drag a bunch of your own files with you as well.
It's more expensive than the others, but I decided it was important to me to review my photos at night when staying in a motel. Still, I look at it this way: It's less than what I would have to pay for 2 more 512Gb cards, and I get 20 times the space.
that's one daggum cool gadget, though I'd not be extremely fired up about the 3.5" screen, better that the 1" or whatever on the camera right? All these photos you take end up on the web at sizes smaller than that so it's all good then? Cool gadget for sure.
Well the only way to get a really good preview in the field is with a laptop, but try carrying that in your photo bag. Anything bigger than this would be inconvenient and would defeat the function of portability. Besides, it's not for proofing; it just helps in verifying you got all the shots you intended and that nothing got really screwed up.
The resolution isn't that great on this screen, but it's better than nothing, which is what most of the others have. And this is the only one that will read raw files. (Though, to be fair, it's just reading the embedded JPGs. But any others with a screen won't even do that.)
I'm thinking on buying a portable storage device but the Flashtrax is expensive for me. I'm thinking on the Gmini 120, that's for sale for $ 213 at amazon. I don't need to review my photos (this feature demands too much of the battery) and I don't really care about the mp3-player capabilities. I had previously found a device named Image Tank G2, that's around $ 199 for 20GB or $235 for 30 GB (mydigitaldiscount.com), no mp3 capabilities. But amazon doesn't carry this brand so I should opt for the Gmini.
Love the FlashTrax. Wish the battery held out longer and was cheaper to get extras, but I got a power inverter for use in my car when it runs out.
I carry two 512MB CompactFlash cards ... fill up one, stick it in the FT, press the copy button ... use the other CF card while it's copying. Much cheaper than buying more cards.
Reviewing a little slow, but I like being able to see that the images are there and good. Plus, when I travel, I feel it's essential to be able to look over the day's shoot back at the motel, that way I can reshoot something if need be. Hate to travel for hours and get back only to find the light was worse than I thought.
posted 11-06-2003 15:45
