Flash memory card reader/writers

General Information

Flash memory cards reader / writers A flash memory card reader is a simple mouse sized unit which allows flash memory cards to be read and written directly on a PC ie they will be seen as additional drive letters and can be ttreated as a drive on the PC and read, written, copied to etc rather than connecting the camera to the PC . Normally they are multi card ie will deal with compact flash, Secure Digital. MMC, Memory stick,smartmedia and XD cards, these are normally 4 slot with multiply cards in some slots. Some manufactuers call these 34 in 1, 17 in 1 or similar ie they are counting every possible type of card it can read. The main slots you will get / need are Compact Flash type 2, SD card, Memory Stick and Smartmedia/XD card, these can / should cover everything but depends on the reader. Some mobile small units are available which will only have a sinlgle slot, normally for SD cards being that they are the most popular, many laptops come with a built in reader or you can use a PCMCIA adapter which is internal.

JTF - Just The Facts Whilst all these readers are USB2 speeds vary greatly, the bottle neck being the reader which lags behind the rate at which the card can take the data. I have never had a single reader that read all cards, seemingly there is always oen they just don't like and won't read, that’s seems to be the norm. Sometimes you can get problems with the reader not being seen on the system and a reboot may be required. The best reader I have ever used is the Dane-Elec 4 in 1 (Quad) long since discontinued, works totally reliably but limited in that can't read above 1GB SD hates Kingmax cards but has fixed / formatted very corrupt card I have throw at it.

Recommended - The Informed Choice The choice really depends on useage, if you will only use it occasionally than the cheapest will do the job, if you are a professional then its worth spending a bit more.
There are some Sandisk Exterme readers which are supposed to be fast but haven't tested one so got to be the Transcend Multi Card Reader.

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