Good card reader?

[Loa]

Hello,

I'm getting tired of uploading my images at USB 1 speeds (Nikon D70), and I'm looking to get a decent USB2 / Firewire card reader.

I need one that's at least capable of reading CF cards, but I really don't need anything else.


Any suggestions that won't completely empty my wallet?

Thanks

Loa

[brian.austin]

I've tried about 8-10 of them and don't really see much difference, as long as they meet USB2 requirements. I usually end up leaving them somewhere (intentionally or otherwise), putting them in the wrong bag, or losing them. I just started buying the cheap ones after two or three times of that and haven't noticed much of a difference in speeds.

My last one cost $20, including USB cable, and reads a number of different cards.

[Loa]

Hehe, thanks for the info Brian.

Guess I'll take a look at a few stores in the nearby mall.

Loa

[cyclohexane]

I use the SanDisk Extreme USB 2.0 reader. I see enough of a speed difference as compared to other readers (i.e. the older SanDisk 12-in-1, and various cheaper brands) that I tend to bring my own card reader into the office when I have a lot of images.

Of course, if your cards can't take advantage of the speed, then a slower card reader is fine. I, however, see a significant speed difference even with SanDisk Ultra II CF cards.

[Loa]

Thanks Michael. I'll see if the SD Extreme is available in my local store.

Loa

[JimH]

Originally Posted by cyclohexane

I use the SanDisk Extreme USB 2.0 reader.

Second that

[Harry]

We are all spoiled!!!! We stand in front of the microwave, heating up our coffee, groaning "come onnnnnn." Most of the noticeable speed from the card readers is going to depend on your system. Just go out and get one that handles the cards you use. You'll be happy.

[oldugly]

I use a $20 one from Staples. Tried it against a much more expensive one (I love going school with the kids of rich parents) and at the end of transfering 20 RAW files there was less than a one second difference. The young man and I each learned a lesson. I suppose if you were going to transfer a hundred files, the 5 second difference might be important.

[Mr Mikey]

If you have an empty 3.5 slot in your computer and your motherboard accepts internal usb2, get an internal one. other than that Sandisk extreme is the only way to go.

[digitalzed]

I love my San Disk FW CF card reader. It's small, fast, and comes with its own case.

Here's a link to the San Disk site:
SanDisk | Products | Accessories | SanDisk Extreme Readers | SanDisk Extreme® Readers

[cyclohexane]

I suppose if you were going to transfer a hundred files, the 5 second difference might be important.

Or in my case, a thousand... =)

[Loa]

Update: I decided to try the cheapest (20$) USB 2.0 reader I could find.

Results: Exactly 13 times faster than by plugging the D70 camera directly in the computer.

Could I have gotten even faster results with a 60$ reader? Sure. Would it have warranted another 40$? Certainly not for me...


Loa

[stoph]

Glad you are happy with your purchase. I couldn't believe how much faster a card reader was compared to just plugging the camera in to the pc...wow!!

[Paul Shields]

I'll go with the flow and highly recommend the SanDisk firewire reader. Much faster than any USB reader I've used previously.

[potato1]

I use a Sandisk multi card reader. That or the CF only version I think would work fine for you.

[keepright]

Loa, I'm glad you're happy with your card reader. Any card reader is better than plugging in the camera, even if the speed was the same: no chance of sending the camera to the floor when you snag the wire that's draped across everything else, and no chance of data loss if you lose battery power, open the card door, or any other camera-induced malfunction.

I use the Sandisk Extreme IV Firewire CF reader that's already been mentioned a couple of times. Its permanently taped to the bottom of my desk so that the cables are tucked away and it's nicely accessible. Besides speed, the advantage that FW gives me over USB is better management. All of my external drives are firewire, so the card reader is daisy-chained through the external RAID that holds my working images through a FW800 connection. That frees up my USB ports for their intended uses, like keyboard, trackball, and printers.

I do also have a USB2.0 multireader for when I need to download from my xD cards, and to be able to read any other cards that guests bring over. I just tried both readers in a speed test with two different cards:

Sandisk FW reader, Kingston 133x card, 744MB, 1 minute and 2 seconds. (12MB/second)
Comgears USB2.0 reader, Kingston 133x card, 744MB, 4 minutes and 42 seconds. (2.64MB/second)

Sandisk FW reader, Sandisk Extreme 3 card, 1.13GB, 1 minute and 51 seconds. (10.18MB/second)
Comgears USB2.0 reader, Sandisk Extreme 3 card, 1.13GB, 7 minutes and 18 seconds. (2.58MB/second)

The firewire reader was daisy-chained to the computer through my RAID drive and uses the FW800 port, the USB card was connected directly to the computer through a USB 2.0 port. The computer is a 2007 Aluminum iMac 2.4GHz Core Duo with 2GB of RAM, and files were copied to the internal (sata) drive. I was surprised at the spanking the FW reader gave the USB 2.0 reader, so I've even go so far as to confirm (system profiler application) that the USB is working at 480MB/s and the FW is at 800MB/s. While I never just drag-and-drop photos to my internal drive -- Lightroom converts them to DNG and backs up the originals to a second FW400 drive straight from the card -- I can't see how this speed difference wouldn't be important in real-world use.

[Jon]

What Matthew Said. My firewire card reader (an older Lexar unit) spanks the bejeezus out of any usb2 reader you want to put it up against.

Firewire will beat USB in continuous throughput - every time. If you have a bunch of cards, or a bunch of big cards to dump all at once, you can't beat the aggregate time saved with firewire.

[JDArt]

I have tried many, many card readers. All of the external ones have given me issues.

I settled on these:

Customer Reviews Of SUPER TALENT INT-AIN1-C All-in-one USB 2.0 Card Reader - Retail

They are internal and read every time without a hitch. Finally I can forget about whether my card reader is going to work on a given day.

[Loa]

Thanks for the added suggestions (for other members).

I would have loved to get a FW reader as well. But for 20$, my little Vantec reader will do just fine.

The time differences are indeed remarkable (though not surprising for any Mac users: FW owns!) Matthew. But I only bought this reader so that I can keep shooting on a second card while uploading the first. I really didn't mind the time it took on the USB 1.0 link... Just some time to go to the bathroom, fix a snack, read up on some news, catch up on my emails...

For 20$, this little 11-in-1 reader was perfect for me.


Loa

[Imagesgranted]

i use the sandisk extreme card reader usb 2.0 fast transfer holds both compact flash and sd memory cards so perfect for my canons. Best part is its only £10 at mymemory.com