Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler some advice for file transfer/mp3 player

I wondered if anyone would have any insight on the best way to store large amounts of pic data from a dig. camera. I am travelling in a couple of weeks (for a couple of weeks) and will probably be taking a ton of pics, Cambodia to see Angkor Wat & the Killing Fields, Vietnamese beaches, etc

I won't have a laptop or anything to upload pics from my dig. camera to, and don't want to have to spend a pile on memory cards. My other need is a decent MP3 player to keep me in good tunes while I'm there. Is it possible to kill two birds with one stone and use an IPod to store both pics and MP3s???

Any help from you Mac lovers out there?

Yes, it is, but you'll need to take your laptop with you because, as far as I can tell, the only way to get the pics from your camera to your ipod is to store them on your computer first, and if you're doing that, you might as well just take a laptop. Secure Digital and other memory chips are getting pretty cheap...I got a 256 Mb secure digital card a few months ago for about $60...that would hold 500 to 1,000 pictures at fairly high resolution, wouldn't it?

Mark

Thanks Mark
that's kind of what I was afraid of. I didn't know if there was any o.s. on the IPod that would allow it to link direct to the camera and download pics from it. Since I don't own a laptop, I guess I'll be going the seperate route. Thanks for the help.

not necessarily w/ the ipod. I don't have one, but I do covet it. Take a look at the Apple website under ipod accessories. They have a Belkin media card reader that looks like your solution...

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore?productLearnMore=T7418LL/A

right on, thanks oldskoolboarder
that looks like the ticket!

What you're looking for is the now-discontinued Digital Wallet by MindStor. Check it out http://www.steves-digicams.com/digital_wallet.html

They're still available new for around $300-$400 US Dollars, probably much cheaper on eBay.

Given that the MindStor is discontinued, that iPod adapter looks pretty sweet, especially since the Mindstor is not an MP3 player.

MP3 is kind of what I'm looking for. It'll save me having to lug around a bunch of cds while on holidays. I'd always thought about buying one anyways. Thanks though Peter.

As I mentioned somewhere here earlier, an important feature of the iPod is the fact that it is a "portable FireWire hard drive for critical data transfer" on my budget proposal. HAHAHA...

I just snuck mine into ERM and casually asked my boss to approve it.

hmmm, you've got me thinking now Peter...

I was sure I'd posted this earlier, but can't seem to find it. I'm losing my mind
any other companies out there that I could accomplish this file transfer with (without a laptop/pc)? I checked out Creative/Nomad this morning and it doesn't look like they have anything. I'd hoped they would because it would likely be cheaper than IPod (15GB @ $440 msrp + card reader @ $100+ msrp = pretty damned expensive). I've heard good things about the Nomad's, but no luck I guess. Anybody have anything else???????

All I can say about the HD-based Creative Nomads is that their ergonomics/interface just sucks a big time as compared to the iPod.

also, if you look at target.com, you can get a 10GB ipod for $299. For ipod users, 10GB may not seem like a lot of memory. But for me and my 128 MB Muvo (love it btw), it sure is a lot...

This might be it...

http://www.apple.com/ipod/beyondmusic.html

Check out the top right paragraph...

"Picture Perfect
You can save a bundle on memory cards when you take your digital camera with you on vacation. Simply transfer the images from your camera to your iPod via the handy Belkin Media Reader. The 40GB iPod holds about 20,000 images, or about 160 256MB memory cards’ worth."

Thanks for the tips guys,
Sushi, I'm surprised that the interface of the Nomad's is poor, I thought I'd read a couple of different reviews ranking them near the top of the MP3 player pile!?!

oldskoolboarder, I'm assuming the IPod on Target.com is in US$$$$, which unfortunately makes it about a billion dollars Cdn. Actually ends up being nearly as cheap to buy the 15GB @ $450.

Tobz, thanks for the link, I think that's the same one that oldskoolboarder directed me towards before. It's the idea I was hoping for, just maybe a little more money than I was hoping to spend. Thanks though.


Once again, thanks for all the help, and keep the ideas coming if there are any more.

Also, that 10 GB might not work with the Belkin doohicky. I haven't looked, so I'm not sure, but...

Yup. It requires iPod software 2.1 or later, which only runs on the dock-connector iPods (3rd generation or later).

Good to know. I really need to bone up on the iPod/iTunes thing. Anyone had any success using an iPod with BOTH a PC and Mac?

Yup. The new ones go back and forth very easily. I have one (temporarily) now. My mother-in-law gave me money to buy and set one up for my father-in-law. Got the 20gb model, since the 10gb model is a rip-off. The accessories that don't come with the 10gb model (dock, remote, clip case) add up to around $70 purchased separately. The 20gb model only costs $100 more. You get $70 worth of accessories plus 100% more space for only $100 more.

If anyone was interested, here's the all-in-one option I had been looking for. I haven't seen a review on it yet, but it does appear to do a good job of 'being everything to everyone'. Reasonably priced too. The only problem I see with it is the reduced battery life, though I guess that's to be expected.

RCA 2780

Just a heads up on that RCA Lyra - the price at FutureShops.com is WAYYYYY out of whack. The Lyra costs half that much at etronics -- and you got to believe patience will soon deliver some 80GB models at reasonable prices.

Birdman

...and then 120 GB models, then 150 GB, and on and on. Then you just end up like Spiffnme without a big screen TV.... (just kidding of course Craig ).

I'm not too surprised their prices are out of whack on the website, they usually are. Their in-store prices usually run a bit cheaper. It only really matters if you plan on paying full price, which I would have no intention of doing.

For me 80GB will be a watershed size on these things. At 80GB one could place about 120 to 150 CDs worth of music on the machine -- actual CD Audio files, not "CD-quality" WMAs or MP3s that have 10% of the original information. When someone makes a good 80GB portable player for under $300, it will be hard to resist. And since that day seems so soon, it seems pointless to invest in them yet ... although 40GB, which some of them do now, is getting very close.

Isn't kind of incredible that within a year we'll probably be able to buy a portable AV player that holds 4x as much as TiVo's from a year or so ago?

It will be interesting to see the variety of features marketed to audio-lovers on these things -- the as yet unknown equivalents of Burr Brown DACs and other sliced and diced features that marketers aim at the higher end. People say the MP3 generation does not care about audio quality, but they will grow up.