Does anyone know of a device that will allow for the transfer of data from a memory stick without a computer? I don't have a laptop and the limited memory of the sticks doesn't leave many choices short of stopping everything to go to walmart to get the pics burned to cd.Any help Is greatly appreciated.Shari
Hi Sari. I use a X-Drive. I know a few folks around here that have one. It is completely portable. The size of a Palm Pilot, and maybe 2 inches thick. It has an internal rechargeable battery so you can take out in the field. It takes 5 or six format, including Compact flash and Memory Stick. It has a 15 GB capacity ... that's alot of pics (it carries a laptop hard drive). Cost me approx $200 USD on E-Bay. No complaints yet.
I keep all photos that have not been burned to CD yet on both my X-drive and my hard drive. Truth be told, I haven't found a reason to delete anything from the X-Drive yet, so I still have backup the shots that are burned as well.
On a side note, I believe in very secure backups, which is why I keep two copies of the CD's... One at work and one at home.
I did perhaps the obvious thing and bought more memory sticks. At approximately $40-50 each on Ebay for the 128-meggers, you can get three of them for the cost of the X-Drive everyone else is pumping (which, admittedly, holds an AWFUL lot more pictures). I've never overrun my four 128-meg sticks, even when spending an entire weekend away from my computer and taking lots of shots at the max size my camera can do (3.2MP).
Very valid point about the memsticks instead of the Xdrive, but in my case, I also have a second camera that uses SmartCard Media. The best aspect of the X-Drive is that it supports 6 different storage card formats. So I'm not locked into a specific format for my next camera.
I keep eyeing those 1 gig dealywhoops, but they currently cost more then I paid for my camera.
