Portable Photoviewer Storage Advice

[RCDisneyFan]

Hi all - I usually post on some of the other disboards and lurk here I'm going to Europe in a couple of weeks and I want to get a portable photo storage device. The requirements are that it has to be Mac compatible and I need to be able to offload pictures from the memory cards without a PC. I've found three things in my price range:

1. Epson P-3000 Used
2. Archos 605 New or Used
3. Hyperspace ColorSpace 0

That's pretty much the order I'm thinking of them in - but wondering if anyone has experience using any of them? If so, I'd love to hear your opinions!!

Thank You!
-Rebecca

 

[pjacobi]

In 2007, I borrowed a friend's 40Gb hard drive Vosonic portable storage viewer for a 2 week trip to Alaska. It supports the display of Canon 30D Raw format, not all devices support Raw format.

I took 3x 2Gb cards and actually brought back 12Gb of Raw images, so I'm glad I brought it! The Vosonic saved the days and was reliable. This was my first trip with the 30D, so I under-estimated exposure count compared to film.

If I had to take the same trip today with the 30D, I would just buy some 4Gb or 8Gb cards rather than my own portable storage device.

If I had a 50D or 5DII, I might have to look again for a portable storage device.

How many photos do you plan to take? Can you afford enough flash cards?


-Paul

 

[RCDisneyFan]

How many photos do you plan to take? Can you afford enough flash cards?l

I've got a D90 and last time I took a 4GB card to WDW - I basically filled that (having been there 5 times already!) and had to delete all of the video I took. That's without taking any RAW photos.. We're going to London, Disneyland Paris and Paris for two days - so...I'm not sure that even 12 GB of the memory cards I have would be enough! In this case, I'm sure there will be architectural types of photos - which I would take in RAW so I could un-distort the pictures.

Because we'll be spending time in urban areas, not on escorted tours, etc, I'm not taking a traditional camera bag (which would have a nice place to organize tiny things like memory cards.)

 

[YesDear]

If you just want storage I recommend a Wolverine data drive. You put your card in and it downloads it to a hard drive. When you get home you connect the drive and download it where you want it. I use two of them and also use mac's and pc's.

Just google wolverine data.

 

[RCDisneyFan]

If you just want storage I recommend a Wolverine data drive. You put your card in and it downloads it to a hard drive. When you get home you connect the drive and download it where you want it. I use two of them and also use mac's and pc's.

Just google wolverine data.

Thanks for the tip... I just looked it up on Amazon and someone's posted that it doesn't read Nikon's RAW format (it's NEF, not RAW.) Their website confirms they don't read D90 NEFs yet too. That puts it on par with the Archos, I think. Why does technology have to be so hard??

 

[Pamlur]

I have had the Epson P-2000 since it was brand new, and love it. I recently downloaded several updates, to bring it up to the point of reading a 2g SD card. But I am a very amateur photographer and don't shoot RAW; just wanted to tell you that the Epson devices are really great to use.

 

[jfinke]

Have you taken a look at something like an Acer Aspire One?

http://www.amazon.com/Acer-AOA150-1447-8-9-Inch-Processor-Sapphire/dp/B001EYV9TM

Probably would give you at least 100GB of usable storage space.

It comes with 3 USB 2.0 ports. Plus it has a Multi-in-one card reader which supports SD, MMC, Memory Stick/Memory Stick PRO, and XD Picture Cards.

 

[pjacobi]

Staples has 8Gb Sandisk Ultra2 CF cards on sale for $24.99, $17.99 for 8Gb SDHC cards. You could buy 32Mb of storage for under $100. That's about 1/2 or 1/3 the price of a portable storage device.

That would give me enough for 3200 Raw shots on my 30D! Perhaps that might be a mere 2000 on the D90.

If you run out, I'm sure there are camera shops in London and Paris.


-Paul

 

[GrumpyOne]

Once the trip gets a bit closer, I plan on getting a small netbook so I don't have to deal with different formats and could run Photoshop . At the moment, thinking about a 10" with dedicated video and 2GB RAM. They're a little pricey but a heck of a lot smaller/lighter than a regular notebook and lower specs can get pretty cheap.

 

[safetymom]

I love my Epson photo viewer. It is great for downloading my images. When I get home the pictures are saved on the computer and the back up hard drive.

 

[DizzyV6P]

I took my Epson P-3000 on my Diseny Med Cruise a few years ago. I think I took over 3000 photos almost all raw. There's no way I'd bother with bringing so many CF cards at the rate I take pictures. During quiet evenings, I'm usually found at the sports bar with a beer and going through photos and deleting the ones I don't like on the P-3000. It's got a nice LCD screen that's large enough not to tire your eyes.

 

[RCDisneyFan]

Thanks for all the suggestions... I probably WILL go with the Epson because I've found fewer reviews mentioning random crashing and picture loss.

I appreciate and understand the suggestion about a small laptop, but we already have one of those - and the whole idea is that I have something small enough to fit in a hotel safe and that I don't have to take out in the security lines. Besides, if I buy a small laptop, I'll never be able to justify getting myself a nice macbook later!!

 

[YesDear]

I do not know what you saw on amazon, but the wolverine data drives will read any file format. I have two of them and shoot a D300 in RAW.

THey make a picture viewer, but what I am talking about is only a data drive.

 

[manning]

How about this.

http://www.mydigitallife.info/2009/02/03/transcends-new-portable-solid-state-drive-ssd18m/

 

[Pea-n-Me]

I appreciate and understand the suggestion about a small laptop, but we already have one of those - and the whole idea is that I have something small enough to fit in a hotel safe and that I don't have to take out in the security lines. Besides, if I buy a small laptop, I'll never be able to justify getting myself a nice macbook later!!

The prices are about the same. I looked at the Epson 3000 and liked it a lot. But I wound up going with the Acer 8" Netbook instead because I liked the fact that with the netbook, I got internet capability as well. It's pretty small, too. Might be worth a look.

Here are the stats, to compare:

Epson: 8 x 9.7 x 4.5 inches ; 2.7 pounds

Acer: 6.7 x 9.8 x 1.1 inches ; 2.2 pounds

 

[RCDisneyFan]

The prices are about the same. I looked at the Epson 3000 and liked it a lot. But I wound up going with the Acer 8" Netbook instead because I liked the fact that with the netbook, I got internet capability as well. It's pretty small, too. Might be worth a look.

Here are the stats, to compare:

Epson: 8 x 9.7 x 4.5 inches ; 2.7 pounds

Acer: 6.7 x 9.8 x 1.1 inches ; 2.2 pounds

So here's my question about that...I'm not all that sophisticated in terms of networking - how would I get the pictures from something like an Acer (which runs the accursed Windows XP) onto a Mac?

 

[RCDisneyFan]

I do not know what you saw on amazon, but the wolverine data drives will read any file format. I have two of them and shoot a D300 in RAW.

THey make a picture viewer, but what I am talking about is only a data drive.

Sorry if I wasn't clear - I think it's specifically the D90's NEF it doesn't read. D300 is listed on the website's list of supported RAW formats but D90 isn't. Turns out the same is true for the Epson as well. So, I guess I'm sort of back to square one and the primary concern is the Mac compatibility..

 

[Pea-n-Me]

So here's my question about that...I'm not all that sophisticated in terms of networking - how would I get the pictures from something like an Acer (which runs the accursed Windows XP) onto a Mac?

I'm no techie either, but I would imagine using a USB cord. That's how we transferred them from the Netbook to our home desktop (PC). I'm sure there's a way it can be done despite the two different operating systems, but in a worst case scenario, maybe you could put them back on your cards and transfer them that way?

We'd thought about all this stuff, too, especially where there's no CD drive on the Netbooks (though you can use an external CD drive if that helps). If you read some of the reviews and FAQ's (WalMart site), it might be addressed there.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

Peeking around one of the Mac user forums (where were those when I was a Mac user?) It looks as though there's been lots of discussions about netbooks.

One option is to buy one that you can load an OS X onto. http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=646884&highlight=acer+netbook

ETA here's what I think you're looking for:

How to transfer data from a PC to a Macintosh http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1408?viewlocale=en_US

 

[RCDisneyFan]

I think buying and installing an OS is probably more expense and effort than I'm willing to spend... Buying an acer one is probably still $75 over what I was aiming for in terms of expense - but it does seem like a pretty good deal to get the 160gb one with a 6-cell battery for $329. Battery life like that *could* allow me to leave the ipod at home (always nice to carry less gadgets!)

So... If I'm reading that Mac article correctly - we bought our Mac about 2 years ago, so we should be able to directly connect using an ethernet cable?

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2274