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IBM microdrive or Digital Wallet?

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Marco Carrega

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I'm going to buy an extra amount of memory for my G2.I've to decide between IBM Microdrive (1GB but smaller) and Digital Wallet (3GB but bigger).

I think 1GB is enough for me and I have no problem of space in my bag, so i'd like to buy the one wich works better.
Any suggestion?
 
Marco Carrega said:
I'm going to buy an extra amount of memory for my G2.I've to decide
between IBM Microdrive (1GB but smaller) and Digital Wallet (3GB
but bigger).
I think 1GB is enough for me and I have no problem of space in my
bag, so i'd like to buy the one wich works better.
Any suggestion?
Click to expand...
There's something very gratifying in turning on your G2 set to RAW and seeing you have space for 359 images. I like my microdrive a lot.
 
Marco Carrega said:
I'm going to buy an extra amount of memory for my G2.I've to decide
between IBM Microdrive (1GB but smaller) and Digital Wallet (3GB
but bigger).
I think 1GB is enough for me and I have no problem of space in my
bag, so i'd like to buy the one wich works better.
Any suggestion?
Click to expand...
I went with the Digital Wallet and I am very happy with it. I find it comes in handy when on a 2 week vacation and you like to take a lot of photos. I thought about getting the 1 gig microdrive but I could get the digital wallet at a good price with 3 x the room. I use 192 meg card and it takes about 3 minutes to transfer the files over to the wallet.--Neil Johnson
 
I think the issue is what format fits your shooting style. With a DW or similar device you will need to stop every once in a while to download. ie a 128 mb CF is like a roll of film, it holds roughly 40 RAW shots. how many shots will you take in a day? On the other hand with a 1 gb mD you will just keep going and do some hard choices in deleting shots when back at your room. In either case the battery life will be limiting, say 200-300 shots depending upon LCD usage. While traveling you will need some way to recharge your camera battery, and carry a spare too.
Mike K
Marco Carrega said:
I'm going to buy an extra amount of memory for my G2.I've to decide
between IBM Microdrive (1GB but smaller) and Digital Wallet (3GB
but bigger).
I think 1GB is enough for me and I have no problem of space in my
bag, so i'd like to buy the one wich works better.
Any suggestion?
Click to expand...
 
I had the same issue when I bought my G2. I figured that the only time that I will ever need a wallet was if I was going to be away from my computer or laptop for several days. It was cheaper and more efficient to buy 2 256mb (Lexar 4x $61 each reabate special) flash cards because I dont have to worry about dropping the microdrive and breaking it. As for the wallet, I would only use it on vacation (maybe 2x per year). I would save the $$ and just buy an extra flash card, imo.
--www.pbase.com/dmanrash
 
I'm still waiting till they release the new 2GB and 3GB MDs so that maybe the 1GB version will drop to a reasonable price. I just can't justify spending $670 CDN on a MD (that's over half the price of the G2) right now. Although at $400 CDN, the 3GB digital wallet is quite a bit cheaper, I don't think I'd need more than the MD's capacity of 333 "keeper" pictures before getting to a computer. That's almost 14 rolls of 24exp film, and these would be only the ones that turn out well! I can't speak from experience, but I think I'd prefer the 1GB MD for its convenience and portability, esp. since I only have one 32MB and a 64MB CF card. Maybe if I had a 192MB or 256MB CF card I'd be inclined to lug around the DW and put up with its relative inconvenience.

Couple of notes: with the MD you'd be able to review all of your pictures on the LCD before getting to the computer, but not once they've been transferred to the DW....On the other hand, I believe the DW can be used as a portable USB hard drive to transfer large files between computers (although relatively slowly).

Michael
Marco Carrega said:
I'm going to buy an extra amount of memory for my G2.I've to decide
between IBM Microdrive (1GB but smaller) and Digital Wallet (3GB
but bigger).
I think 1GB is enough for me and I have no problem of space in my
bag, so i'd like to buy the one wich works better.
Any suggestion?
Click to expand...
 
Marco,

I use a Image Bank which I bought at Sima's website for $199.00. I then got a 10 gig lape top hard drive for $60.00 to go in it. This summers trip to Maine, between two camera's we uploaded about 1000 pics and had space for probably about 4000 more. It worked great and uses your car battery via the cigarette lighter and 120 volt ac and also can use a battery pack which I have but have not used. We have two 128 meg cards and one 80 meg and when we fill them up we just pop them into the Image Bank and press the button and up auto uploads them to the Image Bank hard drive.

Stephen
Marco Carrega said:
I'm going to buy an extra amount of memory for my G2.I've to decide
between IBM Microdrive (1GB but smaller) and Digital Wallet (3GB
but bigger).
I think 1GB is enough for me and I have no problem of space in my
bag, so i'd like to buy the one wich works better.
Any suggestion?
Click to expand...
 
Hey, I just noticed that Minds@Work have a new unit called MindStor that you might want to check out. Haven't read too much but it seems these have USB and FIREWIRE connections. :)

http://www.mindsatwork.net/products.htm

Michael
Mickey said:
Couple of notes: with the MD you'd be able to review all of your
pictures on the LCD before getting to the computer, but not once
they've been transferred to the DW....On the other hand, I believe
the DW can be used as a portable USB hard drive to transfer large
files between computers (although relatively slowly).

Michael
Marco Carrega said:
I'm going to buy an extra amount of memory for my G2.I've to decide
between IBM Microdrive (1GB but smaller) and Digital Wallet (3GB
but bigger).
I think 1GB is enough for me and I have no problem of space in my
bag, so i'd like to buy the one wich works better.
Any suggestion?
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Stephen Daniels said:
I use a Image Bank which I bought at Sima's website for $199.00. I
then got a 10 gig lape top hard drive for $60.00 to go in it. This
summers trip to Maine, between two camera's we uploaded about 1000
pics and had space for probably about 4000 more. It worked great
and uses your car battery via the cigarette lighter and 120 volt ac
and also can use a battery pack which I have but have not used. We
have two 128 meg cards and one 80 meg and when we fill them up we
just pop them into the Image Bank and press the button and up auto
uploads them to the Image Bank hard drive.

Stephen
Marco Carrega said:
I'm going to buy an extra amount of memory for my G2.I've to decide
between IBM Microdrive (1GB but smaller) and Digital Wallet (3GB
but bigger).
I think 1GB is enough for me and I have no problem of space in my
bag, so i'd like to buy the one wich works better.
Any suggestion?
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
THANK YOU ALL!
 
It depends on your needs and style of shooting. I just got back from 12 days abroad, and used a single 1GB microdrive after deciding to purchase that instead of the 3GB digital wallet. At 4MP/fine compression I was able to get 910 images, of which I only filled 850. For me, it was more than enough, but if you need to shoot in RAW mode or will be away from a laptop for longer than a couple of weeks, the digital wallet option might be worth considering.

Kenn
 
My preferred combination is the 340 MB microdrive AND the 3 GB DW. Does this sound redundant? I don't think it is. I agree with the people on this forum that say that the only time you really need the DW is on an extended holiday from your PC. But I also want to be able to shoot 100+ shots at RAW or equivalent plus AVIs on a good day out without carrying extra cards around.

The 340 MB is plenty of storage for many big days of average shooting and only costs about $340 CDN. The combination of the 340 MB MD and the 3 GB DW gives you all the storage both in camera and in the suitcase that you will realistically need even on a big holiday and is less than the price of the 1 GB Microdrive.

...and if cash on hand is a problem - buy the 340 MB microdrive now and the DW when you are ready to go on the big holiday.

Regards
Toad
 
I recently went on a vacation and purchased the 3gb DW to use in combination with my 340mb MD. For my use the 340mb MD was enough for a single day of shooting. I went from RAW to jpg towards the end of the day while filling up the MD. After returning to the hotel room I uploaded the files to the DW.

I feel more secure knowing that most of my files are back at the hotel. I would hate to rely on keeping all my pics on one device and then to have an unfortunate accident or theft of my equipment.

Food for thought! If I were to make the decision again, I would have bought the 10gb DW. I find it very useful for uploading other computer files between work and home.

[email protected]
 
Went down the same thought process and decided...

to buy a digital wallet.

I bought an ImageTank (aka ImageBank) which is just a USB interfaced housing for standard 2.5" H/D. I got a 10Gb unit for about £250 and used it for 4 weeks solid whilst on hols. Great unit, no frills, reliable and cheap.
Marco Carrega said:
I'm going to buy an extra amount of memory for my G2.I've to decide
between IBM Microdrive (1GB but smaller) and Digital Wallet (3GB
but bigger).
I think 1GB is enough for me and I have no problem of space in my
bag, so i'd like to buy the one wich works better.
Any suggestion?
Click to expand...
 
i have four 128mb flash cards and on a recent trip i ended up filling all four of them with raw files. i don't own a laptop, and i still had several days left on my vacation, so i decided to get the DW. it certainly solved the problem. but...

the DW software is full of glitches. it freezes about every other time i try to use it. so far i have not lost any files- it always ends up working, but i have to unplug the battery when it crashes and restart it. very annoying. one would think that with a [$400] product that has been out this long they would have gotten rid of the glitches.
greg-- http://gregrothschild.com
 
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