Thumbsup! Firewire CF reader

Kelley Nelson · Jan 1, 2003

One of my Christmas presents was a Lexar firewire CF card reader and a SIIG firewire interface card.

Very nice performance increase over the USB reader I was using for a pretty reasonable cost of about $120 for card + reader. It'll save me a nice chunk of time downloading.

Installation was a snap on my XP system.

-k

Mike48088 · Jan 1, 2003

How fast does it download your images? I have a laptop and use a pc card adaptor and it downloads at 1m per second. If firewire is faster I'll go that way.

Mike

Kelley Nelson said:
One of my Christmas presents was a Lexar firewire CF card reader
and a SIIG firewire interface card.

Very nice performance increase over the USB reader I was using for
a pretty reasonable cost of about $120 for card + reader. It'll
save me a nice chunk of time downloading.

Installation was a snap on my XP system.

-k

Kelley Nelson · Jan 2, 2003

It's 3.5-3.8 mb/sec in my tests.

The Lexar readers are made by a company called DatFab and supposedly you can get them cheaper under the DataFab name.

-k

Mike said:
How fast does it download your images? I have a laptop and use a pc
card adaptor and it downloads at 1m per second. If firewire is
faster I'll go that way.

Anh Nguyen · Jan 2, 2003

Kelley Nelson said:
The Lexar readers are made by a company called DatFab and
supposedly you can get them cheaper under the DataFab name.

-k

Mike said:

How fast does it download your images? I have a laptop and use a pc
card adaptor and it downloads at 1m per second. If firewire is
faster I'll go that way.

Click to expand...

--
Anh Nguyen:

Have you compared with USB 2 throughput? I bought one for $29 and my XP system accepted it with no fuss, and the speed gain was impressive over USB 1.

Ken Phillips · Jan 2, 2003

which is faster than USB 1.1 but much slower than USB 2.0 or IEE 1394 (FireWire). So once you get past that limit, the method doesn't matter much. I will say that while my PC card adapter in my laptop is faster than USB 1.1, the FireWire/Lexar reader on my desktop is faster still ... at up to about 5 megabytes/second with a 1GB IBM MicroDrive.
KP

Anh Nguyen said:
Kelley Nelson said:

The Lexar readers are made by a company called DatFab and
supposedly you can get them cheaper under the DataFab name.

-k

Mike said:

How fast does it download your images? I have a laptop and use a pc
card adaptor and it downloads at 1m per second. If firewire is
faster I'll go that way.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

--
Anh Nguyen:
Have you compared with USB 2 throughput? I bought one for $29 and
my XP system accepted it with no fuss, and the speed gain was
impressive over USB 1.

--

A couple of Canon DSLRs, a nice off-white lens and some red-stripe lenses and one with a gold stripe, some misc. accessories including various photon ejectors and paper holders. A ton of film equipment from 35mm to 4 x 5. A minivan and a Fender Stratocaster. A three bedroom ranch on an acre. Also, absolutely no Canon 1200mm f/5.6.

Tom Boucher · Jan 2, 2003

I have an iMac and a Powerbook. The iMac has a firewire port and the reader.

Putting the PCCard adapter in the powerbook it is at least 1/2 if not more slower than the firewire reader. But the card is good to use in some situations where you don't want to carry around lots of cabled peripherials (sp?)

Isaac Sibson · Jan 2, 2003

$120 is absolutely ridiculous for a CF card reader. You can get an IDE CF reader that supports Hotswapping for $41 including shipping from a company called prestico. This offers the advantage of being able to boot your computer from the CF card as a hard disk, for doing BIOS flashes or whatever (and is much more reliable and faster than a floppy disk for this purpose), plus the IDE reader will easily be as fast as a firewire reader (both can handle much more data than a CF card can put out). A non-hotswap IDE CF reader is in the $20 region, but you must put the card in before you boot the machine, and not remove until powered down. Since all PCs and recent macs (G3 and G4 towers) use IDE/ UATA interface, the IDE CF reader is completely compatible, and offers the booting and price advantages over the firewire reader.

I currently (until my IDE reader arrives) use a DataFab USB CF/SM reader, and Datafab's drivers aren't the greatest out there. Perhaps Lexar are supplying better drivers.

Kelley Nelson said:
One of my Christmas presents was a Lexar firewire CF card reader
and a SIIG firewire interface card.

Very nice performance increase over the USB reader I was using for
a pretty reasonable cost of about $120 for card + reader. It'll
save me a nice chunk of time downloading.

Installation was a snap on my XP system.

-k

--
Full Frame user!

EOS 3 + Nikon Coolscan III

RichW · Jan 2, 2003

You just plug it in and away you go!! That's the advantage. As far as IDE is concerned most people don't want to open their computer up let alone figure out if they have a spare IDE channel, not to mention all the Bios and IRQ issues with that. Now you throw in driver issues and forget it.... Firewire all the way!

Rich

Isaac Sibson said:
I currently (until my IDE reader arrives) use a DataFab USB CF/SM
reader, and Datafab's drivers aren't the greatest out there.
Perhaps Lexar are supplying better drivers.

Kelley Nelson said:

One of my Christmas presents was a Lexar firewire CF card reader
and a SIIG firewire interface card.

Very nice performance increase over the USB reader I was using for
a pretty reasonable cost of about $120 for card + reader. It'll
save me a nice chunk of time downloading.

Installation was a snap on my XP system.

-k

Click to expand...

--
Full Frame user!

EOS 3 + Nikon Coolscan III

Mark B. · Jan 2, 2003

Isaac Sibson said:
$120 is absolutely ridiculous for a CF card reader.

I think you mis-read the post. If I understand correctly, $120 was for the firewire interface card AND CF reader.

Mark

Kelley Nelson · Jan 2, 2003

The reader was $30 and I spent about another $30 on an interface card so I could connect my 1D. No drivers were necessary with XP. The XP firewire drivers are used.

-k

Isaac Sibson said:
$120 is absolutely ridiculous for a CF card reader. You can get an
IDE CF reader that supports Hotswapping for $41 including shipping

Kelley Nelson · Jan 2, 2003

As someone already said, on XP no drivers needed. I think I have seen the Datafab reader (Which is supposed to be identical to the Lexar, I just didn't know about it before xmas) for ~$20. Having the firewire ports available for other peripherals is a nice extra as well.

-k

Isaac Sibson said:
I currently (until my IDE reader arrives) use a DataFab USB CF/SM
reader, and Datafab's drivers aren't the greatest out there.
Perhaps Lexar are supplying better drivers.

Calvin Chann · Jan 2, 2003

You're lucky. My local shop wants 100 euros (equiv $100) for a SanDisk Firewire reader without an interface card.

Kelley Nelson said:
One of my Christmas presents was a Lexar firewire CF card reader
and a SIIG firewire interface card.

Very nice performance increase over the USB reader I was using for
a pretty reasonable cost of about $120 for card + reader. It'll
save me a nice chunk of time downloading.

Installation was a snap on my XP system.

-k

Isaac Sibson · Jan 2, 2003

RichW said:
You just plug it in and away you go!! That's the advantage. As
far as IDE is concerned most people don't want to open their
computer up let alone figure out if they have a spare IDE channel,
not to mention all the Bios and IRQ issues with that. Now you
throw in driver issues and forget it.... Firewire all the way!

Firewire and USB devices (outside of standard USB keyboards) require drivers, which is why they only work within your operating system. You can not boot off a USB or Firewire drive unless you have a specific type of drive on a few specific motherboards which allow this.

All motherboards allow boot from IDE devices however.

And, since it is reasonable to assume that someone who has a D60, lenses and a computer and use them all together has a reasonable level of technical competance, installation isn't a big deal.

Isaac Sibson · Jan 2, 2003

Kelley Nelson said:
As someone already said, on XP no drivers needed. I think I have
seen the Datafab reader (Which is supposed to be identical to the
Lexar, I just didn't know about it before xmas) for ~$20. Having
the firewire ports available for other peripherals is a nice extra
as well.

Just because XP has a driver built in does not mean that no driver is used. It is still a driver, and thus the device can not be used outside of the Operating System (for example, to boot from). Also, trying to find Linux drivers for some of these devices can be a bit of a chore, if possible at all. With an IDE CF reader, this is not an issue, as it will appear as a standard IDE storage device.

--
Full Frame user!

EOS 3 + Nikon Coolscan III

Calvin Chann · Jan 2, 2003

The drivers for USB and firewire are included with the operating system so that you do not need to insert the CD or floppy.

However, from time to time, new drivers do come out and may be included with a new piece of kit. An OEM may add functionality to the driver meaning that the vanilla one that the OS gives you will not do everything.

Isaac Sibson said:
RichW said:

You just plug it in and away you go!! That's the advantage. As
far as IDE is concerned most people don't want to open their
computer up let alone figure out if they have a spare IDE channel,
not to mention all the Bios and IRQ issues with that. Now you
throw in driver issues and forget it.... Firewire all the way!

Click to expand...

Firewire and USB devices (outside of standard USB keyboards)
require drivers, which is why they only work within your operating
system. You can not boot off a USB or Firewire drive unless you
have a specific type of drive on a few specific motherboards which
allow this.

All motherboards allow boot from IDE devices however.

And, since it is reasonable to assume that someone who has a D60,
lenses and a computer and use them all together has a reasonable
level of technical competance, installation isn't a big deal.

Isaac Sibson · Jan 2, 2003

Calvin Chann said:
The drivers for USB and firewire are included with the operating
system so that you do not need to insert the CD or floppy.

Which doesn't help when there is no OS loaded, which is my point. You can not start an OS from USB or firewire CF readers, which you CAN with an IDE CF reader. Admittedly this may not be of any consequence to some people here, but to others it will be, and when you can get the IDE reader for a lot less money ($26+$15 shipping for the hot swap one), to many here it may be a better deal. Certainly I have found USB readers to be of questionable reliability at times, whereas I have very few problems with IDE devices.

--
Full Frame user!

EOS 3 + Nikon Coolscan III

Darell Neff · Jan 2, 2003

Got the Lexmar Firewire Reader and a Firewire card for about 70 bucks.

It takes about six minutes to download a full 1GB Microdrive with the firewire reader.

Thanks,
Darrell

Calvin Chann · Jan 2, 2003

Isaac

Didn't know you wanted to boot off a card reader. Why would you want to do that? Just curious.

Isaac Sibson said:
Calvin Chann said:

The drivers for USB and firewire are included with the operating
system so that you do not need to insert the CD or floppy.

Click to expand...

Which doesn't help when there is no OS loaded, which is my point.
You can not start an OS from USB or firewire CF readers, which you
CAN with an IDE CF reader. Admittedly this may not be of any
consequence to some people here, but to others it will be, and when
you can get the IDE reader for a lot less money ($26+$15 shipping
for the hot swap one), to many here it may be a better deal.
Certainly I have found USB readers to be of questionable
reliability at times, whereas I have very few problems with IDE
devices.

--
Full Frame user!

EOS 3 + Nikon Coolscan III

keironomahoney · Jan 2, 2003

Just been looking at the Prestico devices and they look ideal. The speeds out of an IDE device rather than USB are much greater and the fact I can get this horrible flimsy card reader off my desk is a bonus! I have a spare 3" bay just waiting and all I need to do now is find somewhere to buy one (prefereably in the UK)

Thanks for the heads up on this item.

--
Cheers

Keiron

http://www.athousandwords.org.uk

Isaac Sibson · Jan 2, 2003

Keiron O'Mahoney said:
Just been looking at the Prestico devices and they look ideal. The
speeds out of an IDE device rather than USB are much greater and
the fact I can get this horrible flimsy card reader off my desk is
a bonus! I have a spare 3" bay just waiting and all I need to do
now is find somewhere to buy one (prefereably in the UK)

Thanks for the heads up on this item.

--
Cheers

Keiron

Keiron- I'm putting my order through for one. If you want, I'll order one for you, and then we can split the postage cost. Email me if you're interested! (And anyone else in the UK that wants one. More the merrier!)

Isaac

--
Full Frame user!

EOS 3 + Nikon Coolscan III

Thumbsup! Firewire CF reader

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