Just bought a 1.0 Gb SD card for my Treo & Kodak camera. I read that a USB SD card reader is a good thing but I can’t figure out why.
What are the benefits of a SD card reader?
You can leave the reader plugged into the computer and not have to drag out the camera’s USB cord and plug it in every time. I got CF reader for my computer (I have an HP 315 that uses CF cards).
You can transfer pictures to a computer . Is this a whoosh?
Using the camera as the reader is generally slower and more involved to connect and file manipulation is usually via some camera file reader software. SD reader sits on the system like a disk drive. Moving, copying files etc is fast and simple.
A card reader would allow you to use the SD card as a mobile storage device, even if the Treo and/or Kodak and/or the respective USB cables were not readily available, so you could use it to move files and data from one computer to another.
Is it absolutely necessary? No–I have both a Treo and a digital camera, and for the most part, I can transfer files just fine using the USB cables that came with those devices. (My camera does not use SD, but it seems to work the same way when I connect to my desktop with the USB connection, or with my laptop using IR.)
However, I did get a HP 7660 printer that connects via the USB port, and which includes readers for almost any flash media imaginable. The big advantage that I have found to this is that I can use the printer to access any of my flash cards (including CompactFlash, MMC, and SD) without having to keep track of multiple USB cables for each of the devices that use the cards.
I would ask the same of you.
I have a home desktop PC with just USB ports, and a work notebook PC with a built-in SD slot. Transferring pictures from my SD camera is quicker and easier using the SD slot. Not by much, but a little.
As others have said, faster, easier, less fuss. I like to carry the USB cable with the camera so I can download images to laptops and the like when I’m on the road, so it saves me from having to dive under the desk and plug in the cable on my home machine where I do most of my image processing.
I have a multi format reader since I have two types of media for my cameras. That way if I switch formats with the next one I’m all set.
I agree with much of what has bee posted previously. I have a Lexar Jumpdrive Trio that works with the basic types of digital media in my various devices. It is rather large and tends to block the other usb port on my laptops, so I use an extension cable. From my own Amazon link, it appears that the comparable IOGEAR product is good also, and may have a thinner “neck” (not block the other USB port).
I find a drive of this type a lot more useful than a standalone USB thumb drive because I can use the different removable media I have available in my camera, PDAs, etc. It is relatively small and unobtrusive, powered by USB, unlike some card readers that are pretty big and require AC adapters. If you are only using your camera around your house and have the USB cable permanently set up, you’ll not fnd much use for these devices, but once you start taking advantage of it (e.g., on vacation, or when a relative wants copies of your pictures) you’ll never know how you got along without it.
Faster, easier, and doesn’t drain your camera’s batteries in the process.
You don’t need a reader for that, you can just use the camera.
Yup. My camera eats batteries if I use the USB-cable and transfer pictures directly from the camera.
I can think of a lot of benefits for my SD USB card reader, however I don’t use my cards with cameras, so a bunch of them might not apply to you.
One big one is that you can probably use it more easily to transfer data (pictures) to machines that might not have the specific drivers and software loaded up for your device (camera.) I don’t know if your camera will just plug and play with any old computer, but I know my PDAs and mp3 player don’t. my card reader will even work with public library computers that have been locked down with respect to other plug and play drivers.
Another possible benefit is higher transfer rates, though cameras are probably optimized pretty heavily already for USB, dealing with large amounts of data as they do. (palmpilots are notorious for taking a long time to hotsync info to the SD card, which is why a lot of palm owners get SD card drives. Also applies somewhat to pocketPCs.)
And finally, the card reader might be lighter and more portable than the camera… if you don’t need to actually take pictures onto the card.
If none of these notions (or others that people have mentioned on this thread) seem particularly important to you, then maybe you don’t need the reader after all. It isn’t something I would consider a blanket ‘must have’ for camera users.
One additional benefit is that you can then use your SD card to carry data from one USB-equipped computer to another without having to buy a dedicated flashcard device.
If you buy one of those 6 in 1 card readers, you’ll also be able to handle media from other people’s cameras – something that might occasionally prove useful.