Why not buy a laptop for storage instead of 5 meg. of CFs.

[Tapeman]

Won't you about break even $?

You can download daily & have all the benefits of a pc.

My desk top pc has built in slots to read menory cards.

Does anyone know of laptops with built in readers & DVD burner?

[scottbergerphoto]

Won't you about break even $?

You can download daily & have all the benefits of a pc.

My desk top pc has built in slots to read menory cards.

Does anyone know of laptops with built in readers & DVD burner?
I can carry 4 - 8 1GB cards in a small card wallet. It doesn't need batteries or recharging. If I drop it I just pick it up. It weighs about 4 oz.
That's why. :D
Scott

[cloudless]

Because the camera is big enough and I don't want to carry so much when I travel.

[SoCal69]

Not to mention the shooting time lost while downloading the images.

[cloudless]

That said, I am still going to bring my laptop to travel instead of buying additional CF cards. Because large CF cards are too expensive and I want to save money for buying the 300D!

(I only have 400MB of CF cards now)

[fwhitesides]

Laptops are heavy and somewhat bulky (as compared to CF cards). Also, it's a pain to stop shooting and download images in the middle of a shoot. Plus, you could miss something great while you are fooling around with booting up a laptop or whatever.

I think a better solution would be to have a CF card (or two) and a portable hard drive like the X's Drive or Image Tank, etc. It's much cheaper than either a laptap or a scad of CF cards.

[PacAce]

I'd bring along enough CF cards for a day's worth of shooting and then download everything to a laptop at the end of the day.

[Sketcher]

Won't you about break even $?

You can download daily & have all the benefits of a pc.

My desk top pc has built in slots to read menory cards.

Does anyone know of laptops with built in readers & DVD burner?
Having the above mentioned (laptop internal CD-RW w/external DVD-RW, four 512MB CF's and 30GB Xs-Drive II) there are benefits depending on application.

1. If shooting and simply needing to offload images from CF cards; downloading to my X-Drive II is more convenient than carrying a laptop, powering up/xferring/pwring down & stowing. And, it's the cost per MB storage leader.

2. If needing more accessible storage space; I don't know about you, but the type of laptop I like to run is $3,000.00+ (obviously there are less expensive alternatives) It'd take me a while for my CF collection to even come close to breaking-even cost/per MB. Further, CF cards are a couple second switch whereas transferring to a laptop is time consuming.

3. If needing additional portable backup or photoshop/imaging solution; A laptop is then the road warriors friend. Being able to view/edit images on the spot or soon thereafter is a nice capability. A number of times I've been able to shoot some images and burn to disc for handing out on the spot, e-mailing via wireless modem or uploading to a website. Most recently, my third child was born and I photographed much of the goings on. When mother and child took their first nap I wirelessly uploaded the pictures to a family website within hours of the child being born; without leaving the hospital room.

Most people just want quick and easy storage which doesn't hamper one's ability to shoot more pictures. More often than not; that's the premium worth paying for. Opinions vary according to intended use and personal preference.

[IanD]

If I'm on the road for more than a day I take a laptop with me. Granted the display on the laptop is no where close to a CRT but in the evenings I can transfer all the images, nuke the bad ones and burn the keepers. I am partial to a new TTX that I bought just before Christmas. Centrino based, very light and really long battery life.
Of course from March till August I am on the road more than at home so the laptop lives in the backpack along with the camera equipment.

[hawg]

Won't you about break even $?

You can download daily & have all the benefits of a pc.

My desk top pc has built in slots to read menory cards.

Does anyone know of laptops with built in readers & DVD burner?

Do you mean 5 Gigabytes?

I bring a small laptop (smaller form factor),with a CD burner, which is really lightweight when stripped to the bare minimum. And most newer PC's have either a PCMCIA or PC Carbus slot that can be used to read CF I/II and Microdrive cards with an adapter.

Also if I anticipate a lot of important data, I bring a 250GB external harddrive to backup the data in the PC.

Another advantage is a bigger screen to do possible initial workflow steps like discarding bad shots( that's most shots for me) :( :( :D :D

[ijohnson]

Don't try to save money in this forum. I could have told you that the answer would have been "both".

[Tapeman]

ijohnson said:

Don't try to save money in this forum. I could have told you that the answer would have been "both"

Why am I not surrised at this reply?

[burkdog]

How many 1 gig cf cards do you need for a day's worth of shooting??

[Jesper]

Won't you about break even $?
You can download daily & have all the benefits of a pc.
My desk top pc has built in slots to read menory cards.
Does anyone know of laptops with built in readers & DVD burner?

Because if I go on holiday, I don't want to be dragging a laptop around all the time. Besides, it needs lots of electricity, which isn't always available all the time.

I'm using a FlashTrax portable hard drive (http://www.smartdisk.com/) of 40 GB. It's very convenient; you plug in your CF card in its CF card slot, push a button and it copies the contents of the CF card onto the hard drive. It also has an LCD screen that you can use to view your photos (and it also plays MP3s and does other things). The 40 GB FlashTrax costs about the same as two 1 GB CF cards would cost here.

Ofcourse the FlashTrax isn't the only portable hard drive, there are lots of manufacturers who sell something like this.

[Conor]

How many 1 gig cf cards do you need for a day's worth of shooting??

depends on how many photos you will shoot in a day.

a 512mb card gets me 150-170 pics (shooting jpeg large fine) depending on lighting and subject matter.

all depends on you.

[PacAce]

Q: How many 1 gig cf cards do you need for a day's worth of shooting??


Take your pick....

A: None. I only have 512 and 256 MB cards.

A: One. When it's full, I call it a day.

A: Depends on how many pictures you take and the format used.

A: Depends on how interesting the subject is.

:mrgreen:

[rick barclay]

The advantage of a laptop comes after you finish shooting, not while you're in the field taking pictures. As to the gentleman who savors
spending $3,000 for a notebook, I can't imagine what kind of machine
that must be. I just paid $1400 for a Toshiba laptop, which comes with:

Pentium 4, 2.66 Ghz MB
512 L3 cache
512 Mb PC2100 DDR RAM
60 Gb HDD
DVD/CD-R/RW
16-bit Windows sound Ver. 2.0 Sound Blaster Pro
32 Mb Nvidia GeForce FXGo 5100 video
15.4" TFT Active Matrix screen
Integrated modem
Integrated 10/100 ethernet
Integrated 802.11g Wireless LAN
and last but certainly not least, Windows XP Pro installed.

What more could you want or get for an additional $1600?

My laptop always goes on the road with me, and when I get lost in the
deepest recesses of Virginia or wherever, I just pull over, break out
my notebook, load MS Streets and Trips, and find out where the heck I am and how I'm going to get to where I should be going. Show me a cf
card that can do that, and I'll concede the point.

[G3]

I use three 512 mb CF cards, That's enough to cover a day's shooting easily. I also use a laptop to download the images at night when I'm sitting around the house or hotel room.

The laptop is configured as follows:

Gateway DS M350X laptop
Pentium 4 2.8 GHz processor
512 mb RAM
60 Gig Hard disk
DVD and CD R/W combo
10/100 Ethernet
802.11 Wireless ethernet
15.4" Display
6-in-1 Memory card reader (for CF cards)
Windows XP
Photoshop CS
Canon software

That way, I can do some sorting and editing at night after I download everything.

There is also a device on the market called FlashTrax that is built by SmartDisk. It is a palm sized device with a 30 or 60 mb hard disk and about a 3" LCD display that allows you to download from a CF card and review photos. However, they start at about $499.00, so in my estimation, you are better off to go ahead a spend another $500.00 or so and get a laptop that can run Photoshop.

[Case]

For my situation, a laptop would be way to heavy and bulky, and multiple CF's too small. It really depends on your situation, but cycling across half of Cambodia with a laptop in the panniers would kill me. I've just bought a X's-Drive Pro with a 30G drive...should be enough for lots of RAW goodness :)

Chris

[Phil Hall]

I carry a laptop when travelling but do not lug it around all day. I download in the evening and then my CF cards are ready to go next day.

[Sketcher]

As to the gentleman who savors
spending $3,000 for a notebook, I can't imagine what kind of machine
that must be. I just paid $1400 for a Toshiba laptop

Heh heh, thank you for that Rick [gentleman]. I thought the same thing myself (I can't imagine what kind of...) when I first heard people ardently espousing the grace of "L" glass. Much the same comparison between your and my laptop can be made in how we respect the 'worth' of lenses. For most, "L" glass is a nicety which does not warrant the expenditure. There are perfectly good consumer lenses which cover the range and come quite close to image quality as the significantly more expensive "L" variant. For a professional however, who must count on their gear to be of the utmost caliber, there is no question that professional lenses are in the kit. Then there are the passionate ones who by neither professional requirement or critical need appreciate and place a personal value on owning the best quality of lens you can buy. Everyone else is quite content in buying the high rated consumer gear and do not want for more outside of dreams.

When it comes to computer gear, consider me an "L" technologist :). As a Systems Administrator I rely on my laptop and remote access gear the way our Photography Pro's rely on their camera kit here. I run a Compaq Evo N800w which being last years' technology is already off the shelves. However, though my 2.2 Ghz, 60GB HD, 1GB RAM and weigh-in of 6lbs doesn't seem a gem pricewise compared to the initial specs of your Toshiba, the guts and functionality which round out the package are what make up the $1,600.00 difference. This beast is crafted for the professional engineer, media-content creator, mobile admin and the like. The hardware and software is certified to production performance specs which can't be matched by a sub $2,000.00 non-workstation laptop.

**Cliff's Notes** It really is the "L" vs "non-L" difference. I'm paid for my work so I ensure my skill is not held back by my gear. Could i 'get buy' with a nice $1,400.00 lappy? Perhaps, but for my line of work and personal interest I won't chance it.
*I do not advocate the purchase of a high-end laptop as a necessity for anyone else but myself or someone who has similar interests, requirements and resources to mine.

[evilenglishman]

--

[figment]

for critcal review, a laptop wins in spades. Not color-correct, but definately better than any 2" screen!

[dphoto]

Wow, that FlashTrax looks nice! Can you transfer files onto that thing with the LCD off, and if so, how much data can you transfer with one battery? The documentation I read mentioned 3-6GB with the LCD on.

The X-Drive also looks nice, but it looks like you are stuck with an internal battery? With 2 hours of battery life, that might only be 4GB of transfer with my slow cards. That might not be so good if you're away from power for a while. Nonetheless, it still looks pretty nice. :)

Anyone have any "field numbers" of their own?

Thanks,
-Deva

[robertwgross]

When I do nature photography in the field, I carry enough CF cards to handle everything for a day (about 2.5GB). Then, typically each evening after sundown, I scan the photos using just the D60's rear display, and I erase any that are obviously bad. Then I transfer the CF images to my X-drive. Finally, I put the CF cards back into my camera for re-format. Then they are stored in a pouch so that they are ready for the next day.

The X-drive is small, lightweight, and its battery is easy to recharge, so I've taken it along on longer backpack trips. I would never do that with a laptop computer.

---Bob Gross---

[Canuck]

Wow, that FlashTrax looks nice! Can you transfer files onto that thing with the LCD off, and if so, how much data can you transfer with one battery? The documentation I read mentioned 3-6GB with the LCD on.

Anyone have any "field numbers" of their own?

Thanks,
-Deva

Deval,
I have a 40GB FlashTrax Drive, and it is sweet!! I would reccommend it! I might be erring on the picky side, but there are some minor changes I would do, like brighten up screeen and make it a much better quality LCD. It sure kicks the crap out of the 1/4 pint sized one on the 10D. FYI, the FlashTrax Drive has approx 4x the real estate as the 10D. I have both of them and looking at them as I write this. Yes, you can set it to auto power off LCD screen and xfer images. Mine does that a lot, but I have it set to power off LCD after like 2 min.

Battery life, as I found it...I was up in Hull, in Yorkshire, England, on holiday and was able to download about 1.5GB (18 Dec) and looked at the pics extensively. The battery was close to dying so I charged it that night. Then another 1 GB was transferred 2 days later and looking at the pics an awful lot and shortly thereafter the battery was at 20% and it was time to charge. FYI: You can check the current status of battery by going to Mode, then hit down and it gives you all the info. I might ahve to take a pic and post it! I had a 2nd one thankfully for the just in case and I need it several times doing other bits. I recon you can get about 3-5GB out of it if you're downloading only but I was looking at the pics a lot!! If you look at the pics a lot and zoom in/out and stuff that takes its toll. The battery life is somewhat disappointing IMHO. All said it is a really cool piece of kit. It has allowed me to shoot RAW a lot and not worry about it. One other pointer, it takes a fair amount of time to download a 512MB CF card. I have 2 of them and that is the real awesome part...whilst one is downloading, use the other and swap out as needed. It is also cool that you can power it off of your computer via USB cable or charger. It uses Lithium-Ion (Li-Ion) batteries so memory is a not an issue as they don't have memory. I am currently trying to devise something to give me greater life than the 2 batteries I have already. I would really hate to be at an airshow and have to stop shooting cuz the FlashTrax batteries are dead, and I am all out of CF card space shooting RAW. That is the skinny on it.

Cheers from England,
Canuck

[CyberDyneSystems]

2 CF Cards and a 30 gig X-drive.. = approx $400.00 That is the way to go.

[ijohnson]

2 CF Cards and a 30 gig X-drive.. = approx $400.00 That is the way to go.

See? What did I say? I knew the most experienced people would recommend both. There is NEVER an inexpensive way to get out of this forum.

[Vegas Poboy]

I needed the laptop anyway so it goes with me when I'm going to shoot and need more than 2.5 gb of space. It all depends on what you need but I know must photographers that I've met that travels use a laptop. large storage space, large viewing area and the ability to email pics to their office.

[CyberDyneSystems]

2 CF Cards and a 30 gig X-drive.. = approx $400.00 That is the way to go.

See? What did I say? I knew the most experienced people would recommend both. There is NEVER an inexpensive way to get out of this forum.

I just recomended the cheapest workable solution? Why is it expensive,. and both what?

No 1.300.00 Laptop recomendation... just a $200.00 X-drive


Both because I said two CF cards?

That only makes sense,. you want a second card to use while the first is downloading to the X-drive,. but I didn't say twice as much CF card space,,... so instead of one 1gig card I recomend two 512 cards (same price as a single 1gig or less) and the X-drive. Total cost about $400.00 for 31GB of storage. If you juts get two 1GB cCF cards it's over $400.00 for two gigs of storage.

If you only intenede to get a single 512,. instead do the same thing,. 2X 256 MB cards and an X-drive,.. thats 30.5 gigs of storage for $300.00... and so on.. :)
:)

[Sketcher]

2 CF Cards and a 30 gig X-drive.. = approx $400.00 That is the way to go.

See? What did I say? I knew the most experienced people would recommend both. There is NEVER an inexpensive way to get out of this forum.
eh!? CDS is correct in recommending the best 'low cost' solution being a couple CF's and an X's-Drive. You'd be silly to not have at least two CF's and there just plain isn't an alternative which stacks up cost/per MB to that solution. If you have a 2.5" notebook drive handy you can buy the X's Shell for about $80.00, pre-installed 20GB units run about $190.00.

Mabye $200-400 isn't "inexpensive" but considering any/all other options it is the least expensive way to go.

What would be your [inexpensive] recommendation?

[scsmith10D]

I bought my 10D and 12" Mac G4 Powerbook in the same month as a "system." I knew I would need the laptop with CD burner on vacations. I'm getting by with 3 256 MB cards and the emergency 96 MB card that Canon sent me. I will get a few more cards before my next trip.

Cards are dropped in the bag or pocket when filled and downoaded to the Powerbook back at the room / house / condo (whatever) using a FireWire card reader. Then I dump the bad ones and burn a backup CD that evening.

I looked at the FlashTrax but was disappointed to see that it only supported USB and not FireWire when transferring contents to the computer.

[theoldmoose]

The Xs Drive is not without its warts.

For one thing, transfer from card to drive are glacial. Something close to USB 1.1 speeds, in spite of the fact that you can transfer directly to the PC from the media slots at card read speeds over the USB 2.0 high-speed port. This could be significant if you have 1GB or larger cards to download to the unit in the field. It's best not to disturb or move the drive while it is in operation, and a long download may tie you up, even if you aren't waiting on it because you've filled another CF card in the meantime.

At least if you are using CF cards, you can probably get by with moving the unit around, but folks that have tried that with SD/MMC or Smart media, that use board-edge connectors, instead of pin-and-socket type, have reported intermittent errors, probably caused by cheap meida connectors in the Xs Drive. I'm also suspicious of the USB connector on the drive, thinking that vibration on the desktop may have something to do with the 'unsafe removal of device errors' that crop up from time to time while I'm copying files from the device to my Windows 2000 Pro workstation.

Which brings up the other issue. The firmware (a version of VxWorks with a buggy FAT32 filesystem implementation) in the unit leaves something to be desired. I've encountered filesystem boundary conditions, refusal to handle certain legal Windows filenames, etc. etc. The unit could use a proper piece of firmware in it, but Vosonic doesn't seem interested in really fixing the problems. They refer you to 'your dealer' for any unresolved issues.

In any event, do you really want to trust your precious travel shots to a single, fragile hard drive, with suspect firmware? I thought not. :wink:

Consider instead, one of the devices available now that burn CD's directly from your media. They sport as good or better battery life, and you can burn multiple CD's for backup if you like, and pack the backups in your checked baggage, and carry the originals with you in your carryons. There was a recent article on Luminous Landscape that discussed this issue at length:

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/locations/wilderness.shtml

[evilenglishman]

--

[Sketcher]

I have none of those problems you mentioned with my X-drive II at all.
My file copying is smooth with no errors, I transferred 3 GB today in under 10 mins, so no complaints from me.

Mine has performed flawlessly as well. I've transferred everything from MP3's to Video to documents (and of course images) and I've never had a hiccup. I understand that some people have had issues but I'm pleased to experience along with quite a few others here in this board that it's the best cost/per MB solution I've bought.

If there is one caveat which I would express; it's that the quality of hard drive one puts into the unit (if installing one's own drive) may be suspect. I've run two drives through my shell. My first was an old 12GB generic which did have problems when bumped. My second and current drive is a relatively new 30GB and aside from significantly shaking the unit it doesn't skip a beat.

[figment]

... There was a recent article on Luminous Landscape that discussed this issue at length:

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/locations/wilderness.shtml
The ONLY way this would be an alternative for me and 1Gb flash cards is if it wrote DVD.

[karusel]

Don't try to save money in this forum.

My god. This is so true. It's like a playground to show and discuss the toys and quality is the only real measure, a very expensive one, that is. But nobody cares. Yeah, why would a boy worry about a price of a toy that he _knows_ he wants? You want it? Buy it. No money? :shock: Earn it. That's the way things work around here (Earth, not forum). And isn't it silly really.. somebody makes a perfect tool for you, but since you can't afford it, you're looking for compromises and compromises mean less optimal choice which is slowing down the progress and if you don't want us to go back to the trees and hang around on lianas munching some silly fruits that have only existed years ago, like, good bananas, then firs buy enough CF to survive at least one really good day, just to be sure nothing goes wrong (Murphy!) get an X-drive, and a laptop with DVD-R so you can burn those hot images TWICE. Use the technology, but don't trust it! :wink: :D

[CyberDyneSystems]

I have none of those problems you mentioned with my X-drive II at all.
My file copying is smooth with no errors, I transferred 3 GB today in under 10 mins, so no complaints from me.

Ditto,..

Currently I am transferring 1gig of RAW files shot durig a ballet rehearsal.. (the photos will suck,. there is NO light :( )

Yes it is slow,. part of that is error checking via /V switch (verify)

As long as I have a second 1gig card,. the download times are of no consequence,.. because there is no way I can shoot a gig of files faster than I can transfer them to the X-drive.

As soon as the second card is full I will swap again,. and I will format the now transferred card in camera with no more concern for the files on the hard drive tha I would have for the files on the CF card or on a laptop.

[CyberDyneSystems]

Actually,. it just copied the 1 gig in under 5 minutes :)

... o-kay breaks over back to the rehersal :)

[Case]

In any event, do you really want to trust your precious travel shots to a single, fragile hard drive, with suspect firmware? I thought not. :wink:

If there is no other option, hell yes!
I don't beleive HD's are as fragile as some think, although i would be cautious during any time the drive is actually in use. Perhaps one of the computer geeks (:)) could confirm this, but i thought HD's sort of "locked down" when not in use, reducing chances of physical damage.
CD's are to small (as someone mention, DVD's would be a better proposition), and there is no way to confirm you haven't just created another drink-coaster short of plugging it into a computer....how many copies would you make to be sure?

Chris

[Case]

In any event, do you really want to trust your precious travel shots to a single, fragile hard drive, with suspect firmware? I thought not. :wink:

If there is no other option, hell yes!
I don't beleive HD's are as fragile as some think, although i would be cautious during any time the drive is actually in use. Perhaps one of the computer geeks (:)) could confirm this, but i thought HD's sort of "locked down" when not in use, reducing chances of physical damage.
CD's are to small (as someone mention, DVD's would be a better proposition), and there is no way to confirm you haven't just created another drink-coaster short of plugging it into a computer....how many copies would you make to be sure?

Chris

[karusel]

If I recall correctly, a HD can withstand a drop from about 30-50 cm high, to a hard surface, anything more is a real risk.

I burn two CDR's with same files, and differend brand CDRs.