Slow card reader speeds

Hi All,

After using cable transfer from my 30D on my workstation I decided to buy a card reader (Sandberg 26in1) to ease the job a bit. The card reader is USB 2 Hi-Speed capable and connected to a Hi-Speed compatible USB 2.0 Port (Asus P5B motherboard).

To my surprise I am only getting like 2.7 - 2.8 mb/s transfer speeds and it seems to me that using cable transfer from camera is actually faster. The CF Card is a Sandisk Ultra II 2Gb card.

2.8 mb/s on a single 7-8 mb. raw file is not what I was hoping for. Am I doing something wrong or are those speeds to be expected from a device that is USB 2.0 Hi-Speed certified?

If I were to take a guess... I'd say they should be at least the same as your camera/cable. maybe try updating drivers. sorry, not much help

Reader does not use any drivers under Windows XP. Auto detected and should be up and running without any as such.

Hard disk free space and fragmentation also count. I used to have speed of about 5-6 MB/s when disk was almost empty, but now I get only about 2-3 MB/s.

Just tried a Mini SD card from my cellphone. That was able to reach 5 mb/s in the same card reader. Sounds very strange that a Sandisk Ultra II CF Card should be slower?

Hard disks are two brand new 500 gb. drives. Very little fragmentation if any.

Probably Sandberg company believes 2.5 Mb/s is high speed.
Actually speed depends on card reader as well.
I can try my 1Gb Sandisk Ultra II CF card with a proper (I believe ) card reader and tell you my speed. I just don't remember it right now.
I have another card - Ridata 4 Gb 150X CF card. I am getting about 16 Mb/s with Sandisk Imagemate (with ESP logo!!!) card reader. Without ESP it was about 10 MB/s as far as I remember.

Please read this. http://www.robgalbrait​h.com …_page.asp?cid=7​-7883-7912
I just want to say that Card reader does matter.

I saw some dodgy card readers. All of them had HighSpeed labels. So this label means nothing for me now.
My own opinion is if they claim 26in1 capability means this is the only advantage they have. Another advantage is the price. Sandisk is not the cheapest card reader. Especially in Australia.

Couple of other things - check the cable, and are you using the same USB port for the reader and for the camera? If a USB 1.1 device is plugged into a hub, it'll slow everything else on that hub to USB 1.1 speeds.

Thanks for the replies and suggestions. Already tried all the hubs with no other USB devices connected. I ordered a new SanDisk Card Reader and I'm gonna send the one I got back.

Please let us know about your new speed. I hope it will be better.
And please check if Sandisk card reader has ESP logo on the package.

Just a thought - is it possible you got one of the counterfeit SanDisk cards that are being sold on eBay?

Good point. Unfortunately.