Digital Mate won't read CF > 1GB

I was bought a combined HDD/card reader casing for Xmas, into which I added my own 120GB HDD. The HDD works fine (I have about 100GB of data on it at the moment) and memory cards up to 1GB transfer without a hitch. But my 2GB cards will not copy over at all.

From Windows the 2GB cards can't even be formatted properly as they are not recognised as 2GB cards and the format dialogue tells me I can format them to 60KB. They work completely OK in my camera and I have filled them to 2GB with no problem.

This is the device - http://www.asound.com …sp?ProductClass​=75&id=334.

There is nothing in the documentation for the device to suggest there is a 1GB limit on the cards. I have written to Asound, two weeks ago, but have not had a reply. Can anyone offer any help?

What do you mean by "from Windows the 2 GB cards can't even be formatted properly"? Are you trying to format them in the card reader while it's connected to Windows? Or are you trying to format the card from the device in stand-alone mode. It's not impossible that your computer doesn't ever get to see the reader directly, but only through the electronics of the Digital Mate; in which case, you'd be restricted to FAT16.

I attach the Digital Mate to the Windows XP laptop via a standard USB cable. The HDD in the DM works perfectly and can be freely accessed from the laptop. The same thing applies to any cards of 1GB or less. I've tried SD cards, Memory Stick and Compact Flash. I can copy data back and forth from the laptop to the Digital Mate.

The Digital Mate will not read the 2GB cards in standalone mode and the 2GB cards cannot be usefully accessed from the laptop, when using the Digital Mate as a card reader. The laptop can see the card in the Digital Mate card slot but doesn't have a clue what it is. It can't see the data on the card. If I use Windows XP to attempt to format the 2GB card the normal dialogue for formatting in XP tells me that I can format the card as a 60KB (yep I do mean Kilobytes) drive. The only format option listed is FAT. I cannot pick FAT16 or FAT32 or FAT12. The drop-down is fixed as FAT.

It appears to me that the Digital Mate is incompatible with compact flash cards over 1GB. I don't know whether another brand would work any better but I only have Datawrite 2GB cards. Actually, I'm assuming the problem is with the card capacity but maybe it is the brand. My other (smaller) cards are Viking/Sandisk/Sony/Ki​ngmax/Integral. But as the Datawrite cards are fine in the camera I don't see why they should not work in the Digital Mate.

Sounds like it's, at the least, not compatible with FAT32 cards. Do you have access to a stand-alone card reader that you can use to format a 2 GB card as FAT16 using Windows? Normally a 2 GB card will be formatted FAT32 by default in cameras supporting FAT32, or by Windows.

My only card reader is the Digital Mate. I have a built in card reader in the laptop but it won't take CF cards. I'll see if I can hunt down someone with a reader - or just buy one.

Assuming I can get the card to work OK in another reader, and format it properly in FAT16, is there any downside to doing that? I guess there is a risk that the camera will throw a hissy fit, and that wouldn't do at all, or might I lose some storage space due to different formatting?

The Digital Mate was only bought last December, as an Xmas gift for me. I really don't understand why it wouldn't be able to cope with FAT32 as that should be pretty standard these days, given it first came out with Windows 95!

EDIT : The Digital Mate is obviously happy with FAT32 for the HDD because I formatted that in the Digital Mate as a single 120GB FAT32 partition. The specs do say "FAT32 supported" although that may be specifically with respect to the HDD. The specs do not differentiate by media type.

FAT16? Not really. You'll have to remember to not format the card in-camera; however I always format my cards in the computer. If they've got firmware in the box allowing the two pieces to talk to each other there's no telling what they may be doing.

OK, cheers. I've got a 2GB mini-SD card so when I find my adapter I'll give that a go and see if that hits the same problem.

SD is another thing entirely; CF has most of the controller hardware on the card. The SD family (including Mini-SD) have part of the controller on the reader. That's why some gear can handle 2 GB SD cards and other equipment can't. But CF problems are primarily due to directory structure until you start running into sector-mapping issues.