Pile of Flash Memory

I guess I'm late on the Spring cleaning, but today I came upon a pile of flash drives in my drawer. Actually, make that a pile of flash memory when you add in the pile of SD cards too. I decided to look into this, rather than keep buying more of these clever devices.

Truth is, none of them were close to capacity. And more than one of them had a folder labeled "Important Documents" that had stuff that the next drive had as well, although none were really complete.

I decided to just delete what I didn't need, and then put the really important stuff on a folder on my desktop. When it was done, not too much was left, which left me fine. In total, I cleaned up around 5 flash drive, and another 5 SD cards. Now that I freed up the memory, I can start the whole process again.

Maybe I should rename the folder "Very Important Stuff?"

Jonas

Why So Small?

I bought a digital camera a few months back, a Canon PowerShot A590. While it was not too expensive, I'm still trying to figure out one thing- it came with a mere 32 MB card. This simply doesn't make much sense. If they want to be so cheap about it, they could just leave it out all together. I have a whole box of cards, and the next smallest one it 128 megs, on up to 4 gigs. They should at least include a 256 meg card in my opinion, or just not bother. What a waste, that I now toss this card that I will never use. Does this make sense to anyone? Maybe they should just include a coupon in the box for $5 off a memory card of the user's choosing.

NudgeCast 1/13/09

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Thoughts on CES, trouble with a flash drive, and spyware software where the cure is worse than the problem.

NudgeCast 8/21/07

This time we're guessing at Apple's next iPod, and talking about a new flash memory review I'm devising.

Listen here.

--Jonas

Or, I'm trying something new, and you can take a listen on blip.tv:




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Ahead of Its Time

I remember a few years back that there were plenty of mp3 players that utilized flash cards as their storage medium. The most common used the Secure Digital format, and built a simple and affordable player around them. Add in monochrome screen, and a set of earbuds, and we’re ready to rock and roll.

The only wrinkle in the plan was that in those days, flash cards were expensive, and the capacities were too small. With a 128 meg card, we could only fit around an album or two of music on the card. I think the companies expected us to buy up a pile of cards and keep swapping them to change music. Even with one of those silly flash card wallets, only the geekiest would want to walk around like that. No, Apple read the market, realized that a mini hard drive would be able to hold much more, and the iPod took over. Apple’s later flash players, the Shuffle, and the newer Nano, have the flash memory built in, and no slot for a flash card, which is really too bad.

One of the few players left that has any slot for a flash card is the SanDisk line. They use the more diminutive microSD card slot in all of their current players. However, the capacities are limited to 2 gigs currently, and the removable cards supplement the internal memory, but are not the only memory. (As an aside, the Sansa Connect is likely to support a new microSD high capacity format with a firmware upgrade, but the cards aren’t even on the market yet, and will likely be quite expensive).

Now that full size Secure Digital cards are so affordable, I’d love to see a dirt cheap player sold that uses the card as the only memory. Better yet, it should support the even larger capacity Secure Digital High Capacity (SDHC) cards that currently top out at 8 gigs, and are expected to grow even further in the not too distant future. Can we imagine a simple player with 8 gigs of flash memory for under a $100? And when the larger capacity card comes out, and drops to an affordable level, we can pop it right in the slot, and double our tunes.

Do I think we’ll see such a product soon? I doubt it. We’re in an Apple dominated media player world, and they’ve never made much that didn’t go out of date faster than the signature white got yellowed. If Microsoft was smart, such a player would make a nice addition to the Zune line, and fill their low end gap. The R&D would be minimal, they just need an interface, and decide on a battery, with my vote to a standard AA. If Microsoft doesn’t do it, then some company really should, maybe a flash memory manufacturer that at least would have a vested interest in selling the cards. In the meantime, this remains an idea ahead of its time.

--Jonas

NudgeCast 8/14/07

This time we're talkin' about revisitin' RSS feeds, a jammed flash card from Dane Elec, and saving photos, the ol' fashioned way.

--Jonas

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NudgeCast 071607

This time out, we're speaking our mind on flash memory card formats, including the ones that aren't worth spending the dough on.

Listen here.

--Jonas

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A New Class of Portable ???

After Palm left us underwhelmed with their new Foleo device, I wasn't expecting much else in this category with all eyes on the iPhone. I was pleasantly surprised to see that Asus has decided to join the fray with a simplified twist on the laptop, and a reported price tag of around $200.

What does two Franklin's buy one today? The specs include a 7" screen, a mobile Intel CPU, 512 megs of RAM, with both 10/100 Ethernet and b/g WiFi connection options. There's no hard drive with CF cards performing this duty. With no mechanical hard drive and that small of a screen I was a little disappointed with the 3 hour run time, but it's still better than many notebooks out there today. To keep the price down, the operating system is Linux based, but it is Windows XP compatible.

I'm especially excited about the 0.89 kg weight (1.96 pounds to the nonmetric Americans). At that weight and price, I would definitely look into this as an able travel companion, if not for other uses. As long as it could surf the internet and word process, that's 90% of what I need to do on the road as well. I could also envision students. particularly younger ones getting a lot of use out a machine like this.

Between the Palm Foleo, and now this from Asus, is there a new class of device developing- a small notebook with a flash hard drive? Is this the next evolution of the notebook? I'm interested to see if others introduce any similar devices.

--Jonas

Sources:
Engadget
HardwareZone

Shrinking Memory Chips

There is no shortage of memory card formats, and I'm sure there are many more planned. It's good for business that just as you collect a drawer full of compact flash cards, that now your new device needs a Secure Digital card. And then just when you have those cards, then they switch to the Mini SD card (which never really caught on because SD Micro was right behind it). The pattern becomes obvious as the manufacturers rinse, cycle and repeat as we buy the next card in the cycle.

The overall trend is to make these flash cards smaller and smaller. As our electronics approach the size of a Chiclet, those older memory formats simply are too big to preserve the svelte lines of that new digital camera or smartphone. Hence, the memory guys come out with an even smaller format that will fit inside of the new device.

I recently purchased a new Micro SD card. As I thought compact flash was pretty, well, compact, I was shocked the first time I saw the thin lines of a Secure Digital card. I was even more amazed when the Mini SD format was introduced that cut the size of the SD card in half roughly. Needless to say, this latest format, Micro SD is something out of a James Bond film that is around one quarter the size of the full SD cards. The Micro SD is also very thin as it needs to fit into the standard size SD adapter to be read by a computer. Seriously, I can only start to imagine how such a small card can hold such a large amount of data, and be this affordable as well (one gig for ten bucks!). While we've all seen pictures in magazines and web sites of these teeny cards, until I held one directly it didn't hit me how diminutive this card really was.

While this downwards spiral towards smaller and even smaller continues unabated, I'm starting to wonder if it should stop at some point. I really can't imagine wanting to own anything smaller than the Micro SD card. It's already smaller than my thumbnail, and as thin as an index card. If we sneeze on it the wrong way, it will be easily lost, and quite difficult to find again. Make that impossible to find if it gets lost outside. Also, before they bring the “Nano SD” card to market (or whatever they decide to call it, “Microscopic SD” anyone?), we should also recall that we have an aging demographic with close vision issues, and arthritis. For example, my octogenarian cousin, who uses his digital camera quite often, would have difficulty loading the Micro SD into his camera.

I think that Micro SD is small enough, and the quest for tiny electronics needs to be balanced with a size that can be used. While one day we may be able to store a gig of data on the head of a pin, the memory makers should remember that it needs to be in a format that preserves usability. Let's hope the Nano SD doesn't come too soon, or at the least, they package in forceps and a magnifying glass because many will need it. Then again, with everything electronic constantly shrinking, some things in life are simply inevitable.

--Jonas

A Big Deal On A Little Card

I've been looking to get a new Secure Digital memory card, but as it wasn't an emergency, I've been waiting to see one on sale. I was also debating if the SD card should be a standard SD card, or one of the newer, smaller SD cards. As the smaller cards can be used reportedly with an adapter just like a full size card when needed, the only penalty is added cost.

Last week Staple's had the card on sale for $19.95 with no rebates. It was a Micro SD card, and it seemed like a good deal. Just to make sure I was getting a good deal, I took a surf on over to the NewEgg site. There were plenty of one gig Micro SD cards in the $10 range from name brand manufacturers. I was getting ready to choose the brand when I realized that the shipping costs were $4.99. While I could still get it for five bucks less than Staples, knowing that the weight of one of these cards is almost nothing, it seemed they were taking advantage of the shipping charges to pad the profits. I decided to wait, and if I didn't find a better deal in a few weeks, I would order one. I really think that if I order something else, and they can ship both items in one box, I shouldn't have to pay the $4.99 charge.

Totally out of the blue, Microcenter emails me a coupon for a one gig Micro SD card for a mere $9.99. Now we're talking, and as I can pick it up, no shipping (I'll refrain from calculating in the $3 plus per gallon gas...ouch!) the only catch is that it is one of these "bulk packaging" deal which translates to just the item with no packaging. I wander around the store, probably as they intended, and I find the display of flash memory cards. While they have every brand out and displayed, they don't have any of these generic cards out for sale. It turns out they keep them behind the service desk. I headed on over, the associate goes in the back, and returns with the card, and the adapter, all in a clear case that is the size of a compact flash card case. As I went for my wallet to pay, imagine my surprise that my generic memory in bulk packaging was actually Kingston brand! If we buy it directly from Kingston, the price is $15 before shipping. Even if I buy it directly off of the Microcenter site, it is also $14.99. I'm also glad that the card is from Kingston as this way it has a lifetime warranty, and I have had a few cards go bad over the last few years.

Reproduced below is exactly what I purchased:


I think the take home message is to not assume that the online retailers have the better deal, as their are some good deals locally. If you have a Microcenter near you, be sure to sign up for their email coupons here.

--Jonas