Can the Advantage use a card reader?

[Hokum]

I'm interested in using the Advantage to have as a mini laptop/phone access/gps and camera card backup device.
As such it would be spot on, small enough to fit in my rucksack but usable in the field.

But can you use a USB or other card reader to backup CF cards to the 8/16gb internal memory?

Edit: Just going to change me request, to who has tried a card reader? As i know it "should" work with one but who has?

[Pantaloonie]

Works fine on mine, using a cheap sd card reader.

[Hokum]

Its CF cards i'm interested in. So i can back up my SLR images to the 8gb internal drive. Do you know if those work?

[Pantaloonie]

Well, I said cheap SD reader, but it's actually one of those multi card readers, and it has a CF slot as well. I don't use CF cards so can't test that, but the Athena reads SD, MMC and Sony Pro Duo cards through it fine, so I have no reason to believe that CF cards won't work.

[bigtsr]

Its CF cards i'm interested in. So i can back up my SLR images to the 8gb internal drive. Do you know if those work?
Just read your post so whipped out the 4 in 1 cable and cheapie 25 in 1 card
reader and yes it sees the SD card NO it will not read the 2 gb CF
card from my Axim51v.

[cktlcmd]

Just read your post so whipped out the 4 in 1 cable and cheapie 25 in 1 card
reader and yes it sees the SD card NO it will not read the 2 gb CF
card from my Axim51v.

I wonder if it could be that the CF cards sucks more power, then if we use a card reader with an external power source, do you think that would work?

...

[Hokum]

Ouch, hmm that could be a killer for me. Thanks for looking though its most appreciated.

[bigtsr]

Well I used the same reader and CF on my host pc and it works fine.
It's either a power issue or because the 7501 doesn't have a driver
relating to the reading of CFs.

[hishamh]

The 7501 should read CF cards just fine - it's more likely a power issue or a FAT issue. I've just tested a few of my cards and found something interesting (I'm using the Dopod U1000) - the Athena will only read one external volume at a time. This was tested with a 4GB Sandisk M2 card with Memory Stick adapter, 2GB Transcend SD (SDIO1.0) card, and 1GB Transcend CF card, through two different multi-card readers, and with both the 4-in-1 cable and dock. All of the cards could be read, but only one at a time. A soft reset was also occasionally required.

This was surprising to me, because I once attached three FAT32 external HDDs to a Pocket Loox 720, and damn me if it didn't mount and read all three. Me being the curious type, I put both card readers through a powered hub and attached that to the Athena - same thing, only one card from one card reader could be read at any one time. I tried the same experiment on my Loox, and it also mounted only one card per card reader, but both card readers could be used at the same time. Just for fun, I added a usb flash drive and an independently powered 40GB FAT32 desktop drive in an external case, both mounted and could be read as well - I had Hard Disk 1 through 4 in File Explorer. At a guess, I'd say the one external volume limit is a problem with the Athena's mass storage driver, or something in the registry.

I also tried an 8GB Seagate ST1.2 CF Microdrive which couldn't be read in any configuration, with or without independent power to the card readers - as this card requires much more power than flash based CF, I'm not too surprised. I have an 8GB CF at home I'll try out later.

[eaglesteve]

The 7501 should read CF cards just fine - it's more likely a power issue or a FAT issue. I've just tested a few of my cards and found something interesting (I'm using the Dopod U1000) - the Athena will only read one external volume at a time. This was tested with a 4GB Sandisk M2 card with Memory Stick adapter, 2GB Transcend SD (SDIO1.0) card, and 1GB Transcend CF card, through two different multi-card readers, and with both the 4-in-1 cable and dock. All of the cards could be read, but only one at a time. A soft reset was also occasionally required.

This was surprising to me, because I once attached three FAT32 external HDDs to a Pocket Loox 720, and damn me if it didn't mount and read all three. Me being the curious type, I put both card readers through a powered hub and attached that to the Athena - same thing, only one card from one card reader could be read at any one time. I tried the same experiment on my Loox, and it also mounted only one card per card reader, but both card readers could be used at the same time. Just for fun, I added a usb flash drive and an independently powered 40GB FAT32 desktop drive in an external case, both mounted and could be read as well - I had Hard Disk 1 through 4 in File Explorer. At a guess, I'd say the one external volume limit is a problem with the Athena's mass storage driver, or something in the registry.

I also tried an 8GB Seagate ST1.2 CF Microdrive which couldn't be read in any configuration, with or without independent power to the card readers - as this card requires much more power than flash based CF, I'm not too surprised. I have an 8GB CF at home I'll try out later.


Great discovery. Thanks!

[hishamh]

I have an 8GB CF at home I'll try out later.

I've tried this card with both my card readers - it works just fine. I don't know what's going on with bigtsr's card, but my (flash-based) CF cards all appear to work.