I am buying an OLY 500 and have bought some 8MG SmartMedia cards for image storage. What are the pros and cons of a Flash Path adapter vs. a Parallel Port reader, specifically the Intermart PCD-SM30P which I have seen advertised. Where is the best place to buy either?

-- Jack Blume (jack@polarnet.com), December 17, 1998

Answers

I haven't done comparison timings on parallel port vs FlashPath, but would guess the parallel port devices will be faster. The FlashPath has the advantage of appearing in Explorer as a disk device, meaning no special software to transfer the files. (It *does* need its drivers installed though, so there is still some impact on your machine's system software.) Either approach will be a HUGE step up from using serial transfer -- I personally have a FlashPath, and noticed a BIG uptick in my digicam use thanks to how easy it became to get the images off the camera. As to where to buy, IR advertiser d-store sells several parallel-port devices, and Lexar Media (I think) has a direct parallel-port device for the SmartMedia cards. IR advertiser State Street Direct had a particularly low price on the FlashPaths for a while, but I don't know if that is still current.

-- Dave Etchells (web@imaging-resource.com), December 19, 1998.

I recently purchased a Lexar Media "Digital Film Reader", in the parallel port version, from www.firstsource.com for $81.68 including overnight shipping. About $65 for the reader. Okay, Okay, it was Thursday and I just couldn't wait. No blindfold, just shoot me, already... Lexar also sells a unit for use with Compact Flash memory.

It's very simple to install. Unplug your printer cable from your parallel port, plug the pass-through connector into the parallel port and attach the printer cable to the pass-through. Perform a similar operation with your keyboard cable(the reader gets it's power from the keyboard port like many webcams) and install the software. Cables are provided for normal and PS2 keyboard connectors.

Once it's installed the reader appears in "My Computer" or the Explorer whenever a SmartMedia is inserted. A small icon is added to your desktop tray(next to the time display in the lower right hand screen corner on Win 95 or 98) that shows the activity & status of the reader. Personally, I would have preferred a simple LED on the reader like all my other "drives" sport.

It's pretty fast. According to Lexar, 20X's faster than a serial connection. I think they're being a bit conservative, since it took me only about 16 seconds to copy the contents of a full 8Mb(7,448KB in this case) SmartMedia to a directory on my hard drive. My Toshiba PDR-M1 transfers about 285KB/minute through my serial port. That makes the reader about 98X's faster than the serial port. Pretty quick, IMHO. :) 16 seconds of anticipation sure does beat over 25 minutes of snoozing with the serial port.

-- Gerald M. Payne (gmp@francorp.francomm.com), December 19, 1998.