2007-02-22T19:00:00
Rated 4 out of 5
Use with Confidence - Excellent Value
Early in 2006, when we purchased this card, the cost per MB made this an excellent value compared to non-microdrive CF cards. We decided that this was a good purchase, despite the fact that reviewers sometimes dismissed microdrives as slow and susceptible to damage in less-than-ideas handling conditions. Even my[...]sales rep, [...], tried to talk me out of buying this card in favor of the "faster" [...] "that the pros use," to accompany with my [...] A year later, and over 15,000 images recorded to my Pexagon/Hitachi 6 GB Microdrive, I can only report one malfunction. Late last year, while shooting a 75th birthday party, 58 consecutive images were successfully captured in the first 30 minutes, but then discovered the camera flashing an "Err 02" message, during which time we cannot account for 24 images that were apparently not written to the card. (Shame on me for not noticing the error message sooner.) Finished the job with a back-up card. Contacted Hitachi Global Storage Technologies and they responded in a timely manner explaining that my "problem is not a known issue with this drive," and recommended "Reformatting the drive on a regular basis is always a good idea."Up to that session, the card had only been "erased" after use. Now it is "formatted" each time, instead. We have had no further problems.I recently purchased a [...] card and performed comparisons between the two CF cards. In-camera tests with the [...] showed no difference in image recording time and no increase in number of consecutive images captured. However, direct transfers to the [...] using PC Card adaptors verified the speed difference between the two CF cards. The microdrive was slightly slower used with a standard adaptor, but transfer speeds were tremendously improved using a [...]. The 8GB Extreme III won that speed test over the 6GB Microdrive. But for shooting, it's just the same.The 6GB Microdrive lives in the camera. It has been dependable and I continue to use it with confidence.
Erick W.
