Hi
when I travel I either use a wolverine 80gb card reader/hard drive for backup and to free cards for more use or (my preference) a laptop to transfer images to a WD 250gb external drive, with a second one as a backup. This fall I'm going to Asia fora few weeks and don't want to bring my laptop for safety and convenience. I will likely more than fill the 80gb wolverine (shooting RAW 21mp). I was wondering if there was some sort of interface that facilitates transfer of images from either the card or the camera itself directly to a stand alone external drive without the need for a computer as the middleman. I know I could buy another wolverine, but their battery is dead after a couple of card transfers, I'm not sure what sort of electrical access I will have, and with a trip like this I really would feel better with some redundancy.
Any ideas? Thanks so much.

If you want to transfer files to an external drive from flash, there has to be a middleman somewhere.

Personally, I'd recommend a netbook. They are small, light, relatively inexpensive and are amazing travel companions.The little 9-inchers even fit in a camera backpack. All you need is a USB CF reader and you can transfer your files to the WD drive.

Full disclosure -- I work for ASUS and recommend theirs, but Acer, HP, Dell, Toshiba...everyone makes one these days.

Here's Amazon's top ten list: http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers...f=pd_ts_pc_nav

HyperDrive units are very efficient in power and the HD80 uses AA batteries and can transfer up to 80GB off a single set of batteries. You can get a universal charger to allow AA battery charging from almost any electrical source. I believe you can also power the unit from an external battery for much longer transfers.

The hard drive may be field swapped and accepts standard 2.5" hard drives.

Originally Posted by ziggy53 HyperDrive units are very efficient in power and the HD80 uses AA batteries and can transfer up to 80GB off a single set of batteries. You can get a universal charger to allow AA battery charging from almost any electrical source. I believe you can also power the unit from an external battery for much longer transfers. The hard drive may be field swapped and accepts standard 2.5" hard drives.

Thanks, that looks good, but on the B&H site it says it has been discontinued here. There is no link to buy on the hyperdrive site. It looks like for their other products you can buy an external power source that accepts AA batteries, and in the accessories section there is a device that transfers from the hyperdrive to an external drive. That alone makes it worth it to me. Shame about the HD80 though.

This may be the obvious, but.... From experience, you typically know when there are potential exposure problems, so you could always shoot .jpgs, then switch to Raw only when needed. That's my typical workflow and it's extremely rare that I regret not shooting something in raw. With highlight tone priority, advanced metering and all the other great features we have now, it's a little more forgiving shooting .jpgs. And thank God for Photoshop when we do screw up. :)

If you start to run out of storage, it probably wouldn't be hard to locate and buy another card or two in Asia. Those things are certainly cheap enough these days.

Hope you have a great trip,

-Rob Pauza
Rob Pauza Photography

Hyperdrive is what you probably want, the current model Colorspace UDMA has a USB Host function which lets you transfer files from the Hyperdrive to any connected USB Storage device (other Disks, Memory Cards, USB Sticks, etc.). Transfer from camera to storage is always slow and drains your cameras batteries very fast.

Originally Posted by Manfr3d Hyperdrive is what you probably want, the current model Colorspace UDMA has a USB Host function which lets you transfer files from the Hyperdrive to any connected USB Storage device (other Disks, Memory Cards, USB Sticks, etc.). Transfer from camera to storage is always slow and drains your cameras batteries very fast.

Yeah that colorspace UDMA model looks sweet, I think I'm going to get the case only and it says it accepts any 2.5" internal drive, which I see on Amazon for up to 500GB for less than $100. The accessory that allows mirror transfers to an external drive makes it all worth it to me, and I already have a load of rechargeable AA batteries I use for my flashes that I can use for power. Thanks for making my day!

Why not just buy a bunch of CF cards? Seems like they would be more reliable than the other issues offered here, except maybe a SSD netbook.

Well by my calculations....

16 x 8 GB CF cards = 504 GB

16 cards x $72 = $1,152

this is for the 8gb 266x compact flash cards at newegg. Sure you can find cheaper, that is just what I found, thinking transcend one of the cheaper reliable names.

Compare that with what? $300-$400 dollars for a UDMA colorspace and a 500gb hard drive. Likely get them cheaper too not checking prices at the moment because I am lazy.

Also you then have one harddrive to keep track of, instead of 16 CF cards...

I would cost is a major factor though.

Originally Posted by Toshido Well by my calculations.... 16 x 8 GB CF cards = 504 GB ...

16 * 8 = 128

A respectable amount for sure.

It would take around 63 - 8 Gig cards to equal 504 GBytes.

Originally Posted by ziggy53 16 * 8 = 128 A respectable amount for sure. It would take around 63 - 8 Gig cards to equal 504 GBytes.

Ooops, it seems my math was WAY off, thanks Ziggy.

Just further illustrates my point on cost though :)

Originally Posted by chrismoore Yeah that colorspace UDMA model looks sweet, I think I'm going to get the case only and it says it accepts any 2.5" internal drive, which I see on Amazon for up to 500GB for less than $100. The accessory that allows mirror transfers to an external drive makes it all worth it to me, and I already have a load of rechargeable AA batteries I use for my flashes that I can use for power. Thanks for making my day!

Where did you see the UDMA model casing only? would you please provide a link? Thanks!

http://www.hyperdrive.com/HyperDrive.../hdcsu-000.htm

http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digita...7703678&sr=8-1

Total price: $350, tops $400 w/ shipping.

HTH,
~Nick