sd cards. What do you suggest?

[jelly]

I just got an ique and I would like suggestions on what kind and size of sd card to get. If I get a 256mb card, how much can I fit on it? I am living in NJ but travel 4 days a week, so I would like to get a big enough card to fit more then just my home area. I think the 256 is cheap enough, but really how much will it hold? Thank you. Jelly

[ZiLT]

I would get a Panasonic SD card. I have 3 of them, 2 512's and 1 256. I also live in NJ and a 256 would do just fun, But I would get a 512 SD card.

Here's a link to the cheapest panasonic 512 SD card
http://shop1.outpost.com/product/3625855

I bought both of my 512's from outpost.

That is a great price for the iQue on your other post.

[Error94]

On my 256 SD I have the Americas basemap, detail maps of all of Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and a few other random places, a few MP3s, several ebooks, a backup of my PDA, and most of my apps. (My launcher, ZLauncher, can save shortcuts to the apps in the PDA memory then copy the apps from the SD as you use them.) So you can really store quite a bit in 256. That said, I am thinking of getting a 512 before I take a long road trip so I can save what I have now in addition to all the states I will be travelling through plus some more MP3s.

[jelly]

Can you fit all the maps of nj on the one 256mb card? Thanks for the quick reply. Jelly

[jelly]

WOW! that is a lot stored on the card. Also, can you tell me about the basemap? is it on the unit already or do I have to load that. Thanks. Jelly

[reddavid]

I have all of Pennsylvania, and from Vermont to Virginia - coastline (I-95 corridor) on a 256 card. All of Jersey will easily fit on 256.

512 would be just more data/fun...if you can swing the $$$.

btw, you can see the sizes of the maps when you generate the image file to download to the iQue....

John

[waltisimo]

There are 2 different US basemaps. A big one and a little one. The little one comes preinstalled in the iQue's internal memory. You can move it to the card or install the larger one on the card.

You can change the basemap via a feature on the install CD or do it by hand. To do it by hand you find the basemap folder on the install CD and steal the files out of it. The only trick is that you have to install 2 files to put a basemap on the card. There is a large .img file that goes in the GARMIN folder on the card and a very small .pdb file that goes to the internal memory.

[ZiLT]

Originally posted by jelly
Can you fit all the maps of nj on the one 256mb card? Thanks for the quick reply. Jelly

you can fit NJ and a few more states on a 256 card

[TanD]

I would suggest the Scandisk Ultra II SD card from here

http://www.ecost.com/ecost/shop/detail.asp?DPNo=292217

one of the highest performace card available now.

[TanD]

I would suggest the Scandisk Ultra II SD card from here

http://www.ecost.com/ecost/shop/detail.asp?DPNo=292217

one of the highest performace card available now.

[Moose Man]

I had (operative word) a SanDisk 256MB and replaced it with a 512 Panasonic card. There is a visible difference in access time between a Panasonic and the SanDisk card, since the reason "had".

Go to this thread and read CinderK's results about a third of the way down the post.

http://www.pdastreet.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=23239

[Foretraveller]

Pls. accept that I am not over-burdened with knowledge. But isn't there a difference in transfer rates between the 256 and 512? I think the transfer rate for the 256 is 2 meg per second and the rate for the 512 is 4 meg/second.

Also, is anybody familiar with the PNY card? Who makes it? A salesman at Best Buy told me it was simply a relabelled SanDisk card.

[Foretraveller]

Well, I just checked Panasonic site. I wasn't even close and was still wrong. Both the 256 and the 512 have a data transfer of 10 mg/second.

Sorry everybody.

[TanD]

The Scandisk Ultra II SD card I mention above is the new Scandisk High Performance SD, which has a minimum of 9 meg/sec write and minimum of 10 meg/sec read.

[toolbear]

I have had two SanDisk cards in my digital camera. Both failed under warranty.

They are not answering my emails about what happened to the disk under warranty (got 5 months out of that one) I mailed back for RMA on 5/5.

I would love to avoid them and go Panasonic, but did not have a lot of choices at Best Buy or Costco when I needed one before starting a trip.

The next one will be Panasonic.

Not a happy SanDisk camper.

[jelly]

that scandisk ultra card sounds incredible. Thank you all so much for the suggestions. Jelly

[jelly]

I travel a lot with my job and sometimes I go to europe. Is there an option to load a (at least) basemap of both europe and america?
The reason that I ask is because I was in Frankfurt a few days ago and was walking around. After walking for awhile I realized that I was lost and thought that if I could have made the hotel a waypoint, I could easily have found it again when I was ready to go back. Is this at all possible? I understand that the ique would at least have to have a european basemap for me to use. I was wondering if it comes with one or if I would have to buy it. Thanks! Jelly

[microbe]

You can load the world basemap on the SD card. It is 30MB and includes all the available basemaps.

[jelly]

Wow Really! Do I have to pay extra for this or does it come with it? Also, could I add the say the hotel as a waypoint and just walk around and find it using the basemap? I can't wait! Jelly

[jonasolof]

Originally posted by microbe
You can load the world basemap on the SD card. It is 30MB and includes all the available basemaps.

I have City Select Europe. IN addition to the world basemap I could load the US basemap (plus of course all the european detailed maps of my choice) from the CD. The US basemap seems to add a certain level of details over North America and is useful as a general map. (Well, it could be that the world map already contains the relatively higher degree of details that the US basemap has. Since I loaded them together I couldn't check that)

Jonas

[CinderK]

FYI...

For those of you who followed Moose Man's previous link and read my SD card testing results, the SanDisk cards that I tested were not of the "Ultra" variety. They were the standard SanDisk cards. It sounds like these newer SanDisk Ultra cards are meant more for the "power users" & that they're probably comparable to the hi-speed Panasonic cards. I have not had a chance to test the SanDisk "Ultra" cards. If I ever do, I'll try to remember to post the results.

CinderK

[EarlyAdopter]

Has anyone heard of “Dane-Elec/Panasonic”? I was shopping for a Panasonic SD card and the FlashMemoryStore

http://www.flash-memory-store.com/dasd256.html

is selling them as Panasonic cards. But the card, in their picture, looks different from the Panasonic card on other sites. Not surprisingly, there's a significant price difference. Anyone know the scoop?

[jonasolof]

I just shifted from a Dane Edge 256 to a Panasonic 512 card. Panasonic is much faster when zooming in and out and redrawing maps.

My Dane Elec presents itself as a Toshiba. It even says so on the rear side in hard to read text printed directly on the card. I think there are different varities of Tosh cards. But I never had a problem with the Dane Elec card, so it might be worth the price difference.

For europeans: Dane Elec is sold at Media-markt also.

Looking at the link, I see a small difference in the paper label between my card and the one in your link to the flash-memory-store. On mine the nametag Dane Elec is underneath the white area with a dotted line for writing on.

The web page shows a label with the name tag above the white area. What's in a label?

The Panasonic card has the text Matsushita printed on the card on the rear.

I'd check twice before buying!

Jonas

[EarlyAdopter]

Thanks for the info.--I think I'll go for the one that is clearly made by Panasonic.

But before I click the Buy button, I've read here that there is a difference between SD cards formatted for cameras vs. PDAs. If that is true, why do no Web sites, or stores, (at least that I've seen) mark them either way?

[Last Mrk]

Matsushita is the parent company of Panasonic.

[jonasolof]

Originally posted by EarlyAdopter
Thanks for the info.--I think I'll go for the one that is clearly made by Panasonic.

But before I click the Buy button, I've read here that there is a difference between SD cards formatted for cameras vs. PDAs. If that is true, why do no Web sites, or stores, (at least that I've seen) mark them either way?

(Last Mrk, Thanks for the clarification about the link between Panasonic and Matsushita, I should have mentioned that. )

Early adopter: You format the card (and preferably so in the iQue, takes two seconds).

Whether a card is fast read or fast write would be seen from specs. Unfortunately, they are not shown by internet vendors so you have to rely on independent tests such as have been done on this forum earlier. Logically, there should be two versions of let's say a Panasonic card for the two needs. I have yet to see an offer of two versions though.

Panasonic and new Ultra San Disk are said to be fast. Ultra San Disk has one favorable report so far, Panasonic has many.

Jonas

[cancivsi97]

Originally posted by Foretraveller
Also, is anybody familiar with the PNY card? Who makes it? A salesman at Best Buy told me it was simply a relabelled SanDisk card.

The 256MB one I bought for $60 says it's a Toshiba card... the read speeds are great but write speeds are painfully slow. Okay for use for maps and mp3 storage but definately not one for a digital camera. I also use a 4in1 card to read write to it instead of palm sync so it's not painfully slow.

VFSMark Results with r2 update.

File Create: 34%
File Delete: 18%
File Write: 11%
File Read: 760%
File Seek: 842%
DB Export: 31%
DB Import: 887%
Record Access: 952%
Resource Access: 834%

VFSMark: 485