SD Card for m515

[PilotUser]

Does anyone have any idea if there is a limit on the capacity of the SD card the Palm unit can use ?

I believe that largest capacity of the SD is 128Mb ... Has anyone have any problem using this size on their unit (specificly m515) ?

Thanks ...

[DrMud]

I have seen 256MB Cards list for sale!
You should have no problem with your 128 card on the 515. OS 4.1 handles the previous issues encountered with 4.0 when going beyond 64MB. Be aware that your Palm when ask about the card will show the memory as less than the 128MB. Some space is used on the card for its own memory needs, i.e. name and file structure.
DrMud

[d-roC]

i have a 128MB card and it works fine. i like it. i cant wait to get my files from my 32mb card over to it. as long as u dont format the card in the palm. then u will have a boat load of probs. the cards come formatted already so u dont have to do anything.

now go have fun :D

[PilotUser]

Thanks for the replies ...

Is there any situation why we should format the SD card ? And if we must, then how can it be formatted without using the Palm ?

Can the card be both used on a digital camera & Palm interchangeably ? (at the same time ?)

[DrMud]

There are I am sure a number of situations that could require that you format an SD card. Palm OS 4.1 still seems to have problems with formatting cards over 64mg. A card reader would be the easy way. Be sure to set the format to FAT 16, the old DOS format.
A piece of software called SyncWizard (PalmGear.com) allows you to use your Palm and the HotSync Cradle as a card reader and will format. I use this program and love it for a variety of reasons.
DrMud

PS: I have no direct experience with SD cards used in cameras. It is most reasonable to assume they are also format in FAT 16 due to the very nature of the application in a camera.

[ChessMan]

The answer is yes to the use of the same SD card for both Palm Applications and Photos on a Digital Camera. Although I use separate cards for each I did combine both as a test to respond to your question. The files appear to offer no conflict, and when put in a card reader they are identified as what they are and may be read and sent to their respective devices.

I never thought of combining the files on a single card but there may be some advantages by virtue of the fact that one card does it all.

Hope this helps.

ChessMan

[DrMud]

Thank you for the test ChessMan. I have been looking for a good deal on one of the less expensive Kodak cameras that uses SD. My goal to take pictures on the road and email them from the Palm using my wireless modem.
DrMud

[Sparticus Caine]

I had my Visor Neo crater on me the other day... board must have been cooked. All it gave me was Fatal Exception errors, even on a hard "wipe it all off" reboot. At any rate, I bought a Palm M500 and was a bit miffed because I couldn't use my Neo's mp3 player springboard module anymore. My day brightened when I realized I could just take the 64mb MultiMedia Card that came with it and format it in my new unit. Woot! An instant extra 64mb (61.0mb actually) of memory! Its a good unit to, the M500.

[ChessMan]

DrMud, if you are looking for a truly portable Digital Camera, take a close look at the Minolta DiMage X. It is as small as a 2mp camera can get (3.5" x 2.6" x .7") and it offers incredible image quality. It can be had for about $240.00 on the web.

In its small leather belt case it takes up less room than my Palm m515, which makes it easy to take on the road.

I have attached the URL to get you to their demo site.

[URL=http://www.minoltausa.com]

Hope this helps and good luck on your quest.

ChessMan

[DrMud]

Thanks again for the personal review. It looks like just what I'm after.
DrMud

[2cool]

I've been using the 256MB SD on my m515 for a couple of months with no problems. The built in "Menu/Info/Device: SD" correctly lists the card size and free space.

[Sparticus Caine]

Just out of curiosity, how much did your 256mb SD card cost you? I have the 64mb one now, but a 256mb would be just dandy :)

[PilotUser]

I do not currently have a SD card yet, so will need to rely on you good folks out there for info ...

Has anyone use the SD card concurrently on both the Palm and another device (digi-cam, MP3 player ... etc) at the same time ?

Would the Palm (and/or) the other device allow the card to store different file format at same time ? Or the card has to be dedicated to a single device at a time ?

Thanks in advance ...

[ChessMan]

PilotUser

Regarding multiple devices using the same SD card, see my earlier post (8/23) in this thread.

It does appear, based on that limited test, that each device identifies its own file on the card. When the card is placed in a reader each file is easily identified as to what it is.

Another interesting note, is that after taking photos with my Minolta DiMage X Digital Camera, and then placing the card back in my Palm m515 it automatically opened the Photo Viewer Album.

These things are smarter than we are!

Hope this helps.

ChessMan

[2cool]

$150 at TheNerds.net.

Originally posted by Sparticus Caine
Just out of curiosity, how much did your 256mb SD card cost you? I have the 64mb one now, but a 256mb would be just dandy :)

[Sparticus Caine]

Is that US or Canadian? If its 150 Canadian, thats my next stop :)

[elchino]

Do the SD cards function like the springboards do? Can I run some applications off the card?
Do you store the database file on the card and the prc file in the internal memory?

:cool:

[y201k]

Ask DrMud.
I have Leaxar SD card (obtained from Compusa). When insert to my M505, it displayed: This card is read-only.

I checked w. the salesman and was confirmed that this is a for data card.
I returned and get another card, the M505 displayed the same thing. I still have the card.
To clarify the thing: the sd card made by Lexar, has green and yellow color, 32MB model: SD-M32B1.
Please give me an advice and I am listening.
Thanks.

[DrMud]

All SD cards are the same basic content and function. They are storage. Some applications like PiDirect will launch apps from the card. If you have difficulty with the card not being read by your Palm your Palm can Format the card so that it will be read correctly.
DrMud

[y201k]

Thanks DrMud.
Can you tell how to format the card?

[ffolliet]

further on multimedia cards

have a 32mb in my palm and recently tried to upload documents to go premium. crashed the whole system.

now my card has "disappeared" tried synchwizard but it doesn't "see" it to allow me to format it. any clever ideas??

[DrMud]

Go to the main Application screen (Home) and find "Card Info" icon, tap Card Info, drop down the menu, choose "Format Card." Next thing you know you will have a formatted card and be happy again!
DrMud

[y201k]

Thanks DrMud.
I followed your instruction, But, it seemed is card is, as the palm showed, read-only.
I might have to contact lexar to find out.
Thanks for your great contribution to the forum.
:p

[DrMud]

Read Only!? Was the card orginally formatted for content such as a game card or dictionary? I hope they not only give you a good answer but also a new card.
Best of luck.
Doc

[ChessMan]

Just a quick thought - check to be certain that the lock on your card is not on. If it is you will get a "Read Only" message.

Hope it is that simple - Good Luck!

ChessMan

[DrMud]

Earlier in this thread I posted a word or two about SyncWizard. SyncWizard can format the card. If you have this program try using it to format the card. If you don't have it try it as a demo.
DrMud

PS: I hope to hope that chessman is on the right track. Simple is always too easy to over look.

[ffolliet]

simple it may be but i've tried that. the device doesn't see a card, therefore won't format. suspect the card must be fried, somehow.

[Telyx]

Chessman is right. There is a little tiny slide "switch" on the edge of the card. Make sure it isn't in the Lock position.

[ffolliet]

nice try guys....... no wee sliders switch anywhere.

any OTHER ideas?

[ChessMan]

If there is no switch, my guess is that your card started out as a dedicated program card (no switch) that truly is "Read Only", such as a Rand McNally Road Atlas Card. You can read it - but you certainly don't want to write over it.

I'm certain that every SD Card manufacturer makes a number of them without a switch for dedicated programs to be "Read Only". Again, I'm just guessing - but your card manfacturer may have packaged a "Read Only" card in error. Probably best to chat with the manufacturer or go back to the store you purchased it at and get one with a switch.

As always, Good Luck in your quest.

ChessMan

[ffolliet]

but it's a multi-media card......

thanks for ideas tho'

[Sparticus Caine]

Ya know... instead of an SD card, why not use an MMC card instead? I find that MMC cards have less problems and seem to take to the Palm alot better. Just an observation from the retail side of things...

[ffolliet]

SUCCESS!!!

using old fashioned (flawed) logic i did the following.

tried my card in another palm and his in mine. nada on mine, fine on his! problem = palm reading not the card. soft re-boot......(doesn't it take ages!!) tada! look at all that free memory!!

so thanks for all the help, but i finally sorted it myself. don't know why it was a problem but it's fixed.

[ChessMan]

Congratulations ffolliet!!

You've proven once again that simple solutions are more often than not the right solutions. We were all looking for the unusual when a simple reset solved it all.

Perhaps we're all just spoiled by the fact that the Palm OS works so well that we don't even think about it occasionally getting out of sync.

The good news is - you're back in business.

Enjoy!

ChessMan

[foneill]

:( I have read the posts on this thread. I also am having a problem with a 128mb SanDisk SD card. I did try formatting it and it just hung there and I needed to do a soft reset. After several attempts the same thing happend. It does not recognize the card at all. It is also too late to send it back to Buy.com.
Can anyone help me?

Thanks:(

[drdwm]

I've even used the sd card to transfer Word or Excel files from my computer to work...with the small almost no weight card reader...it's great. And...I transfered all data from the Palm Dictionary Card to the 128mb sd card....EVERYTHINGS ON ONE CARD!!!!!!

[Kayvon]

foneill, almost all the SD cards I have seen come with a manufacturor's 5-year warranty (take Sandisk, for instance). If it's been less time than that, give them a call and they'll usually ask you where you got it (Buy.com in your case) and when. If it's been more than 5 years, I'm interested to know how you got a hold of a 128mb SD card that long ago and what you were doing with it. :)

As for the maximum capacity card available (that was the original post question), I believe Lexar beats everyone in that competition. They sport a 512mb, read: half a gig!, secureDigital card. I'm not sure how the access times compare on it, though.
However, pricewise, the 128mb is probably your best bet. The dollar per megabyte ($/mb) drop to about .6 there. It goes up as you increase the total capacity, or go for a smaller card. 64mb and 256mb are reasonable alternatives, however, depending what you'll need them for. They still make ok sense pricewise.

And someone asked a couple posts ago why we don't just all use MMC (MultiMedia Cards) instead of SD cards. Besides the encryption offered with SD cards (which I won't pretend to understand at the moment-- they just all have that as a feature on their specs), the SD cards sport a faster i/o rate. In other words: yes, MultiMedia Cards will work just fine, but since we're often worried about speed on whatever we use them for (an m505/m515 in this case), it's nicer to have an SD card that reads and writes faster.
While I'm on the subject, programs like VFSMark (available on palmgear.com) can rate the speed and effeciency of SD/MMC cards. My 128mb Sandisk reads faster (114%) than the Palm's 16mb SDC, but writes MUCH slower (6%) than that card. It's not too tough to get around, however, since I have a USB MMC/SD card writer/reader that connects to my computer with a much more reasonable write speed. Anything large I need to install I just pop the card in the reader instead of the Palm. The read speed of the Palm is what's really important to me (since I _read_ cards while I'm on the road and rarely write large amounts of data to them).

Hope this helps!

[foneill]

thanks,
I did contact Sandisk and I just got the info from them on how to send it in for replacement. I appreciate your help.

[djmangen]

Regarding MMC versus SD speed: I will NOT pretend to be an expert on this, but I have been told that the speed advantage for SD is a theoretical advantage, in that the current generation of PDA do not take advantage of the additional data lines on the SD card.

[cricket7]

I went to Nerds.com and saw too many different kinds of cards. Which card would I want for my m515? What should I be looking for in the card?
THanks.

[Kayvon]

Originally posted by cricket7
Which card would I want for my m515? What should I be looking for in the card?
THanks.

The first thing I would look for is a good warranty. I'd make sure it covers a year or two. Any longer than that isn't too important to me because I either forget I have the warranty or lose the card or something else by that point. Besides, if it works for 2 years with no problem, it'll probably keep working for another 3 or 8, if it doesn't get hit by an "act of God" not covered in the warranty. Like getting snapped in half or something.
The next thing you could check for is access speed. I talked about this briefly in an earlier post on this thread, so I won't duplicate that text here, but I'm sure you could ask around and find out which brand is balanced to fit your needs.
Other than that, I can just tell you which brands are most popular. Sandisk seems to be the leader and moderately priced. All Palm cards are extremely overpriced. Lexar has a series of cards which seem to be less expensive at times. A lot of other 3rd parties make them, like Panasonic. Panasonic was involved in inventing the SD card along with a couple other companies I can't recall, so one would think they'd be good quality, too.
The only other "feature" I can think of
is a write protect switch I've seen on every SD card so far. If that's a big deal to you, you might double-check to be sure the generic brand you're ordering has one.

In a nutshell, I'd just try to find a good price for what you think you'll be using. I'd also be sure there's at least a very basic warranty. That's about it! Take a look at my earlier post or feel free to e-mail me if I can clarify or answer anything else.

And if you find an incredible deal, tell me. :)

[Pointman]

:) Kayvon, Thanks for the GREAT input!! Thanks for taking the time to share your knowledge with us.