SD card question

[gunman168]

Hi,

Is it ok if I install my applications/programs on my sd card? I need my SD card for larger memory for programs but wouldn't it drain my battery a lot sooner since files are being accessed through the sd card almost all of the time when working? Coz someone told me that the sd card doesn't draw power when the files in it are not being used at the time and on the other hand drains a considerable amount of power when internal files are accessed. Is this true?

Battery drain really concerns me since I hate gadgets that drain batteries really fast since I'm on the road almost all of the time and doesn't have access to power....and I don't like carrying extra stuff like chargers :) .

Sorry for the questions. I'm new with these things. Any comments are welcome and greatly appreciated. Thank you.

John
gunman168@yahoo.com

[Olydus]

I don't know the specifics about power drains but I can speak from the (limited) experience I've had.

I got an SD card a couple weeks ago. Programs run splendidly off SD cards. In fact, I've gotten away with putting a program in the background, swapping out the SD card, then putting the original back in and still have the program running great. There may be a couple apps out there that insist on certain directories being in the main memory though.

As far as power drain goes, the SDs drain is minimal(much less than, say, a CF card), I haven't noticed any real difference in battery life. But again, I've had minimal experience dealing with the power drains so someone else may want to comment.

[stevemw]

Yes, I agree with Olydus -- I too have installed many programs on my SD, especially those which come with or update databases, and have not had any problems other than the occasional loss of the program specific icon image on the shortcut in the Start menu (the only place that this appears to occur -- the icon sometimes changes to a generic application icon).

I have gone thru 128MB, 256MB SD cards and am now on a 512MB SD. After the next ROM update for the 3900 I will probably reinstall most of the additional applications on the SD.