Anyone have experience using 4GB CF card on SL-6000?

[MacHead_Shane]

I was wondering if anyone has had any experience using large-capacity caompact flash cards on the new SL-6000. Can the Zaurus support the new 4GB cards?

I had a SL-5500 that had to have the cards formatted in FAT16. To the best of my knowledge, that will maximize capacity to 2GB. If it accepts FAT32 formatting, it should support the 4GB card.

My company wants to stay away from MicroDrives (due to higher power consumption) and are really interested in the 4GB CF cards. If anyone has had any experience, I would greatly like to hear about it.

Thanks.

[v8esprit]

I\'m using one right now.  Its 1 FAT32 Partition.  I got the Hitachi 4GB Microdrive out of a Muvo.  There are tutorials on how to disasemble the Muvo.  I did, formated it FAT32 and plugged it in.  No probs.  

I\'d recommend it.  Now its not fast...but still faster than this 256mb SD card I have.  

It does take up battery life, but I got the expansion sleeve and now my battery lasts forever.  I\'ve yet to deplete it.

Both are good upgrades, but expensive.

-Lox

[ev1l]

He's specifically asking about the CF card. As in solid state, not microdrive.

[stnkypaperweight]

I just got my 2.2 GB Magicstor Microdrive today.

Put a 128mb movie on it... plays just fine.

The drive is doing fine so far...  

 

duh..  i should have read a little bit more...

I don't see why a solid state high capacity CF card wouldn't work on the 6000.
It supports CF Type II and large storage obvioiusly works.

But, I don't own a solid state CF card cuz they cost almost twice as much.... so I can't give a definitive "yes".

I haven't noticed much drain on my batteries so far from my microdrive... I'll keep you updated tho.  ( the magicstore supposedly "sleeps" when its not in use to reduce power consumption )

If the Magicstor manages power consumption well,  a 4.4 GB Magicstor could still be feasable and much cheaper....

Also, in respect to your question about fat32: I have a fat32 formatted SD memory card and its working fine and so is my fat32 microdrive.

[freizugheit]

Be careful, new 4GB Microdrive from MuVo has built-in locking mechanism and cannot be mounted on the Z.

[stnkypaperweight]

ok.. well I had a issue related to using swap on the microdrive in combination with suspending and waking up...

oh well...

Here's the link to the forum topic for more details:

Topic: Bad 2.2 GB CF Card...

 

[xjqian]

I Bought the seagate 8GB microdrive from Amazon for $153 after rebate. Formated as ext2.

Good: worked great for file transfer, waching movies, etc.
Bad: the microdrive's generic delay of spining up (1-2sec) after suspend-resume remains. This means I can't leave program like zbedic (dictionary on microdrive) open while suspending, which will in turn crash the applicaion and creat a "ghost" zbedic after resume. x/qt debian on the microdrive is not stable either. Besides, small clicking sound every ~10 seconds during sustained r/w.
Not sure: impact on battery life?

I'm also thinking about buying the Hitachi 6GB microdrive for comparison as the price has dropped to ~$107 after rebate. Attached please find the datasheet for both. Quoted below are the salient points I think important:

                                                         Seagate 8G          Hitachi 6G
Areal density (Gbits/sq.inch, max)           72.9                       78
Weight (gram)                                          18                       16                      
Cache                                                      2M                    128K
Sustained transfer rate  (Mb/sec max)        8.8                      9.4
Current (read/write) mA                          330                 230/280
Current (standby)  mA                              30                    13/15

Except for the bigger cache (which I'm not sure how that transpires to real life performance), seems Seagate can't keep abreast with what offered by Hitachi. I'm especially suprised by the Seagate's lower Areal density considering its 2GB extra capacity. It looks to me that Seagate can't manufacture their 1.0inch microdrive as small and dense as Hitachi does, which is likely to be justified by the 2gram more weight and the higher current draw (larger area to move the header). Seems I should stick with Hitachi as they are apparently the leader in the microdrive technology.

[speculatrix]

I saw that seagate have promised a 12GB cf-shape microdrive.

I keep saying to myself that the next size increment will then give me a drive big enough to be useful to carry around lots of my MP3 collection and some movies, and by the time the next drive comes along, my demands for storage have also gone up!

When there's a 40GB, then it should be enough... or maybe I should hold out for an 80?

[freizugheit]

Do your homework, if 40 GB CF were available, what will be the cost.

I think that I better get a 40 GB low-end light-weight notebook and partition its drive into a Windows XP and a Linux format.