SmartCard ..... What is it?

[fow99]

Hi all,

I wonder if smart card can be used as a kind of portable storage as Zip? It is cheaper, more portable and more spacious. But I have a feeling (or the ads gave me this feeling) it is only used to store ditital image, etc. Can it be used as normal storage ?

 

[ucla88]

i'm guessing you mean a smart media or compact flash card.
a smart card is a non technical term, but usually refers to cards that meet the iso-7816 spec

i.e. what's a smart card

(these are the cards inside dongles, satellite descramblers, etc)

as for smart media cards, well fwiw i use my smart media cards to hold data. it doesn't always work. now that these cards are so cheap i suspect we may see a move towards more standardization. the problem i have is when i write to the card from the computer, it will often cause the camera to have difficulty reading the card. i'm not sure about the formatting of these cards, but i'm sure we will see them being used for general storage now that they are relatively inexpensive. i don't think there is any hardware reason why they can't be used as you describe

 

[Muadib]

ucla88 is right, you are using the wrong term. To answer your question, yes you can use them for normal storage. I use a compact flash card for storage on my ipaq.

the problem i have is when i write to the card from the computer, it will often cause the camera to have difficulty reading the card.
Have you tried reformatting it in the camera?

 

[ucla88]

<< Have you tried reformatting it in the camera >>


yes, and it usually works, but it's still buggy.

 

[fow99]

<<
Have you tried reformatting it in the camera? >>



Do I have to use a camera? I don't even have one. What I want to do is to use it as a Zip or something