I've searched the forum for prior discussions of this topic but have not found anything current relative to performance of SM cards. Can someone educate me as to whether there are any significant differences between brands of cards. I'm considering a Delkin 64MB which is a great bargain on mobshop (about $109 with a special promo code). Delkin gives a lifetime warranty. Would there be any good reason to pay a lot more, say $165 or so for SanDisk or Oly (of course, non-Oly SM cards don't support panorama mode)? Is there any difference in SPEED of these consumer brands of cards?

Thanks.

-- Robert (broeux@home.com), April 20, 2000

Answers

There is no difference in access speed between brands of SmartMedia cards. These cards, ironically unlike CompactFlash, do not have built-in processors. All data handling is done in the camera. Think of SM cards as solid-state floppies.

-- Brad Grant (bradandsteph@home.com), April 20, 2000.

Furthermore, if I'm not mistaken, all the smartmedia cards currently on the market are actually produced by only two actual manufacturers: SanDisk & Mitsubishi... who are also currently litigating over a few "niggling" details. :-) -Imaging Resource news item.

-- Gerald M. Payne (gmp@francomm.com), April 20, 2000.

Uh, I take that back. They are litigating, but I think it's Toshiba & Samsung that actually produce the durned things... Maybe I should give up while I'm behind? :-)

-- Gerald M. Payne (gmp@francomm.com), April 22, 2000.

I have a Oly USB Smartmedia Reader-Writer which I bought for $79.95 at a camera shop. It can handle Smartmedia cards up to 128Mb. It is compatabile with Win98, MacOS 8.1 or later, iMac or USB-equiped G3 CPU. Works just fine so far with my Oly 2020 and Windows 98.

-- Norman Hendricks (kinsfolk@hotmail.com), April 25, 2000.

Olympus brand SmartMedia cards are the only ones that will allow the 2000 and 2020 cameras (and others?) to operate in panaramic mode.

-- Paul Verizzo (paulv@paulv.net), October 18, 2000.