Get 64GB CompactFlash--via 4 microSD cards

(Credit: PhotoFast)

Admittedly, CompactFlash cards are no longer as popular as they were when digital photography first started. These days, most digicams use SD/SDHC media, while mobile phones mainly accept the physically smaller microSD format for storing data.

This is why I'm puzzled as to the reason PhotoFast has conceived the CR-7200, a CompactFlash card adapter capable of holding four microSD cards and combining their storage space. Given that the maximum a microSD card can now hold is 16GB, the CR-7200's capacity would be capped at 64GB.

Although manufacturers such as Pretec and Transcend have announced 64GB CompactFlash cards, they have yet to retail them. Hence, the PhotoFast adapter may be the only higher-capacity alternative for now. But these days, only higher-end dSLRs accept such flash media format so there are only limited uses for the CR-7200.

Though the PhotoFast adapter sports an "extremely high speed" label, it's not immediately clear how fast the card can read and write data. Often with flash memory, there's a tradeoff between high capacity and high speed.

According to Gizmodo, this adapter will be available for $30 in July.

(Source: Crave Asia)

[AmbientShadow]

Hah, are you serious? It says "Raid 0" right on it. Technically that could quadruple the speed and capacity of any one of those microSD cards. That's the point of it, and that's precisely what the bottleneck is on a lot of dSLR's, which, like you said, is the primary market for CF cards. This way instead of having to spend a pile of money on a large, fast CF (which is expensive), you can drop a bit on this adapter, and buy a ton of microSD's and put them together.

Admittedly, Raid 0 will not fully quadruple the speed of any given single card, however it will be damned close.

[joshuaguttman]

You are correct, but it also tipples the chance of a storage failure. I was taught (but never followed) in photography school to swap out cards during a photo shoot to guarantee that at least some of the shot would survive one card failing. I just use one big 8GB compact flash card.

[Someone-else]

@joshuaguttman: If that adapter supports Raid 10 it's exactly what you need: double the performance, double the reliability and double the storage of a single card.