Thursday 6 September 2012

New Eye-Fi Cards

I have just bought an 8Gb Eye-Fi SD card. This is a regular 8Gb card with an inbuilt WiFi capability. Once you have the card activated (via the Eye-Fi Site in a web browser) it automatically transfers images from the Eye-Fi card, to your computer. It works as fast as your home wireless setup works. 
It sells for around $108 (the model pictured). The Eye-Fi card I bought is an 8Gb, Class 6 read/write card with 802.11 wireless capabilities (whatever that means...).
What the Eye-Fi card does in reality is quite incredible. In the box you get an SD card, plus an SD card reader. Plug the reader into the computer, follow the install prompts and load the application. It takes a few minutes. When the app is fully loaded, you get a message onscreen to remove the card.
Place the card into the camera and, via the DSLR menu, turn the wireless functionality 'On'. (I use a Canon EOS D60 - in the Menu, choose the first yellow wrench icon and you'll see the Eye-Fi menu. Turn wireless on). You only see the menu if the card is in the camera...

Take a snap and the image is transferred to your PC/Mac. You automatically get an email notification from Eye-Fi that 'x' number of pictures have been transferred to your PC/Mac. You can either leave it at that, or, via www.eye-fi.com, manage your images using the online image browser to sort,name and distribute photos to locations like Facebook, Twitter, etc. Files are held for free for seven days, then deleted off the Eye-Fi server.


If you want to keep them online, Eye-Fi offers cloud image storage for $49/year - but I could not find out how much data $49 might buy you.

Eye-Fi also has a feature called Endless Memory. What this does is automatically delete images from the card once they are transferred so effectively, Yes, you can keep shooting because the card (theoretically) never fills up. A neat concept. 

There are three types of Eye-Fi card:
Connect X2 
  • Endless memory
  • Automatic photo & video upload
Mobile X2 
  • 8GB memory storage
  • Endless memory
  • Automatic photo & video upload
and Pro X2

  • Wireless RAW upload
  • Wi-Fi based geotagging
  • 8GB memory storage
  • Endless memory
  • Automatic photo & video upload
These sell for $58, $88 and $108 respectively (www.d-d-photographics.com)

1 comment:

  1. Hey, would love to know if you have experience of the 32gb cards before I fork out 130 bucks - http://www.cameracompare.com.au/Search?q=eye-fi+32gb

    Thanks!

    ReplyDelete