Press Release: TRAVEL PLANS THIS SUMMER? HERE’S ADVICE FROM
SANDISK ABOUT FLASH MEMORY CARDS FOR YOUR DIGITAL CAMERA
If you’re getting ready to pack your
suitcase, your sunscreen lotion and your digital camera for a summer getaway,
don’t forget to pack extra flash memory cards. And, since you’ll
be capturing plenty of magic moments, the experts at SanDisk® Corporation
(NASDAQ:SNDK), the world’s largest supplier of flash memory cards, have
some tips on how to get better results from your photography and protect your
images from heat, rain and even accidental erasure.
Get Higher Capacity Cards: With card prices
falling while digital camera resolutions are rising, consider upgrading your
memory, so to speak, with cards that are at least double your previous
capacities. If you’ve been using 256 megabyte (MB) cards, move up to a
512MB or one gigabyte (GB)* model. If you want sharper and larger photos,
you’ll need to set your camera at higher resolutions and this, in turn,
will consume more memory. Consider using a high-capacity, high-performance card
such as the SanDisk Ultra® II 1GB.
Get Faster Cards: All flash cards are not the same. “If you have a
late-model digital camera with a rating of 5 megapixels or higher, and if you
like to shoot moving objects, you have a better chance of capturing the specific
moment from a faster card,” says Tanya Chuang, product marketing manager
for the SanDisk Ultra II and SanDisk Extreme™ III high-performance cards.
“For example, moving from a standard card to a SanDisk Ultra II card
provides up to three times faster writing speeds in many of the newer digital
cameras that have fast internal processors.” (Actual speeds depend on the
image processing ability of your camera and the make of your existing flash
card, however.) SanDisk offers the Ultra II line in SD™, Memory Stick
PRO™ media and CompactFlash®. Even if your camera is not fast or
high-resolution, having the faster cards will be welcome when you upgrade to a
new camera in the future.
Get A Faster Digital Camera: Perhaps your camera is a few years old, and
maybe it was your first digital camera. If so, think about purchasing a newer
model – and look for information on the buffer processing times of the
camera. Manufacturers now offer digital single-lens reflex cameras that can
record higher-resolution images faster than their predecessors for well under
$1,000, and many new, small digital cameras of 5-megapixel resolution currently
retail for under $300. Most of these newer cameras reduce noticeably the
momentary hesitation you may have experienced when you click the shutter. With
a new camera and a faster card, you’ll have a better chance of freezing
the action.
How should you
handle your flash cards? Lisa Tisdale, SanDisk’s technical help desk
manager, offers these
pointers:
Taking Cards Through Airport X-Ray Machines and Metal Detectors: You can put
full or empty flash cards in your checked baggage or in your carry-ons with
little risk of damage from airport scanners. The International Imaging Industry
Association conducted tests last year with security devices used in U.S.
airports and found that no damage to the cards resulted with normal travel
frequency. As an added precaution, SanDisk recommends that you take the card
out of your camera before passing through security
devices.
Avoid Exposing A Flash Card to Water or A Washing Cycle: It happens, not
infrequently, that people might accidentally leave a card in a pants pocket and
then wash the garment. Or they might drop the card in a swimming pool or
waterway. Don’t despair. Let the card dry for a couple of days –
you can even use a hairdryer with a non-heat blower – and there’s
the possibility, based on experience reports from SanDisk customers, that the
card might still function. Consider testing a completely dry card first in a
card-reader of a personal computer.
Avoid situations that can damage images. Although no battery power is required
to store pictures, it’s important to have sufficient power when your
camera is transferring captured images to your card. If the battery is too low,
you could lose one or more images during the transfer, so it’s a good
practice to stock up on a spare recharged battery. Also, never remove a card
while a camera is writing to it or while formatting the card in a
camera.
Recovering Deleted Images: Suppose that, in sorting through your images, you
accidentally delete a picture that you really wanted to keep. Or perhaps
you’ve reformatted your card by accident and wiped out all of your photos.
They are gone from sight, but usually they remain stored on the card, although
in inaccessible memory locations. Using a software program such as
SanDisk’s RescuePRO®, which you can purchase for $40 through
SanDisk’s website (<http://www.sandisk.com/>www.sandisk.com) and
install in your computer, you can often recover so-called “lost”
images by selecting “Full
Recovery.”
Coping With Heat: If you leave rolls of traditional analog film on the back
seat of a closed, parked car during summer temperatures, you stand a good chance
of ruining your film. Although it’s advisable to keep flash cards at room
temperature, SanDisk’s standard flash cards are designed to withstand
relatively high temperatures – up to 60 degrees Celsius or 140 degrees
Fahrenheit – without loss of stored images. SanDisk’s Extreme III
cards are designed to operate in extreme temperature conditions at the limits of
human physical endurance.
Making Prints While Vacationing: If you’re anxious to print your photos
while traveling, before you drop off a card at a professional photo processor or
use a self-print kiosk, back up your images on a laptop PC or burn them to a CD
or another storage medium. That way, if your card is lost or damaged, you still
have another set of pictures.
And here’s one last thing to
keep in mind: You can buy cards at odd times of the day. If you run out of
memory and need to find a card or two early in the morning or late at night,
head for a supermarket or drug store. SanDisk produces a line of readily
available and inexpensive cards, called SanDisk Shoot & Store™, that
come in capacities of up to 128MB in formats of SD, CompactFlash and Memory
Stick PRO.
Enjoy your
vacation!
SanDisk is the original inventor
of flash storage cards and is the world’s largest supplier of flash data
storage card products, using its patented, high-density flash memory and
controller technology. SanDisk is headquartered in Sunnyvale, CA and has
operations worldwide, with more than half its sales outside the
U.S.
Posted: Thu - June 30, 2005 at 02:42 PM