Customer Reviews

FireWire 400/800 UDMA CompactFlash Reader

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The biggest issue with USB CF Readers is not only are they slower, but ALSO slow down your entire computer considerably while transferring because they use a lot of CPU cycles.

A Firewire reader like this, is not only noticibly faster, it will allow you to continue to use your computer for other things while you're transfering files to or from it. The reader is also UDMA compliant allowing it to read and write data from UDMA complaint CF cards at a higher rate of speed.

I've found the reader to be very reliable and fast and it's low price make it quite the bargain.

After having a Sandisk firewire reader for a year, that worked fine on a XP OP system, I found it caused my 64 bit Vista system to crash if the card was left in the reader for more than 30 minutes. I was totally unhappy with the Sandisk standard reply emails so after going back and forth a few times I bought the Calumet reader. It works like a dream. It has an adpter that I assume is needed for converting from Firewire 400 and 800 rather than having two cables. It seems to transfer data faster than I was getting from the Sandisk but I am sure that was because the Sandisk was not working properly with my system. I little blue light flashs on the Calumet reader as it reads the card. Time will tell how reliable it is but at this point I am totally satisfied and ask why spend more?

This FW 800/400 Reader is great for video productions using the latest HD DSLR's. I'm using the 7D. The USB 2 readers don't cut it . They're to slow. If you are using a Mac to connect the FW reader and media wrangle to your hard drives of choice then this Compact Flash reader is inexpensive and works as it should. If you are using a PC then look elsewhere. The firewire 800/400 connections are only for mac computers. They do not connect to PC's

The Calumet CF reader mimes with exceptional speed rates accessing your CF card.
The only problem with this device, which I have never tested,
is ironically that it requires FireWire.
Most devices will have a FireWire port, which is fine.
Calumet FireWire 400/800 UDMA CompactFlash Reader requires you to have the
self-powered 12V 800Mb/s FireWire 1394B 9-wires interface to use its promised capacities.
Those are found only on Macs. PC laptops usually only have the mini 4-wire 1394A
port, which is useless with this device. In that case, you better stay with an USB
alternative. Even if you have a powered 6-wire 1394 port,
the transfer rates of USB should be higher.

I am disappointed that this information was not provided in
the description of this product on this site.