Customer Reviews

PalmOne Memory Backup Card (m125, m130, i705 & m500 series)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

In order to avoid problems and issues with purchasing this card, you should know what it is capable of! This hardware was released before the software vendors were able to update their software to run on it ( if they even intended to ) MOST database programs will not run on this card, most large programs will not run on this card. In fact, it is a RARE program that actually will run on the card! To be specific:

NO palm brand or palm supplied software ( address book, to-do's...) will run on this card NONE of the software supplied on the supplemental software CD that Palm gives you when you purchase the device will work on the card.

Palm offers NO help, info or advice about the card. Palm tech support people not only lack information about what can and cannot run on this card, but their response to every question is ....that is 3rd party software, ask the vendor. Most vendors I contacted told me to contact palm! A few vendors told me they were upgrading their software so that " it should work on the card sometime in the future."

Palm could not supply with the name of ONE SINGLE piece of software that runs on the card!!! I asked what software they may have used for beta testing and they claimed not to know that information.

However, by experimenting with my palm I found that the following was true ( this of course only covers the software I own, there may be some other software that does work better )

This software DOES NOT run on the expansion card: Address book, Memos, To Do's, Calculator, Notes, Clock, Mail, Memo pad, Expense, Any of the Teal products, Michelin restaurant guide, Zagat restaurant guide ( although Zagat did tell me they are working on an upgrade ), Word to go, Fireviewer ( although that vendor did specifically tell me it would work on the card ) Route Expert, Any of the Aramis products ( city travel guides ) Metro-O, or any of the Collins dictionaries

These product DO work on the expansion card: Clock Plus, Currency X, and Unit Convert

So, to summarize...think carefully about what you intend to use this card for because there is a high possibility that you will be disappointed! This may be one palm add-on that you may want to wait awhile to purchase. Instead, buy a Palm back-up card. It works beautifully and seamlessly!

Having lived through a Palm IIIx glitch that erased all my address listings, when I bought my Palm M505 I vowed to make the Memory Backup Card one of my next purchases.

It is tiny enough to store virtually anywhere (although not in a wallet or place where it will be manhandled). It backs up my Palm, including 3rd party software, in just over 3 minutes. Operation could not be simpler. Pop the card into the SD slot, press backup and off you go.

The card has a small lock switch, which keeps you from accidently erasing the data. One thing that Palm should include is a small case for the card. I use the case for my Sandisk 32 mb card to protect the Memory Backup Card, but this should really be included, especially since the card has exposed contacts that should be kept clean.

All in all, an elegant solution to system backup and worth the price for peace of mind.

I bought two of these cards.

Just like it is supposed to, this card only backs up your PDA's built-in memory, not your expansion card memories. The most important thing in my PDA is my built-in memory. It contains my contacts, my calendar and my encrypted PINs- I use an encryption program. I cannot afford to have these lost which is why I use a PDA in the first place. If my PDA is lost or destroyed I can buy a new PDA, but if I just entered several new contacts, appointments, or encrypted PINs since I last performed a HotSync, I have to reacquire that data. I carry one backup card on me at all times in a pill box- along with my other expansion cards- and swap it every week with a backup card I keep at home or in my hotel room. This way I have a week old back up if I need to check something I accidentally deleted without selecting "Save archive copy on PC". If my wife or I enter an important new contact, appointment, or encrypted PIN, I immediately use my back-up card to back up the data, instead of waiting until the next time I am at my computer to HotSync. Most people recommend buying a 16MB expansion card and using a backup program to backup your PDA. I disagree. Since the backup software is hardwired into the card and very simple to use, I do not have to worry about accidentally ruining the backup.

This card is not for everyone. But if you have important data, the ability to buy a replacement PDA, slip the back-up card in, and instantly have your PDA back, makes this a life saver on the road.

-Bj
CJ's Husband

I just bought the Palm m505 and this memory card. I assumed that it would triple my memory without a problem. I was half right. It tripled my memory, but only for applications that do not access other files. In other words, your Palm (and I assume any other device using this card) will not be able to access document files put on the card. Nor will readers on the card be able to access the normal memory. I use about 85% of the normal 8 megas on the palm and most of that is for documents and books. This card is useless for that. Right now I have installed everything that I can get to run on the card and its less then 1 MB. I have memory, but nothing that goes on it is very big and the big files wont work on it.

I gave it 2 stars because it did do what it said. If I find a way around this dilemna I will love what it can do. Bottom line, it promises more then it delivers.

Ok, i've read the reviews. I know what they say about these expansion cards, they dont' work, blah blah blah. So I bought one.

First of all I will tell you some things. First of all, if you are going to buy an expansion card, DON"T BUY THIS ONE! I bought it a few months ago and now you can get 4 times the space, 64mb for (less). Thats worth it. But meanwhile, about the card.

Ok, You cannot put like your date book and adress book on this. Palm protects that stuff so no one can read it from you. So you have to keep that on you handheld. I've put all of my games on this palm, tetris, Ace, Pinball, bomb, boxman, rally 1000, space trader, space war, tictac toe, UFO wars, and tons of other software. I keep all of my photos from MGI Photo Suite on here and all of my videos from TealMovie. It works like a charm.

The problem is if you fill the thing up more than 50%, your looking at a 10-20 sec wait everytime you want to access anything on the card. That isn't bad considering the space on it but if you are VERY VERY impatient, forget it. I love this thing, I own a 16mb (this one), a 32 mb (SanDisk), and a 64 mb (SanDisk). Don't be worried about buying from SanDisk which sells the 64 mb card, I've talked w/palm and SanDisk manufactures teh cards for Palm anyways so yoru getting the same product w/a diff. lable.

The reason this is 3 stars is the cost. (...) Search SanDisk Secure Digital card on Amazon.com and you'll find the better buy.

This works without a hitch! It is a cinch to install and the backup process is easy to do and reletively quick. This is a very useful device to have when you are traveling and could have a loss of power, or an inability to sync to your computer. Well worth the $!!

The 16MB expansion card gives 14MB of additional storage space (talk about rounding up!). It's never fallen out, even when my Palm fell out of my pocket and onto the pavement (proving that the m505 can survive a 3-foot fall). Yes, it's slower than running programs directly from my m505, but isn't that what you'd expect from a removable storage medium? It doesn't bother me, since I simply store the stuff I use the most on my Palm and the rest on my card. I've been able to run the packaged PhotoSuite program as well as a number of freeware programs/games off the card. Some stuff doesn't work, and that's annoying because it's basically trial and error, but with all those creative software people out there, it's just a matter of time before software compatibility catches up with the new Palm hardware. I think it's a bit pricey, which is my only real knock on the card. If you're expecting to add 16MB of fast memory, you'll be disappointed. If you're looking for 14MB of memory with limited but growing software compatibility, you'll be satisfied. Either way, Palm has us m50x users at its mercy, particularly if you're like me and bought your m50x knowing that you'd need more megabytes. But you paid for convenience and portability, and you got it. You can still laugh at those guys with Visor Edges that need more memory as they strap on that giant adaptor for their memory modules.

This card is a sham folks, save your money and get a 16MB or 32MB MMC or SD card and download BackupBuddy. They offer two versions, a free utility that installs onto the card and the palm that allows you to do manual backups and restores. Or a very cheap shareware version that does automated incremental backups, encrypts the backup files. Both versions allow you to restore from the card without having to reload the software into the palm.

I don't know why Palm choose to sell this card at such a high price... it seems like they took an MMC card and put a backup utility on it, and doubled the price.

I got my card a while ago when nobody could answer if cards from other vendors work too. You get as an example the panasonic 64megs for 120 bucks which I would prefer now. Sometimes it says it enhances your memory but its not the same as internal memory. Applications start slower from the card, if at all (some like vindigo do not work of the card since they need more then one file to execute properly). Also the overall handling is uncomfortable. You need to get tools like Filez, MS Mount and McFile to make working with the card more userfriendly.

The concept is definitly not yet ready for primetime. My brotehr uses an MMC card and he says he gets the same speed when it comes to launching applications.

Eventhough it's good and fast due to SD card bandwidth interface, compared to MMC and Sony memory stick. Palm 16 MB SD card is too expensive. The price of [money], you can buy at least 32 MB or even 64 MB of Sandisk SD card from some stores. Moreover, 16 MB is not enough anymore when most of the professional palm programs are among 4-5 MB.