SDHC substitute for SxS cards

[Chris Hurd]

Originally Posted by Andy Wilkinson

Personally, I think an end loading slot (Kensington style) for the SDHC is more reliable and rugged as a two-part express card adapter that you could easily open up risks damage.

That's a pretty good point... there are some good arguments either way (open slot vs. hinged shell).

[Paul Kellett]

Chris, i've no doubt that whatever you and company "x" come up with will be good quality, i don't think you'd put your name to something that's only going to last a short while.
As long as i can still use sdhc cards in it i don't mind what it is.

Paul.

[Dean Harrington]

Originally Posted by Chris Hurd

That's a pretty good point... there are some good arguments either way (open slot vs. hinged shell).

Chris, that's a good way to approach the design ... I wonder if the new card will allow for 60 fps? It would be nice to have slow-mo working!

[Chris Hurd]

Isn't the overcranking limitation due to a USB bottleneck? If so, the adapter would have to be PCI-Express, which raises the price. Even then it's still bound to be significantly less expensive than Sony's SxS media.

[Dean Harrington]

I've been running my kensingtons though the express card slot on my MBPro. I'm not sure about where the bottle-neck is on the cards? All cards up to this point have trouble getting past 40/50 fps but are capable of faster speeds, I understand ... correct me if I'm wrong on this point.

[David Heath]

Originally Posted by Paul Kellett

I'm hoping that this new sxs substitue being developed is an adaptor which uses sdhc cards, rather than a one piece card. ...........

I really hope this development is just an adaptor,

My thought was that there's room for both, for as well as, not instead of.

I accept all you say about the desirability of an adaptor/SDHC card for some situations, but there are other times when a one piece card may be more appropiate. Handing over media with shot rushes may be just such a case, the form of ExpressCards seems more robust and the larger size may make it less easily lost than SDHC.

There again, it may not be possible to develop such a one piece card for less than the combined cost of an adaptor plus an SDHC card. In that case, you may as well hand over adaptor and SD card together, and in this case Chris's suggestion of an enclosed adaptor would be preferable.

[Steven Thomas]

Originally Posted by Chris Hurd

Isn't the overcranking limitation due to a USB bottleneck? If so, the adapter would have to be PCI-Express, which raises the price. Even then it's still bound to be significantly less expensive than Sony's SxS media.

True,

The bottleneck is how Sony is handling USB 2.0 over the expresscard slot.

If the card was designed for PCIe, then we would be able to reach the given SDHC card's datarate used. Since the SanDisk Ultra II is capable of sustaining 15MB/s, it "probably" would work fine for the top overcrank datarate. I believe the required rate is around 12.5MB/s for overcranking 60FPS @ 720 24p.

[Ross Herewini]

I received the final production version of the Expresscard adapter I was referring to in my post of 28/11/08.

This isn't a prototype, this is from the first batch off the production line, ( although we didn't have the final artwork ready for this small batch, so please excuse the temp label for now ).

If you watch the video below you can see the card in action.

The first design consideration was to ensure that with an SDHC inserted, the EX1 door would close. - Done.

The second was It is designed to ensure that the SDHC will not eject from the Expresscard while it is in the camera, unless by deliberate and concerted effort by the user, not by accident. You can see where it slightly moves but does not eject or disengage from the Expresscard or camera, even after sticking my big thumbs in there to try to. - Done.

The third was performance - that it should meet at least the performance of what other cards were already doing. The card will crank up to 48fps, which as we understand from many on this thread is the limitation of the USB implementation on this camera. - Done.

The fourth was that it would be reliable, that it should work each time and every time. So far it has been recognised every time by several EX1 cameras and hasn't dropped one frame. - Done.

The last consideration, not a design one but just as important, that it didn't cost any more than other cards already on the market. - Done.

The price? $US35 + postage which will be approx $10 to the US, and $12 for Europe.

We will be offering quantity discounts on freight as most people appear to be ordering more than 1 at a time, with orders of 10 or more being freight free.

We'll be putting up the website to take orders on Friday this week, and we expect to start shipping 19/12/08 ( 12/19/08 for our US friends ). There shouldn't be any shortage of cards as we have already committed to our first production run of 20,000 cards to be delivered over the next two months.

Oh and one last thing the name? MxR Expresscard Adapter. I wanted to use "Efilms Expresscard Adapter", because "Efilms" has been my trading name since 2001, but I thought it would confuse people.

If you have any questions I'd be pleased to answer them, just remember we're in Sydney, so if you don't get an immediate response it's because we are catching some shuteye, too much excitement for one day.

http://www.efilms.com.au/streams/SDHCExpress.wmv

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/attachmen...1&d=1228737851

[Chris Hurd]

Fantastic, Ross -- congratulations! Is it using the USB interface, or is it or PCIe?

This is most likely worthy of a new thread...

edit: added to http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/sony-xdca...sxs-cards.html

[Ned Soltz]

Great work!

I'll buy a few and give you a plug in one of my articles!

Looking forward to your site going live...

[Ross Herewini]

Hi Chris,

We used USB for this version, but PCIe is definitely on the radar.

[Dan Chung]

That's really fantastic, I'm in for a few.

Dan

[Steven S. Miric]

Waiting for a link... My fingers are ready....

[C.S. Michael]

The entrepreneurial spirit at its finest. Well done! Count me in...

[Craig Seeman]

What a tease! Now you got me wanting the PCIe version!
I do a far amount of overcrank so I'd hate to have to keep popping in the SxS card for that.

What great affordable stocking stuffer. Although with shipping from Australia to USA it'll probably arrive after the holidays. You're gonna have a hard time with production and fulfillment for a bit I'd imagine. You know you're going to get a lot of orders.

Originally Posted by Ross Herewini

Hi Chris,

We used USB for this version, but PCIe is definitely on the radar.