Card Reader or USB Connecter ?

[Rodney9]

Hello,

Which is the best way of getting your photos from your camera onto the computer, card reader or using the supplied USB connector.

Is there any quality difference ?

Which is likely to break first, the usb connection plug/socket or the card slot mechanism in your camera ?

Any ideas, What do you use ?

On my K100D I always used the supplied USB connector lead, it was very easy to plug in and use, but now with my K20D the USB lead is quite a bit harder to plug in, it needs more force, so it worrys me a little and thats why I"m asking the above questions.

On an other subject, who uses the supplied Pentax software, is it any good ? I've always used iPhoto and Photoshop Elements.

Thanks,
Rodney.

[jachol]

Rodney9 wrote:

Hello,

Which is the best way of getting your photos from your camera onto the computer, card reader or using the supplied USB connector.

Is there any quality difference ?

Which is likely to break first, the usb connection plug/socket or the card slot mechanism in your camera ?

Any ideas, What do you use ?

On my K100D I always used the supplied USB connector lead, it was very easy to plug in and use, but now with my K20D the USB lead is quite a bit harder to plug in, it needs more force, so it worrys me a little and thats why I"m asking the above questions.

On an other subject, who uses the supplied Pentax software, is it any good ? I've always used iPhoto and Photoshop Elements.

Thanks,
Rodney.

Hi Rodney,

For a long while now,I've preferred to use a card reader, for one you don't need to power up the camera, and two I've always found the file tranfer to the PC much

faster, I do have a built in card reader in the main PC, fits in one of the floppy drive slots, I also have a separate plug in reader that just takes SD cards which works

equally well. I doubt there's any difference in IQ, after all it's only two different methods of file transfer involved.

PersonallyI don't think there's any great risk in plugging/unplugging cards from the camera, there's probably more risk in using the USB socket, I'd think it

possible to inadvertently lever the plug entry to some degree if the plug isn't presented squarely each time, this is much less likely in inserting a card, because of

the way the socket is designed.

Re. software ... I don't even install the Pentax software now, I've never been very impressed by it, but having Photoshop influenced that decision. Several years back

now I bit the bullet, and got down to using PS exclusively for any processing, I'm still learning, I doubt anyone ever finishes learning PS, even the pundits. Those are my

thoughts ... Jack

[snostorm]

Hi Rodney,

I use a card reader. The most common reason for physical damage to digital cameras that I've heard is something snagging on the cord connecting the camera and computer while downloading files. It seems like a disaster waiting to happen. The cat jumps on the desk. . . the arm of your computer chair snags the cord. . . and the camera gets dragged off the desk, falling to the floor. I've personally had this happen with everything from scanners to portable hard drives -- and I'm not gonna let it happen to one of my cameras.

Card readers are cheap now, and a lot of SDHC cards even come with them. I like the SD specific readers because I have a lot of partitions/virtual hard drives, and the multi card readers like to create virtual drives for each of the major formats, so they use up too many drive letters in the computer's system.

The only downside is if you forget to replace the card in the camera. . .:? . . . but there I've worked out a tricks to minimize this possibility.

Scott

[beachboy2]

Hi Rodney

Since getting a laptop with inbuilt card reader, I find using it to transfer photos preferable for all the above reasons.

cheers

bb2

[Black Knight]

Hi Rodney

Card reader here also. As to software. I tried the Pentax Software, I Did not like the interface. So i uninstalled it. I use several programs , PSE, PS CS3 and PSP11. Almost forgot Lightroom. Which one i use depends on my needs at the moment

Phil

[albreca]

Hi
built_in laptop card reader.
Reason on my previous Cam (Oly UZ), i first used theUSB plug of the cam, but the door is quite flimsy there, so i switched to an external cardreader (xD-Picture Card).
My feeling was and is that the card door is much more stable than the USB plug door.

Now with the K100D and SD Card, it is much easier, because of the built in card reader.

For the software:
For downloading on XP just the XP tools, for downloading on Linux 'cp' or 'mv' or Digicam.
For postprocessing on XP and Linux gimp
For viewing on XP the windows fax and picture viewer/picasa/fast stone image viewer
on Linux Digicam/Picasa.
Organizing on XP with explorer (move to different folders), on Linux Digicam.

So i am pretty comfortable with all this tools, the only tool, which i am looking for is a tool on XP, with tagging possibilties (and it should be possible to create new tags, and give more tags to one pic)

bye alex

[Lyrics51]

I agree with everyone else. With my first digital p and s I used the camera for transfer. Then I bought a card reader and found it much quicker. Ever since then I've used the card reader, either external or built in. As for software, I use Picasa for the most basic stuff. I have an old program called MGI Photo Suite for cloning and things of that nature. Recently I downloaded a free program called GIMP 2 which is very powerful (some say as powerful as PS, but not as intuitive) and I use it when I need the use of layers,perspective correction and a few other things. Then there is Neat Image for noise reduction. If I would take some time and work on how to use GIMP, I would most likely not need the others.

Glenn

[ennacac]

Same here, I have a friend that fried their point and shoot from feedback from the USB port in thier PC by plugging the camera in.

I always use a card reader since it is much faster and safer.

Tom

[Driver3]

I was using the built in card reader in my Dell Dimension. When I bought a couple of SanDisk SDHC 4gb ExtremeIII's, the built in card reader wouldn't handle them. In fact it completely locked up my computer! I used the card readers that were supplied with the cards and the downloads are lightning fast!

Dennis

[bigdawg]

A card reader is ten to one better rodney. All my computers and my lap top as well as my television have one built in...Oh yeah my Kodak 5500 printer has one as well so I can use it to review and print directly from the SD card! I still have the Sandisk brand reader I bought several years ago and it travels with me in case the one in the lap top screws up!

Dawg