Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Plant City, FL
Posts: 385

This weekend I picked up a standalone MP3 player (Circuit City has them for $50 after rebates - tell me again why MiniJam should cost $250+?). Anyway, it uses SmartMedia cards to expand the memory and that got me thinking that it would be really nice if I could read the same cards in the Visor.

Inspired by the do-it-yourself CF card project that Taki got translated for us (thanks!!), I started researching what it would take to do the same for SmartMedia cards. I'm a long way from even having a prototype, but it does look like this could be done, with the bulk of the effort being in software.

I'm not 100% certain that I'm going to persue this project, but if I did, what kind of interest would there be in the Visor community? I'd love to hear from people who think they might be interested in a Springboard that would let the Visor read and write to SmartMedia cards. A few specific questions:

1) If you couldn't access data on the card directly but instead had to move stuff back and forth between the card and Visor RAM, would it still be useful? If so, what would it be worth?

2) If the Visor could read from it just like RAM but still needed a special app to write databases into it, would it still be useful? If so, what would it be worth?

3) Obviously, making the SmartMedia card look just like Visor RAM would be the perfect solution, but I'm not sure it's possible. If it was, what would that be worth?

Your feedback is going to determine how seriously I take this project, so let me know what you think. Post here or email me at [email protected]. Thanks.

- Dave Kessler

Registered: Nov 1999
Location: Pittsburgh, PA, USA Interests: Women, Drums, Visors, Computers, Home Theater and any cool gadgets.
Posts: 138

I was always hoping for a Springboard Compact Flash option for the Visor.

A Smart-Media adapter would be even better. If you have never seen them, those cards are about the same thickness as about 3 or 4 sheets of paper and about two stamps side by side in size. I cannot believe that small, thin thing, can hold 64-megs. It is the thinness that really is amazing to me; did I mention they are very thin?

They are small enough that you could carry several right in the credit card slot of the EB Slipper case and not even know they were there. It would take about 6 to 8 to take up the same space as a credit card.
They are small enough that you could have the springboard have the actual slot for one as well as a small storage compartment that could hold several more. Not that you may even need it if you had a 32 or 64 meg one.

I would be VERY interested if this could work about the same as the 8-meg flash SB as far as having applications and documents available (read only is fine) right from the card.

This would be a MUCH better option than a CF slot because of the small size. I would still take the CF though given the options we have now, which is only the 8-meg SB. I would really like to be able to have more memory storage at once. 32-megs + would be good. I like to keep tons of documents, books, manuals, text files, FAQ�s as well as games available and I am already seeing the limitations of the extra 8-meg SB I have. At $80 each it seems to much to buy another one.

Oh well just my opinion�

Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Plant City, FL
Posts: 385

quote:

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Originally posted by Babylon5:
I cannot believe that small, thin thing, can hold 64-megs. It is the thinness that really is amazing to me; did I mention they are very thin?

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Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Texan in Calgary for a while
Posts: 1361

Don't forget that the MiniJam works as an MMC reader/writer, and that InnoGear has plans for a standalone MMC module later this year. See my interview with Bob Fullerton for details.

------------------
James Hromadka
VisorCentral.com
Personal Website: http://www.Hromadka.com

Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Plant City, FL
Posts: 385

quote:

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Originally posted by JHromadka:
Don't forget that the MiniJam works as an MMC reader/writer, and that InnoGear has plans for a standalone MMC module later this year. See my interview with Bob Fullerton for details.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Rio Rancho, NM. USA
Posts: 1

Yea, but if we had a CF Springboard we might be able to share apps and data with the CF slotted TRG Pro's. That kind of cross hardware platform would be great.

Registered: Jan 2000
Location:
Posts: 219

Hi Dave & all,

I like smart media card because of its size, as someone said. I read about a company called Sunland Group in a Japanese Palm web site. They say they'll be shipping a "clip-on" smart card reader/writer for "PALM & other PDAs." (Go to Product->Proprietary hardware) There isn't much info or photo at their site but I wonder if they are developing one for Visor. Clear Smart Media Card would look cool with Visor!

[This message has been edited by Taki (edited 08-02-2000).]

Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Plant City, FL
Posts: 385

You weren't kidding when you said there wasn't much info on Sunland Group's page However, it looks to me like what they are working on is a reader for Smart Cards ... not SmartMedia cards. Smart Cards are credit cards with memory chips embedded in them. They are quite common in Europe. I expect them to become more common in the US over the next couple years. Current examples are the new Amex blue card and the activation cards for DirecTV DBS receivers. I haven't researched what kind of capacities are available, but the form factor (credit card size) pretty much makes a small size Springboard reader out of the question.

Registered: Jan 2000
Location:
Posts: 219

Oops! I thought Smart card & Smart Media Card are the same! Excuse my ignorance...

Registered: Mar 2000
Location: Border Independent
Posts: 69

I think an MMC card reader would be very good! I would encourage this project, especially if apps could be run from it like RAM.

Everyone keeps comparing the MiniJam with other MP3 players on price (valid) but I think they tend to forget that much of the price is the removable MMC cards. Innogear should have stuck to their guns and sold a model without any memory cards cause I think people would have psyhcologically gone for that better. But then maybe they would have returned them after failing to find any memory on the market that isnt backordered!

Back to the subject, I definately think a memory "drive" for the visor is in order.

Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Plant City, FL
Posts: 385

quote:

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Originally posted by hrdbyte:
Yea, but if we had a CF Springboard we might be able to share apps and data with the CF slotted TRG Pro's. That kind of cross hardware platform would be great.

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Registered: Jan 2000
Location: Monroe, Michigan, USA
Posts: 244

The TRGPro does use plain old FAT for the CF cards.

Registered: Jun 2000
Location: Seattle, WA, USA
Posts: 22

quote:

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Originally posted by SuperStream:
Everyone keeps comparing the MiniJam with other MP3 players on price (valid) but I think they tend to forget that much of the price is the removable MMC cards. Innogear should have stuck to their guns and sold a model without any memory cards cause I think people would have psyhcologically gone for that better. But then maybe they would have returned them after failing to find any memory on the market that isnt backordered!

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Plant City, FL
Posts: 385

quote:

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Originally posted by adenoid:
Just don't want to invest in a lot of "8-track tapes", if you know what I mean.

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I know exactly what you mean! And of course we must not forget Palm's recently promised to support for Secure Digital (which I still haven't been able to find out much about)

What I've learned from researching this project is that each technology is targeted for a different application - which explains why there hasn't already been a shakeout.

Compact Flash - biggest form factor, best suited for "random access" applications. Data can be read directly ... no need to buffer it up in RAM.

SmartMedia - compact, designed for high bandwidth sequential access. Good for storage, but you really need to read the data out into RAM to work with it.

MMC (and SD?) - very tiny, designed for low bandwidth sequential access. Data basically gets in and out of the card via a serial port.

Memory Stick - not small enough and no one wants to pay Sony to license it.

I suspect MMC/SD is going to kill of SmartMedia in the long run. I think CF's future is tied to the success of the PocketPC but it will probably be around for a while. Needless to say, I'm beginning to think my SmartMedia Springboard idea is a dead end. As much as I love the idea of a thin 32+ MB Springboard, I just don't think it will be practical. I suspect my effort would be better spent trying to figure out how to do a more compact CF adapter Springboard.

My thanks to everyone for your input!

- Dave Kessler

Registered: Nov 1999
Location: bright side of the moon.
Posts: 996

hey Dave,

Thought i'd ask you if you've seen this site:
http://www.geocities.co.jp/SiliconV...visorcf2_e.html

[This message has been edited by Hoser_in_USA (edited 08-03-2000).]

Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Plant City, FL
Posts: 385

quote:

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Originally posted by Hoser_in_USA:
Thought i'd ask you if you've seen this site:

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Yep, that's the one that got me hooked on this idea in the first place. But there are two problems with that adapter. First is that it's not practical (for me at least) to have the CF card sticking so far out the top of the Visor. Second is that supporting CF storage cards is a LOT harder than supporting I/O cards. Never the less, it's an excellent starting point

Registered: Sep 1999
Location:
Posts: 95

I got the impression that CF cards are (at least generally) more square than rectangular in shape. I'm thinking the pictures on that page are either using a non-standard size CF card, or have the card hanging out of the slot for display purposes. I saw a CF memory card for a camera, and it was smaller than the springboard slot cover that comes with the Visor. (I wanted to try fitting it inside, but it was in much larger packaging, and inside a glass case, so I didn't get the chance.)

Registered: Jun 2000
Location: OH
Posts: 4

I had hoped the MiniJam would have adopted to Smart Media. We have a digital camera at work that uses both SmartMedia and CompactFlash. The SmartMedia is much more reliable in the camera and I still get over the physical and storge size of it.
VST currently makes a Zip Drive that reads Zip, SmartMedia, and CompactFlash. Having one media for many devices (Digital Camera, PDA, etc) would (have) be(en) great. Sony has the right idea, too bad it hasn't caught no with other media that doesn't require huge licencing fees.

Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Plant City, FL
Posts: 385

quote:

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Originally posted by theo:
I'm thinking the pictures on that page are either using a non-standard size CF card, or have the card hanging out of the slot for display purposes.

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Nope, it's a standard size CF card. They are a bit wider than they are "tall". Using a standard PCMCIA to CF adapter card in the Springboard slot will result in about 8mm of the CF card being "inside" the Visor ... the rest will stick out the top. That's exactly what you see on the homemade CF adapter page.

It may be possible to build a custom CF adapter that keeps the CF card flush (or nearly so) with the top of the Visor and only adds a little thickness - that's something I'm currently researching

Registered: Jul 2000
Location: cambridge, MA USA
Posts: 27

I was hoping that the MP3 player used the SM format as well, but there must be some technical issue with storing MP3s and other files on the same card. At least two MP3 players I've considered purchasing say in their instructions that the SM card must be reformatted and then cannot be used in a digital camera or other application.

Anyone know why this is?