Anyone use an IBM microdrive

[dvleemin]

Hi,
I was looking at the specs for the Oly5050 and I saw that it can use an IBM microdrive. Considering they are 1 gb, that sounds great.

However, is there any performance issues with using them?

Darryl

 

[Scubatooth]

Microdrives were very popular a couple of years ago when CF card sizes were no more then 256mb. at the time they were good but then about a year after they came out lots of owners started noticing problems with them and then "SDS (sudden death syndrome)" hit in droves and people were in a uproar about them online.

tNext is that they are power hogs (around 10x+ normal CF consumption and a significatnt delay in write speed between shots because the drive has to spin up and down between shots) other one is that they can take that much of a shock to them (a 1 foot drop on to soft carpet would trash them). They wont work for under water applications because the heads of the drive need a cushion of air to read on so they dont hit the platters (there effective opreating range is -10 ft - 10000 ft)


Finally is that they are more expensive then normal CF cards, as 1 GB cards now adays are running around 250 a piece. if you would like to know where PM me

 

[Genesis]

Are available for $239 now on eBAY, the new "F1" card which supposedly is a "40x" card (with a published I/O performance approaching 6MBPs - that's megaBYTEs, not BITs.)

That's faster than virtually any current camera can do I/O to them..... and definitely faster than a prosumer model like the Oly5050.

 

[nlbford]

Scubatooth once bubbled...
Microdrives were very popular a couple of years ago when CF card sizes were no more then 256mb. at the time they were good but then about a year after they came out lots of owners started noticing problems with them and then "SDS (sudden death syndrome)" hit in droves and people were in a uproar about them online.

!!!????

That's somewhat scary, cuz that's what I have been using exclusively in my Nikon. I have not had a problem at all in almost a year and I love the storage space it gives me and I don't have any issues with running low on batteries too quickly. Maybe I'm lucky.

 

[Genesis]

Microdrives are nice, but they're winchester disk drives.

Give one a good jolt while the heads are flying and it WILL suffer a headcrash, as will any winchester drive.

BTW, "good jolt" is about 3-6gs - which you can generate with a 1-2" drop onto a hard surface!

Parked/idle they can sustain 20-30gs, which is more than you want your camera to be subjected to....

 

[dvleemin]

Thanks Guys!

I didn't even realize CF cards came in 1 GB.

Darryl

 

[Crazy_J]

They have up to 3GB even now:

http://www.pretec.com/index2/product/SSD/ach_industrial.htm

~Crazy_J
:doctor:

 

[SimonJ]

Had a Microdrive for a little over a year before it broke. The trouble is that they have moving parts, which seem to be a little prone to damage with rough ride. Personally I am going to stick to large capacity and fast CF cards from now on.

Simon