Card Reader: mem size up limit?

[luis69]

Hello,

I'm going to buy a card reader (for SD and CF).

I sometimes see some card readers with advertising statements like "It reads SD cards up to 512MB". But then I read buyers writing comments like "It reads my 1GB SanDisk without problems" (thus the item seems to go beyond the limit advertised...)

So I would like to understand if a card reader (usually?) really has a memory size upper limit with regard to some memory card type. Or should I think that the above quoted statements were used to highlight the larger size available at the time the advertising was set up? (and not up to date now?)

To state it in other terms, if I buy a card reader without any advertised limit, can I expect it to work with all current memory size (and those for the foreseeable future)?

Thanks in advance for your precious support.

[jevans64]

I got my crystal ball out, and I DO see you buying another card reader in the future.

Most manufacturers don't update their packaging to reflect larger sizes, but that doesn't mean that that 8GB SD card you buy next year will work on the reader you buy today. It is safe to assume that SD cards up to 2GB and CF cards up to 4GB will work even if the specs say differently, but it isn't guaranteed. If you dig deep enough, you will be able to find out what format version standard the reader uses.

You should be safe sticking with branded readers, like Sandisk, Transcend, Ultra, Belkin, etc. It is the non-branded, sub-$10 ones that might not work.

I can point you to one of the best readers I have owned, the Transcend TS-RD13. It is small, fast, and has 5 slots, the 5th being for xD flash. The other reader I have is made by Y-E Data ( YD-8V07 ). It is a 3.5" floppy / card reader combo for my PC. While not as fast as the Transcend ( ~30% slower ), it IS firmware upgradable.

[jwmiles]

I have a 8gb cf and 2gb sd installed in my x51v. Have not had any problems.

[Frenchy]

There maybe a limit of 1Gb on the earlier Axims but teh X30H and up are seeing 8Gb no problem.

[rlarson_mn]

My 6-1 card reader is over 4 years old and it can read my 8gb CF micro drive just fine. My X51V reads it fine also along with a 512mb SD card.

[byrnefm]

I recently bought a KeyMem 133x 2GB SD card which works fine in my Axim X50v, and both my Lexar and generic (USB 1.1) card readers fine. However, it won't read in one of my brother's card readers (Datatech, I think). It was the first card I've ever seen that wouldn't work in a card reader!