Alera Digital Photo Copy Cruiser

[Suhit Gupta]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1567419,00.asp' target='_blank'>http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1567419,00.asp</a><br /><br /></div>"Digital cameras certainly have their strengths, but when you've filled up your last memory card halfway through a two-week vacation, you might as well have run out of film. The Alera Digital Photo Copy Cruiser addresses this problem by combining a memory-card reader and a CD writer in a single appliance. The Copy Cruiser can back up nearly 700MB of photos to disc with the touch of a button. It includes a headphone jack that lets you use the device as a portable audio-CD player, and when attached to a PC, it provides all the functionality of an external CD-RW drive and an eight-format card reader."<br /><br /><img src="http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/images/alera.jpg" /><br /><br />The device is capable of reading CF I and II, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro, Microdrive, MultiMedia Card, SecureDigital, and SmartMedia cards. It can play back CD-Audio and has a headphone out. Plus, the device supports USB 2.0 (unfortunately it is a USB 1.1 interface for the card reader); and at a mere 2lbs but with a whopping 48X/36X/12X CD read/write/rewrite speed I think this would be a great accessory on vacation. An extensive review of the device can be found <a href="http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1567320,00.asp">here</a>.<br /><br />I have a 1GB CF card in my EOS 10D and even though I take a lot of pictures, I seldom travel without my laptop so I am usually covered. What do you guys currently use to back up your images on vacation if your flash card fills up?

[pre]

Just bought the Canon and also considered the running out of memory senario. I've got about 1.5 G on various Compact Flash cards, but the Canon pictures are about 3.3 Meg. Did some research and found the Gmini 220. Plays MP3 and WMA. Has a Compact Flash reader that will suck your pictures off of your card in a "Flash". Roughly 2 1/2 x 3 x 1 in. . Bought it for about $300, and so far I'm very happy with it. I use it every day as a MP3 player when I work out. I'm leaving tomorrow on a 7 day cruise so we'll see if it holds up as I anticipate. I now have two digital cameras that I'll take along. The smaller one with a water proof case. Click, click, click... 20 Gig is a lot of picture potential.