Belkin iPod flash reader
I was tempted to get Belkin’s new iPod CompactFlash reader (Belkin F8E461) until I read this:
I am going to call tech support on Monday and find out what the hell is going on here- seems like they stuck a USB interface for a FW device or there is some bug in the software. Xfering 500 MB took 22 minutes, and I shudder to think the chances of getting through 1 full 1GB card without one of their batteries dying- if it weren’t so slow I wouldn’t sweat the batteries, but at that speed… jeesh. 300 kBps just can’t be right! [David Gawlowski on dpreview.com]
In short, it’s so slow that it’s utterly worthless for anyone with more then a handful of pictures. Belkin admits that it’s only supposed to do .3 MB/sec, and says that they aren’t planning on changing it. I’m not sure what they’re thinking; is there really a market for clunky-looking, painfully slow media readers?
At least the software support for this exists on the iPod now, and maybe someone like Griffin will come out with something that doesn’t suck.