Sometimes, I find myself starting a story or concept in one review and forgetting to finish it there. Instead, the story picks up in a subsequent review and this is much what happened with my review of my Fujifilm 16MB xD-Picture card (reviewed at:
http://www.epinions.com/content_456594132612 ). In that review, I mention how I had lost the card that came with my camera on my annual Las Vegas trip and had to purchase a replacement. I replaced it with the one I reviewed there.
But, my story does not end there! No, I found myself with my Fuji Finepix Digital Camera (reviewed at:
http://www.epinions.com/content_359969623684 ), in some of the neatest places on earth where I would not be able to use my laptop to upload the pictures I had taken. So, after I replaced my picture card with one with equal capacity to what the camera came with, I soon found myself desperate to upgrade. Truth be told, I was stupidly timid about upgrading because I was unsure of whether or not all of the Fujifilm picture cards were compatible with my camera and I was operating on a stupid fear that upgrading would somehow "overwhelm" my poor Finepix. As a result, when I was near civilization, before going to Mount Rushmore, I decided to pick up a Fujifilm xD-Picture Card with the 32 MB capacity. This is twice what I (and my camera) was used to and truth be told, had I known then how the camera handles picture card memory more or less like how it handles batteries, I would have upgraded to a level of card that would not have required me to upload the pictures to my computer the rest of the trip. This card barely staved off the inevitable uploading and truth be told, I got quite a few pictures, but I could have gone with even more.
Basics
The Fujifilm xD-Picture Card with the 32MB capacity is a tiny chip designed to store digital images on compatible cameras. This picture card is a small, flat storage device that fits into virtually any Fuji digital camera and any other camera that uses an eighteen pin connection to a camera. If you are unsure of whether or not that applies to your camera, either consult the camera's manual or carefully remove your current memory card and count the pins. "Pins" in this case are the flat leads (usually a gold-color) that conduct the information, they are separated by faint nonmetallic bars. If your memory card has eighteen little bars (they look almost like piano keys!) then it is considered an eighteen pin lead and this product would be instantly compatible with your camera.
The Fujifilm xD-Picture card is approximately one inch wide, three-quarters inches deep and only 1/16" thick! This is small and easily lost. I suppose, though, if one is a spy and one needs to quickly conceal the picture disc, it makes it easy to swallow to conceal to get spy photos where they are going. This is very small and because most people never remove them from their cameras, that ought not to be much of an issue.
Capacity
As one might guess, the 32MB Fujifilm xD-Picture Card holds thirty-two megabytes worth of visual information. This is a pathetic amount of capacity for people who are spending a day out shooting the sites at places they are likely to only go once in their lives. While some might find the (in my case) ninety-six pictures this will store great, when one considers natural wonders like Carlsbad Caverns and how many pictures one could take in such a place with capacity and batteries, ninety-six is hardly enough. Perhaps in better terms: think of how few pictures that would be at a wedding! What does this mean in practical terms? That largely (honestly) depends on your camera. However, the FinePix offers four quality levels based upon the resolution of the shot taken.
At the minimum resolution (.3M) the 32MB card will hold 242 photographs, but they will be the most grainy that the camera takes. Conversely, a 32MB chip will only hold 48 of the highest resolution images possible. My experiences have been that I do not like the result of the lowest resolution images and I burn through batteries and memory far too quick with the highest capacity ones. I keep my camera set to the 1M quality, which provides images that are a decent size with an impressive enough resolution and this picture card holds 96 pictures at the medium quality quality. My average day of photography, I discovered, was about forty-eight pictures right up until the moment I upgraded to the 32MB card. It was then that I discovered that, less inhibited by storage space, I could take a lot more pictures. So, I found I quickly filled up the card with 96 JPG files that are 6.40 inches (162.2 mm, 1280 pixels) X 4.80 inches (121.9mm, 960 pixels) with a 200 X 200 DPI resolution (though, honestly, that might just be the imaging program I open the pictures in) and True Color (24 Bits).
For those who can live with 96 great pictures between reloads or 242 crappy ones, this is a great memory card for you. The thing is, I can completely recognize that this is not enough capacity for most people and as a result, this lowers the overall usefulness of this product. Virtually everyone who wants to be taking serious amounts of photographs and EVERYONE doing photography professionally will need greater capacity than this!
Durability
The Fujifilm xD-Picture card is essentially a tiny piece of plastic with little metal strips on it. The metal strips (or leads, as they are properly called) plug into a slot in one's camera (consult your camera manual for how to do that). As well, there are chip readers that may be plugged into computers to read the chips directly. It is important to note that software support for extracting information from this card is entirely dependent upon the user's camera or computer! This picture card comes with no software support, nor does it require any to use. It simply plugs into a compatible camera and is as easy to use as batteries.
However, this is a small device and is easily lost. As a result, users must be very careful while handling it. I have NEVER had this Picture card lose a file and until I actually lost my original one, I cannot imagine I would have been taking it out of the camera for anything. However, proper care indicates that one should ground themselves (eliminate static electricity from the body) by touching something metal before touching the card. The only other way I can imagine to damage this is step on it (it is mostly plastic, so it will break) or swallowing it.
This is a durable card that most people will never need to take out of their camera.
Warranty
Fujifilm tends to have a five-year warranty on a lot of their picture cards, but the 32MB card has only a one-year warranty. In all honesty, in the six months since I purchased this picture card, I have not had any reason to believe it will kick out on me. It has been reliable, even when I suspect it could be easily lost.
This product has only a one-year warranty and I cannot speak to how responsive the company is to replacing them when needed, as I have not needed to exercise that.
Overview
The Fujifilm 32MB xD-Picture card is good, but not adequate as far as capacity (or warranty) for professional photographers. For us amateurs, one still is likely to enjoy the flexibility and capacity of more storage than this.
For other memory products reviewed by me, please check out my reviews of:
Verbatim Store 'n' Go 1GB Flash Drive -
http://www.epinions.com/content_413799911044
Kingston Data Traveler 1 GB Flash Drive -
http://www.epinions.com/content_452335996548