Eye-Fi announced two new wireless memory cards today, and they’ve dubbed their original card with a new name.
The new line-up:
- Eye-Fi Explore: The Explore card can automatically locate nearby WiFi networks and geotag your photos using Skyhook’s global Wi-Fi positioning system. It can also automatically connect to any of Wayport’s 10,000+ hotspots (in other words, pretty much every McDonald’s in the US). MSRP $129.
- Eye-Fi Share: The original Eye-Fi card with a new name. It allows users to automatically upload photos straight to their favorite photo sharing service over WiFi. MSRP $99.
- Eye-Fi Home: This one’s for the folks who transfer a lot of photos to their computer, but don’t need them to be auto uploaded to any photo sharing sites. The Home allows users to transfer photos directly to their PC without the use of cables, card readers, or docks. Pretty much the same card as the Share, without the sharing part. MSRP $79.
All 3 cards carry 2 gigs of storage, are Mac/PC compatible, and should hit the shelves on June 6th.
Eye-Fi will be showing off the Explore card at today’s Where 2.0 Conference, which I’ll be attending - expect some more details later.
the Eye-Fi is piece of crap - I returned one I bought over the weekend…couldn’t even get through their stupid registration process, and I’m a pretty tech-savvy dude
isn’t this supposed to be a *consumer* product? …. like click, click, click, and it just works?
hell, even their (slow via email) support people couldn’t solve my problem….
so, I thought, wait a minute, with freaking broadband or wi-fi everywhere I go now, I can upload my pix to Flickr pretty damn fast as it is
who needs additional grief or complexity? so, I saved myself a hundred bucks
Comment by Graeme Thickins — May 12, 2008 @ 5:53 am
Geotagging via WiFi outside highly dense urban areas is useless.
Comment by TranceMist — May 12, 2008 @ 6:11 am
I still say, call me when they add RAW file support.
Comment by Daveed — May 12, 2008 @ 11:25 am
Why do you need RAW support for uploading to photo sites? I thought this at first myself too, but instead I would just shoot in RAW+Jpeg. Main point I see is getting the files up there quick. Look at Nikon’s solutions… so expensive.
Comment by David Fisher — May 12, 2008 @ 12:57 pm
It’s not just RAW files. It’s the greatly increased hassle of *some* of your files (JPG) being transferred but not all (RAW, AVI, MOV) which means you still end up having to plug the card into a card reader, and then get EyeFi automatically launching some web site, and you have to remember which you transferred and which are safe to delete.
It’d be far simpler to transfer all files to a folder on my computer. And then I could plug the card into my phone and transfer songs, or transfer it into other devices and get any type of file. As is, the EyeFi folk spent extra effort restricting what it can do, which makes it less valuable and more of a pain for the user.
Comment by Amit Patel — May 12, 2008 @ 7:27 pm
This product is slick. It has saved me countless hours of time.
I come home after taking pictures, turn my camera on and put it on the counter. By the time I get a drink it has moved a copy to my computer and uploaded a copy to Flikr.
BIG TIME SAVER!
Leo - the new one will geo tag. No gadgets or expensive equipment.
Comment by B Davis — May 12, 2008 @ 9:16 pm
I agree with Amit. They need the basic version, that will simply let you transfer all photographic files from camera to computer. If they had this, the EyeShare would find a huge market in the professional and prosumer photography markets.
Comment by Riprap — May 13, 2008 @ 4:05 am
I love my EyeFi.
I use it hooked up through a CF adaptor on my Rebel XT (350D) which has a tiny preview screen.
I shoot lots of photos in a light tent and as soon as the shot is taken it appears on my PC so I can preview it full-screen straight away without having to pull the card out and copy it off.
Saves me hours of time.
Comment by Charles — May 13, 2008 @ 5:10 am