5 Things You Need to Know About Your Digital Memory Cards

Technology has transitioned us from the days of the floppy disk to a new storage medium, digital memory cards. Today on media no larger that a twenty-five cent piece we can carry with us 50,000 digital photographs, or 25,000 musical recordings, or 10,000 unabridged volumes of books, just to name a few. Digital cameras, video cameras, portable video game players, digital picture frames, cell phones, mp3 players and computers are only a couple of the modern appliances we use daily that use and need digital memory cards.

Each year the storage capacity of memory cards increase. The 16 gigabit (that is 16 billion bytes) limit is slated for an incremental growth advancement with the next production model. Memory cards are here to stay. Compact, easy to use, and easy to access digital storage media has become a staple need in our daily life. Digital memory cards fulfill that need. We buy them, we use them, but what to we know about them? What is there to know about them other than when I plug them in they work?

Here are 5 things I'll bet you did not know about memory cards;

You can recover some deleted data from a memory card. The kicker here is deleted data. If you lost the data as a result of re-formatting the card, recovery is not possible. There is rescue software you can purchase that will do the trick. Do a quick Google search on "memory card rescue software" for more information.

Digital memory cards have two different speed ratings. They are the maximum transfer speed and the Speed Class rating 2, 4, and 6. These speed rating affect the transfer speed of the media to and from the card to your appliance. It is recognizable in the slow refresh rate of the display on your PSP, digital camera display, and Blackberry. You may also notice a slight delay when your appliance is reading and saving data. Class 2 is okay but Class 4 and 6 are much faster.

Faster memory cards can boost the performance of your digital appliance. The faster burst rate with the right card/appliance combination will result is remarkably improved performance. The faster card burst the read/write transfers speeds. Your gizmo will recover more rapidly so that you can get back to the task at hand.

Your memory card should always be formatted for the application it is being used in. Each appliance has its own format configuration, which may not necessarily be compatible with another appliance you may want to use the memory card in. Be sure you transfer your stored data before using your digital memory card in a different appliance. You stand a chance of loosing that data. Also an appliance with a properly formatted card in it will respond faster.

You cannot take advantage of a fast memory card if you do not have the right equipment. If your appliance is not rate for a high speed memory card, be it your mp3 player, cell phone, or your card reader it will not experience any performance increase. You will not be able to take advantage of the faster speed so don't waste your money.

The main benefits of digital memory card is compactness, transfer speed, storage capacity, and reliability. To date it is the best digital storage media created. As with every tool, rightly applied knowledge is power. Learn to take full advantage of your memory card and rev up your digital appliances.

Resource: PC World Magazine - September 2008