Flash Reviews

Thought I was taking a gamble by looking into compactflash memory with a company i'd never heard of... but on the contrary, this has been exceptionally functional. highly reccomended.

... if you don't want any hassles. You won't have any problems with the product. You also get an individual plastic case, as most compact flash cards come with. But, as with all non-volatile memory, the question is how many cycles will it take before it dies? I guess I'll write another review in about 40 years to let you know.

I bought this card for my Kodak DC215 Digital Camera, and I'm about to buy another one for an upcoming trip. I have had no problems with it, and it has provided me with some of the additional memory I need to take more/higher quality images. If you're looking for a solid flash card, this is definitely a viable option.

I bought this 4 weeks back. When I try to shoot quick events (like fire works, baby smile etc,) by the time I get the picture the actual event what ever I intend to shoot goes off! It has very bad write speed. It's good for taking slow pictures of still objects only.

Since getting a 128 MB Compact Flash card by Viking to use with a 3.3 megapixel Canon G 1 digital camera this past June, my whole family has been pleased with the quality of the card and the fairly rapid data transfer from the card to our PowerBook computers. So far, so good. The warranty on the card is for five years per the website. We use a different mfgr's PCMCIA device to hold the card for data transfer and it is so easy to use. We just hope the card continues to work as easily in the future (5 years down the line) as it does now with no data loss. (We prefer equipment that uses compact flash to smart media technology as compact flash cards hold so much more in less space).

A recent afternoon of picture taking (about 33 shots) by part of our household (outdoor waterfall and state park panorama photography, but without the wide angle lens) at highest resolution only filled up half the card, so we were pleased. If they had brought the wide angle lens, they still could have gotten all the shots. The card is comparable in speed to another card made by the originator of compact flash technology (SD), but not the fastest speed on the market, yet good enough for us (we are talking mere seconds for data transfer with that PCMCIA device!).

We've found that if you take pictures for fun and are a serious hobbyist, but not a pro, a good size card is 96 to 128 MB--so this 128 MB card is a handy size to have (pros need a bigger card of at least 256 MB due to non-stop shooting). We carry a couple of 96 or 128 cards and can then take enough pictures on each card without having to change cards per se while shooting a lot of pictures at one location.

...

I'm a happy owner of Nikon's new addition in the advanced amateur/professional Digital Camera market - the D100. The camera received tremendous pre-release publicity and I can say from first hand knowledge that the praise is justified. However the D100 doesn't arrive with any means of image storage. So I ran down to the closest electronics store and purchaged a 128 MB CF Memory card for about ($). The card was rated as "4X" speed. It worked great with no complaints. However last week I searched Amazon.com and found a very high quality Viking 128 MB Compact Flash card at ($) and free shipping! The Viking is a much higher quality card that the one previously purchased and ($) less money and no shipping cost! A real bargain in my book! Are you an eBay shopper? Then you know that the Viking card is selling for more on eBay than Amazon's price!

The first time I used this card, it had card errors. 1 or 2 missing pictures. I reformatted it and kept using it without additional issues, but eventually it lost all my pictures on one shoot. I contacted Viking's 24/7 technical support, but they were closed, and I sent in the card for 24 hour replacement and received a replacement four business days later.

Though I am in the market for another 1 gigabyte card, and the Viking is presently the best price. I will not buy it.

I have CF cards from other manufacturer, including Viking.

Two things I noticed:

1)It used up the battery faster than other CF.

2)Response time to write is slower than others, so it is good for still pictures. I missed quite a few good picture moment for my 3 years old son as he played.

After upgrading from a 3.2 megapixel digital camera (canon S20) to the 4.0 megapixel (canon s400), it was time to eliminate the somewhat useless 16 MB, 32 MB, and 64 MB Compact Flash cards from my arsenal of digital photography gear.

I have kept 128 MB, 256 MB, and 512 MB compact flash cards, but have found the Viking 1 GB compact flash to write and read quickly (in part on canon's new image processing and buffering in the S400 powershot camera).

Although I debated using a multispeed USB enhanced "digital film" product, for the price this Viking CF card is the best value currently (12 June 2003) available given the rebate and free ground shipping at Amazon.com.

I would recommend this product to other digital photographers, especially with the latest 4 and 5 megapixel cameras.

Mine must have had the fix already in place for disabling the power saving feature. I bought this for my wife for mother's day and so far... it works... I like the fact you can rotate the image if it was in landscape mode. It does sort of "zoom out" and thus the only real way to do it so it looks good is to use some photo editing software.

One thing I have noticed is that the pics of sometimes have a "flicker" depending on if their are lines in the image (like power lines in the backgrond). Also some colors flicker like crazy like the green leaves in images of Yosemite. This is really minor.

This is a great product, a fine gift, espcially for those who love photographs but are not techie or don't have a computer. I was diappointed in the auto shut-off feature that couldn't be disabled, but the fix below from our friend " A customer from West Des Moines, Ia" is brilliant and worked for me the first time, with less than three minutes time invested. The company should send him/her a dozen of these picture frames for figuring this out!

Great Product!
There's now a firmware fix for the auto shut-off.
My unit has a line on the setup screen to immobilise this feature.
Good to hear a manufacturer responding to customer feedback - thanks Vialta!
I think earlier units can be upgraded too - need to contact Vialta for that.
I use Vistaframe at home for the family pictures, and also for business presentations. Easy to set up and I can run Powerpoint presentations when the slides are saved as jpeg pictures.
Also use it in office reception window to promote our company services.
Great graphics & really wide viewing area.
Previous reviewer had display problems, but mine are great.
5 Stars from me.Recommended.

Although the name of this case says it holds Smart Media cards, it is not really designed to do so. Smart Media cards do not fit in the two compartments of the case; so if they are set inside the case they will just flop around and potentially get damaged. The case seems to be designed to hold only compact flash cards; however I do not have any compact flash cards, so I cannot say for sure if they would fit.
The case itself is very nice and sturdy for whatever does fit in it.

This TRAVEL CASE FOR COMPACT FLASH & SMART MEDIA CARDS from Verbatim Corporation is similar to the ones that come with some media cards. Unfortunately when purchasing some brands of media cards, a useless vinyl sleeve or nothing is included to store and protect the card. Media cards are sturdy but not indestructible. The thin metal contacts must be protected from damage to be readable and writeable. If a media card is unintentionally flexed, irreparable damage will occur. A protective case is an essential accessory especially as the MB size of media cards increases. Now that 128MB and 256MB cards are becoming more common, you risk losing hundreds of pictures by damaging a media card not properly protected. These cases from Verbatim are ideal since they are sturdy and hold 2 cards each. Now I'm able to remove a memory card from the camera and place it in the protective case while the next card to be used is still protected and readily available.