512MB/1GB SD card with SmarST and iPAQ 2210

uffe73

Hello all,

I have with a great deal of interest followed the large number of postings regarding which SD is best for PDA navigation. Considering how many combinations of SD cards, PDAs and navigation programs there are on the market, it seems impossible to get a completely correct answer to which card is REALLY the best. The pricing is of course for most people an issue as well...

Anyway, most of the postings about SD cards have been written by people using TomTom, that seems to be more demanding for the memory card than SmartST. I would therefore like to ask the Navman users specifically what good and bad experiences you have had with SD cards of the bigger sizes. I'm using a 256MB Integral card today and have had quite a lot of problems with SmartST freezing and sometimes hanging completely requiring a soft reset. I'm suspecting these problems could be connected to the SD card - maybe also a bad BT driver.

Since I'll be upgrading to SmartST V3 (whenever it is actually released Laughing

) I'm also thinking about getting a bigger SD card - 512MB or 1GB, depending on price and review ratings. I would be very greatful to those of you who would like to share your thoughts about these SD card types used with SmartST. I'm not sure if it's worth spending the extra money to get a card with the highest speed rating (I believe the fastest ones on the market are the Ultra High Speed SD cards with 45X or 60X) since the SD slot on my iPAQ might not be able to read/write at that high speed anyway.

Best regards,
Ulf
_________________
TomTom GO720T: App ver 8.351(9982/090518), OS:315187, GPS v1.20, Boot 5.5120
TT RDS-TMC: 4V00.013
Maps: Scandinavia v840.2562, Western_Europe v715.1703
Garmin GPSMap 60CSx (SW ver. 3.70)

CoolHand · Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2004 5:58 pm Post subject:

I bought a 1Gb Twinmos SD card from www.mycom.se for 800 crowns and it has reduced the time it takes to start up Navman V2 by more than half on my iPAQ 3970.
I had the same doubts as you about weather the iPAQ would take advantage of the faster card, but it does.
All my other apps which are on the SD card run faster now as well.

uffe73 · Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2004 6:25 pm Post subject:

Thanks for the info! 800 SEK (about 60 GBP) sounds like a decent price provided that it's a good card. According the to their web page the reading speed is 6MB and a the writing speed 4.8MB. Not sure how that can be translated into the CD-ROM speed rating (32X, 45X, 60X etc).

Does anyone have experience from the 1GB cards from Kingmax and Transcend?

/Ulf

PS: What's the V2 map data like in Stockholm? I've found quite a lot of small errors in Gothenburg that I have reported to Tele Atlas
_________________
TomTom GO720T: App ver 8.351(9982/090518), OS:315187, GPS v1.20, Boot 5.5120
TT RDS-TMC: 4V00.013
Maps: Scandinavia v840.2562, Western_Europe v715.1703
Garmin GPSMap 60CSx (SW ver. 3.70)

DavidW · Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2004 12:45 am Post subject:

Can you post the markings on the back of the Integral SD card, Ulf? Whilst you're quite right to say that TomTom software tends to be harder on memory cards than other software, I've managed to push one style of card Integral have shipped to go wrong and shut down in a memory card reader on a PC simply by reading two large files simultaneously.

The style of card I'm talking about has a code in portrait format towards the bottom of the back of the card in small print. It consists of a letter followed by eleven numbers - there's no other markings. The example of this card I tried was branded Integral "High Speed" 1GB.

The only other mention of this style of card in the forums was with someone who was having severe problems. If nothing else, the more details we have about the markings on troublesome cards (which relate to the card's manufacturer rather than the brand - some brands change manufacturer from batch to batch), the better we can advise others about cards that tend to be problematic.

David

uffe73 · Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2004 8:29 am Post subject:

David,

My Integral card is marked with:
SD-M256B1
0408SD3372H
MADE IN TAIWAN

I've tried to search for this card identy on the internet but without any luck. I'm not sure if Integral is a card brand of itself or if it's rebadget from another brand.

/Ulf
_________________
TomTom GO720T: App ver 8.351(9982/090518), OS:315187, GPS v1.20, Boot 5.5120
TT RDS-TMC: 4V00.013
Maps: Scandinavia v840.2562, Western_Europe v715.1703
Garmin GPSMap 60CSx (SW ver. 3.70)

bigkoala · Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2004 2:15 pm Post subject:

Avoid Sandisk 512MB. I get regular read failures just when I am trying to find an important address and SmartSt loses the entire map data.

I also get regular freezes on SmartSt requiring soft reset. I reduced this somewhat by installing SP2. However I use my Ipaq to synchronise contacts and calendar with outlook and I am wondering whether this is affecting the amount of memory that Navman needs.

I love the program but I find it has a lot of practical issues making it work reliably.......
_________________
Navman SE 3450 Sleeve with
256MB Compact Flash (Type: Integral) on
Ipaq 5450 with
512MB Secure Digital (Type: Sandisk)
SmartSt Software V2.00.0036 SP2

DavidW · Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2004 3:07 pm Post subject:

Ulf,

That's not a style of card markings I recognise, but is another one for the 'suspect' list.

Integral rebadge other manufacturers' cards - I don't believe they manufacture any SD cards themselves, but I may be wrong on that. The days when it was possible to reliably identify who made which SD cards have passed as there's many more manufacturers than there once were. That said, it's still helpful to know about the markings from troublesome cards.

Integral have a web site at http://www.integralmemory.com - though I'm not sure it will tell you anything useful.

David

Tim Buxton · Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2004 3:26 pm Post subject:

David,

Would it help to post the Manufacturer ID, if available? In Pocket Mechanic I can get this if I go to the "Card Benchmark" screen.
_________________
Tim

DavidW · Posted: Wed Dec 08, 2004 3:37 pm Post subject:

I've looked at that information myself and can't relate it to the manufacturer of the card - but maybe someone else can. In my experience, it seems to be related to the serial number of the card rather than identifying the manufacturer.

I believe some of the Palms can identify SD card manufacturer - though I don't know how they do it and whether it's reliable.

David

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