The Eye-Fi SD Cards take wireless image and video transfer to the professional level with a 16 gigabyte high capacity card that also transfers images and video to a computer, tablet or smartphone for easy viewing and editing.
Ease of Use, Performance: 4/5
Look & Feel: 5/5
Features 4/5
How much I enjoy 3/5
Total: 4/5 Stars
Eye-Fi is revolutionizing the photography and videography world and has even shown the digital camera industry a technology that every camera and camcorder should have but until they do all have Wi-Fi the Eye-Fi card is here. The idea is a simple one and one that has seen as big a revolution in the picture taking industry as cameras went digital by a simple SD card that connects wirelessly to a computer.
The Eye-Fi card is a simple SD Card that also has a small Wi-Fi circuit built in that connects and sends pictures to your computer, tablet or smartphone but you need an internet connected computer to set the system up. Eye-Fi has released a 16 gigabyte Pro version of the wireless SD Cards that not only connects and sends images and video along with the higher storage capacity but also does it faster than previous versions.
I have purchased an Eye-Fi card in the past and recently received their newest one for review from Eye-Fi’s public relations company and I am impressed with not only the greater storage but the finer tweaks to the whole system in general. Set up is simple with the included card and an SD card adapter as the company included a full installation program right on the card along with all that is needed for the wireless networking.
The Eye-Fi cards can be formatted for erasing pictures but this will also erase the installation program but a simple download and transfer will get the program back on the card if you would like. The main settings and stuff on the card for the networking will not be erased and will remain on the card even if you do format the card to erase images and clean up the data storage.
The Eye-Fi card works well and is easy to use for simple transfers of images and video from a camera or camcorder to a computer whether it’s a Mac or Windows but for other setups like to a smartphone or tablet your mileage may vary. I recently received a BlackBerry PlayBook and could not get the Eye-Fi system up and running on it how I would like so I am simply using an old Windows XP laptop to download pictures to and then I can copy them to my work computer.
My setup is typical of many professionals I have heard about where they want to look at pictures immediately when taking them so they can adjust the image how they want and reshoot or to simply show to clients to see if they approve. The Eye-Fi card allows photographers to take a shot, wait a few seconds and have the image displayed on screen of a laptop or desktop computer without hassles but you will need a small program for the viewing part.
Eye-Fi works as a simple wireless network device and sends pictures to your computer but what happens after that is up to you, you can use slideshow programs to view all the images in the folder you sent them to or something a bit different. An Eye-Fi user came up with a simple program that watches a folder that you specify and views the latest image to enter that folder which is perfect for photographers who want to see and adjust the latest shot they took.
The program is called Previewer and is a simple program that you start up to a screen with the latest image from your chosen folder or a blank screen if there is nothing in the folder and a few simple settings on the top menu bar. The Previewer program does not do slideshows but you can have this running along with a slideshow from an image viewer like Windows Live Gallery or GraphicConverter.
I tried to set up the mobile Eye-Fi app on my BlackBerry PlayBook and was able to send photos to my PlayBook and then to my computer but I was not pleased with the time it took to view images on the PlayBook. For some reason the PlayBook just does not handle the image downloads nearly as fast as my computer or older laptop so using a tablet for me is out as I just cannot have the wait while working.
Good workflow is essential when it comes to taking pictures and that is what the Eye-Fi card is all about, allowing a photographer to take pictures for almost instant viewing on a computer or tablet but the PlayBook is currently not a supported device. The PlayBook does work with the Eye-fi but is much slower than I would prefer however the iPad and other tablets behave better with the Eye-Fi setup according to other reviewers and users.
The Eye-Fi card allows photographers and others to seamlessly view photos, upload them to a computer and to web services like YouTube, Flickr or Facebook with ease and without having to manually transfer files or folders. You can also use the Eye-fi storage servers to store your images with a yearly subscription costing about $50 so you will always have access to your files without the worry of them getting lost.
Eye-Fi is a great product and one that I highly recommend if you’re looking for that professional touch to add to your studio or photography business as well as those home amateurs who just want simple image handling without the hassles of pulling cards out of cameras and moving files. The larger 16GB size of the latest Pro X2 means no worries about filling up the card even when shooting in RAW and the wireless SD card even handles video with ease just a lengthier transfer for longer video.
I only have a few complaints with the cards and mostly with Eye-Fi itself which mainly stem from how they are slow to listen to users complaints and suggestions but things are improving. I was surprised when I first bought an Eye-Fi card a few years ago and it did not have some kind of viewer to see the latest image as it was transferred but over time a user solved that problem.
I just thought that this would be the main objective of the transfer of an image to a computer so the photographer could see the picture on a larger screen and see if the focus and image looked alright or if adjustments needed to be done. Eye-Fi has solved many problems but the main suggestions that I would have thought would have been a major feature from the start has not been addressed but the card does have its good features along with a few bad things.
I highly recommend the Pro X2 Eye-Fi card for the best in transfer speed and capacity at the low cost of about $100 which is a good price when you compare this to the cost of a Canon Wireless File Transmitter which start at $500.
