Help Connecting external card reader?

[DroidCake]

I would like to be able to read microSD's without having to remove the back cover. Is there a way to connect an external card reader via USB?

Thanks,

~DC

 

[kamikazekyle]

Connecting a card reader directly to the phone? That's not possible as far as I know. If you're just needing the contents of the card, you can mount the SD card as a drive in your computer (plug in the phone, choose Mount as Drive). In essence, your phone would be acting as a reader in that case.

 

[DroidCake]

Connecting a card reader directly to the phone? That's not possible as far as I know. If you're just needing the contents of the card, you can mount the SD card as a drive in your computer (plug in the phone, choose Mount as Drive). In essence, your phone would be acting as a reader in that case.

I want to view video from a sports cam on a Micro SD card out in the field without having to take the back cover and battery off.

~DC

 

[kamikazekyle]

Ahh, gotcha. Yea, in that case, you're probably out of luck. I don't know of any phones off-hand that have the support for an external card reader. I suppose with Android it might be possible -- at least with some phones and readers -- but haven't come across anything. Afterall, Android has full support for writing to the cards themselves and full *nix mount goodness, it'd just be a matter of getting an app and/or driver to interface with a drive being presented via USB then mounting it.

Some phones have the SD card more accessible than others, but the Evo's is just in a really, really bad spot. I do hate that about the Evo since I have oodles of microSD cards that I could slapt full of videos or music and swap in when I want an extended media-only session, but that's not practical with the Evo.

I think there are also some devices that could present themselves wirelessly as a WebDAV/FTP server or something similar and have a card reader built in, but I've never really paid any attention to them. Your best bet would probably be to purchase a portable video player that accepts SD card inputs if you reguarly review the footage.

Now if you do find a way to use an external card reader with the Evo, let me know

 

[talz13]

I believe the problem with this is that you would require a host USB controller in the EVO, or some implementation of "USB to go". USB isn't a peer-to-peer connection like firewire is, so it requires a host to host a client (i.e. your PC is the host, and the EVO is a USB client). It would be very cool to get it working though!

 

[DroidCake]

Thanks for the input guys. I think I'm just going to wait for a decent android tablet that has the microSD slot and can support 1080 playback

~DC

 

[kamikazekyle]

Thanks for the input guys. I think I'm just going to wait for a decent android tablet that has the microSD slot and can support 1080 playback

~DC

Mmm, that'd be nice. Slap on the next generation of nVidia's ION chipset, stick on a hefty but power-efficent CPU to suppliment, solid bluetooth stack to support external controllers and keyboards/mice, and you'd have a nice little portable. 'course battery life probably wouldn't be all that great

In any event, thanks for the reminder about the USB model, talz123. I tend to stick to Firewire and Fibre channel in day-to-day stuff with the odd SAS/iSCSI. About the only thing I use USB for nowadays is charging and keyboards/mice (plus my phone ).

 

[-DRM-]

Dragging this one back up - anyone know of any new ways to do this? I've heard some other non-Android phones can mount an external card reader, but I can't believe nobody has come out with an Android app for this yet. I need it for the same reason - viewing and saving pics/video in the field from game/trail cameras.

 

[Mr. Ed]

would be super cool

so using something like this

http://gsmserver.com/shop/cables/pc_cables/usb_to_micro_usb_5pin_micro_sd_card_reader_cable.php

most of these cables do have a disclaimer that the sd function is disabled when a card is in place tho

 

[sitlet]

Yes, that would be nice. However it wont happen with the Evo. Android would need usb host support, to be able to read data coming IN to the phone, which it currently doesnt have.

 

[akazabam]

There are probably wifi and/or bluetooth sd card reader options out there. I'm sure they're more expensive, but there's a higher likelihood that they'll work with android.

 

[sitlet]

Well here is a step in the right direction:

Eye-Fi launching new 8GB wireless SD card today, kicking out Direct Mode for iOS and Android next week -- Engadget

Since we cannot connect a card reader directly to the evo, this wifi card will let you immediately share pictures from a camera to the evo via wifi. Sounds like a good idea to me.

 

[terrytexstar]

I work for a newspaper and use a digital camera in the field. There are often times I am in the field and need to send a pic back to the office and it would be nice to have a multi-card reader for my droid that can handle a compact flash card (much bigger than an sd card) . Even one that required external power (12 volt cig lighter) would be handy. I waste a lot of miles somedays rushing pics to the office before deadline so hopefully some bright engineer will figure out a cost effective way to make this happen.