Datawise Compact-Flash Card Reader

If you've got a digital camera or a handheld computer, you know what a tedious process it can be connecting cables up to your PC's serial port, then waiting while the information downloads oh-so-slowly. If the time you've wasted irks you and you've got a spare £50, Datawise might have the answer.

Once you've plugged the CompactFlash reader into a USB port on your PC, all you need to do is take out the memory card from your device and slot it into the reader. As you'd guess, the reader then reads the card and passes all the information to the PC. The card simply appears as another disk drive in My Computer on your desktop, so you can copy data to and from it as you wish.

At least that's the theory, and with USB's reputation for ease of use we were expecting the card reader to live up to the promises on the box.

Unfortunately, we found it tricky to get the Datawise device up and running, due to the wrong drivers being supplied on the floppy disk that came in our box.

This meant that, at first, we simply couldn't get the card reader to install properly. We had to find Datawise's website, then download the proper drivers from there. After that, installation was a manual process rather than being automatic as it would have been if the disk had been right. While it's not at all difficult to do this once you know what you're doing, it's inconvenient and would be confusing for a beginner.

On the other hand, once installed we had no further problems. Copying data from the card directly is much faster than downloading pictures from a digital camera over a serial connection, and the reader is ideal for this. It's less useful if you have a palmtop or handheld computer. Although it's a handy way to copy extra programs onto a memory card, you'll still need the wired connection to synchronise contacts and appointments between your PC and the handheld computer.

As for options, our card reader came in a fetching shade of purple but other colours are available. Datawise can also supply readers for other types of memory card, as well as one that uses the parallel port.