Rating: 
Summary: Unbelievable machine!
Review: I finally ordered the SmartMedia ImageMate, even after reading some pretty horrific reviews (and some very good ones). The SanDisk web page says to check the CDW EasyCreate, and mine was OK (3.5c, "c" makes it OK). Received the reader, installed the software, plugged it in to an empty USB port, stuck in a half-full SmartCard from my Olympus 360L camera, clicked on the "G" drive, and there it was - all of it! Downloaded 40 images in 15-20 seconds (not 20-30 minutes!), played around with uploads, deletes, any old files (not only images) - WORKS LIKE MAGIC! (**FAST** magic...) I have Windows 98, Pentium III at 733 MHz, a Costco USB splitter, 3 or 4 other USB devices, shut down & restart each day,and the system still crashes once a day or so. Pretty standard setup, I think. Good luck to all!!!
Rating: 
Summary: What I Was Expecting
Review: I first bought this reader to try to save some deleted pictures on my D-490Z digital cam. No sucess. Ok, that was just a thing to try to save them, but I tell ya, don't buy it if you want to recover OLYMPUS D490Z deleted pictures. But, after all I got impressed by the speed that my pictures now are downloaded! It's a lot faster, a lot easyer tham by a serial cable. The installion is amazinly easy: it was my first USB device! I'm only having one problem... some pictures that I download trough the reader get damanged... but if I download it trought cam's serial cable, it is a normal photo, without any error. Don't know if it is camera's fault, card's fault or reader's fault... After all, I say it: it's a very good accessorie for a digicam w/o usb connection!
Rating: 
Summary: Beware, Conflicts Exist.
Review: I have 2 of these SanDisk USB readers (they will read only 1 type of memory card, so if you have devices with CompactFlash, MultiMediaCard memory, SmartMedia, etc., you'll need 1 reader per format). They can be difficult to set-up, as the software (in both cases) required an update from their website (nice site, user-friendly) and, more importantly, there are known conflicts with other device drivers you may have on your computer (such as CD-RW drives and Zip drives). While these conflicts are mentioned on the SanDisk website, the solutions they offered were not always helpful. Once solved, this device is great. I have since purchased the Viking reader and have encountered no conflicts at all.
Rating: 
Summary: How Can You Know?
Review: I have bought all of my recently purchased digital camera stuff here. So far, everything works great. I would like to buy a card reader, but the reviews are scary -- especially the cards getting damaged by the reader. I wrote to SanDisk about this problem, but have heard nothing back. I hope more purchasers will write additional reviews to let us know about the card damage problem
Rating:
Summary: Stability is totally unpredictable
Review: I have over a year of frustrating experience with this product running under WinME. The thing constantly locks up. The only way I can get it to be even slightly stable is to reboot between reading cards. Otherwise the system locks up whenever going from one card to the next. Horrible drivers. My experience with it on Win2000 was too short to be sure, but having to live with this product has been bad enough. I hardly use it now, but I'm disappointed to see that I'll likely have to throw it away when I go to WinXP. No matter, it's barely worked anyway.
Rating:
Summary: Stability is totally unpredictable
Review: I have over a year of frustrating experience with this product running under WinME. The thing constantly locks up. The only way I can get it to be even slightly stable is to reboot between reading cards. Otherwise the system locks up whenever going from one card to the next. Horrible drivers. My experience with it on Win2000 was too short to be sure, but having to live with this product has been bad enough. I hardly use it now, but I'm disappointed to see that I'll likely have to throw it away when I go to WinXP. No matter, it's barely worked anyway.
Rating:
Summary: Worked great on Mac OS 9, now what about Mac OS X????
Review: I have used this device for the past year with my digital camera, and it worked great. Slide the memory card in and up pops the disk on my desktop. Copy the images, and you're done! But so far under Mac OS X, there seems to be no such support! Help SanDisk! iPhoto from Apple is so cool and I want it to work with my card reader!
Rating:
Summary: Works like a charm
Review: I installed the San Disk Smart Media Reader USB version (they call it the ImageMate) on my computer with Win98. Installation was a snap by following the instructions, and I was uploading pictures from my 32meg smartmedia card in less than 5 min. The directory acts just like another removable-disk drive (assigned F: on my computer) and is labeled USB when viewed after clicking on My Computer icon. It sure beats uploading from the camera.
Rating:
Summary: Don't do it, pay for quality
Review: I just bought a digital camera so wanted a card reader to easily get to the pictures. I didn't need anything fancy so went with this one. MISTAKE. As other reviewers have stated, conflicts exist. I couldn't even get the software to install on my Win98 machine and [their website] is no help whatsoever. There is no good information on this error and you cannot even search on their new site without unknown page web errors. You can download the instruction manual, but it is just the 5 page quick start manual which came in my box. Gee, thanks. One reviewer mentioned that he needed a software update, but I couldn't even find that. I am returning this item and going with a more solid product like Viking's. Don't bother with this one unless you want to spend a lot of time with installing it (or are just lucky!)
Rating:
Summary: Quick way to download pictures
Review: I own a Canon Digital Elph camera that uses CF cards. I purchased this reader so that I wouldn't have to hook up my camera to the computer (and run down the batteries) each time I wanted to download photos. The drivers installed easily, and I haven't had a single problem with it. I suspect that the other guy just has some weird software incompatibility issue that could happen with any device or software.
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