SanDisk ImageMate is the fastest way to transfer digital data to/from your PC. ImageMate sits on your desk and acts like a removable disk drive, treating the memory card like a diskette. Drag and drop files from the card to your hard disk drive and back. ImageMate simply connects to your printer port with a printer pass through connector to keep your printer online.Take the memory card from the camera, insert it into the ImageMate and copy your favorite pictures onto your PC in seconds. Data transfer speeds are at least 20 times faster than serial port connectivity - great for large and numerous images. Since the camera does not have to connect to the PC for downloads, it saves battery power. SanDisk ImageMate also allows to transfer data from your Handheld/Palm PC to your desktop PC and vice versa.

User Reviews about SanDisk ImageMate External Parallel CompactFlash Card Reader

Great reader. I use it instead of pluging my camera to the computer. Fast and easy! -- Great buy for the money

As you may have learned the hard way, Windows NT does not support USB regardless of whether your computer has it or not. Not one single store in my local area (Orange County, CA) carries a parallel port compact flash card reader (they've all joined the 21st century with USB). I bought the Scan Disc model and love it. In fact, I just purchased two more for my coworkers that are constantly bugging me to use the compact flash card reader to retrieve their photos. From other reviews I can see that the Scan Disc is superior to the Kodak model. I have no complaints; it's easy to hook-up and it works just fine. If you're aware of what a compact flash card reader is then there's probably no need to tell you how much easier it is to use vs. the archaic software that comes with most cameras. Although, the software does give you thumbnail image views making digging up old photos much easier. -- Are you stuck on Windows NT too?

I recently received a wonderful gift of a Kodak DX3500 digital camera, with the Loading Dock that connects it to a PC. My initial elation evaporated as I discovered that the Dock-to-PC connection requires a USB connection. The Toshiba Tecra 8100 laptop I'm using has a USB port, but it's taped over because NT 4.0 doesn't support USB (Win2000 and 98 do). I turned to look for a device that would read the camera's CompactFlash card, but didn't need USB to connect. After some scouring of the web (including a comical dead end involving "tech" reps who couldn't provide answers to compatibility questions beyond reading from the company same web page I was already looking at, and a more technical rep who informed me that the item was no longer available from the mfr. and agreed that it probably should be removed from that e-tailer's web page), I found the SanDisk ImageMate External Parallel CF Card Reader. This device provided what I needed: a CompactFlash card reader with a non-USB connection to a machine running NT 4.0.

The setup was painless. The ImageMate plugs into the parallel port, with a passthrough connection for the printer. Power is drawn from a passthrough connection to the PS/2, into which the mouse cable connector fits.

The ImageMate software makes the device appear as a mapped drive. You can read, write, and delete picture files on this drive. A provided software utility swaps out the ImageMate (to let you safely removed the picture card).

We installed the Kodak Loading Dock on a Win98 USB machine, and it works just great. But transfer on the ImageMate is almost as fast and easy.

I've been verbose in this review for the sake of others running the web search I did. You've probably come to the only right place. (I didn't find any other easily acceptable connection devices.) -- worked for me - NT 4.0 on Toshiba Tecra 8100 laptop