Eye-Fi 802.11n Pro X2 hands-on
By Donald Melanson 
posted January 7th 2010 4:11PM
posted January 7th 2010 4:11PM
Not every SD card merits the hands-on treatment, but Eye-Fi is blazing a trail of its own into the WiFi wilderness, so we decided to swing by their booth to check out their new 802.11n-equipped Pro X2 first hand. Available in 8GB form only, this one is a Class 6 memory card so it should be equally speedy when taking photos or video as well transferring, and it packs the same geotagging, RAW, and ad hoc support seen in previous Eye-Fi cards. New with this card, however, is a so-called Endless Memory mode that'll free up space as photos are uploaded via WiFi, and the company's new Eye-Fi Center photo management software, which you'll be able to check out for yourself later this month. Hit up the gallery below for a closer look at the card itself.
Interested to know how well this is selling
it's obviously some amazing tech but are people actually forking out
@mark29 well, I bought one (pre-ordered one), so I'm a statistic. ;)
While I already have a 1st gen version... I could not be up-sold due to the annoying (1 change a new card and sell it for the same price) deal.
So, I waited. Glad I did, to expensive to keep swapping. BUT, this could be the ONLY card I'll need for some time!
@gerphimum I have not taken my current eye-fi out of the camera since it's been put in. just keep recharging the camera. Old card bat life is decent. (we'll see 'bout the new one). I can't imagine it's much different since it's only active when your camera is on (no idle battery drain).
I get free geo-tagging just by using the old trial smug-mug service. Originally (and may still) they gave a free smug-mug trial with free geo-tagging while you used smug-mug. Well, by leaving the service on, (even after the smug-mug trial is over) you still get the geo-tagging free and the images load to your machine fine (who cares about the smug-mug upload). I see little errors on their web page when it fails to upload to smug-mug but didn't care since my local and ftp transfer worked fine (still does).
As for FTP... simple... just setup a network drive on your machine and away it goes (wherever you want).
@va jj it deletes the last image(s) on the card, so I'd suspect (besides attempted checks to be sure it did upload correctly, you'd see the image first and or mess with it somehow on a 'puter before it's deleted (it's 8GB after all). Even taking HD and or raw you'll still get some decent numbers off that.
@optimusprimed it's a web interface that sets-up the card. You plug the card into a machine with web capability, and the settings are written to the card (kinda like a firmware upgrade) at that time. When you take the card out of the 'puter it knows what to do by the settings you transfered to it.
Hope my long reply was more helpful than annoying. :)
@thecolor thanks for the info
I'm still amazed they can fit a Wi-fi module inside an SD card and the actual memory!
Eww! His fingernails!
Im curious to know what kind of battery hit the camera takes when this thing is up and flying
Most pointless photo gallery, ever. It looks like ... a memory card. The gallery on the link provided is a lot more worthwhile.
It's a great bit of tech though, impressive that they manage to cram so much in.
okay so if it didnt uploaded your photo correctly and it deletes the photo.
WOOOOHPS.
@va jj
I've been studying the internals of the last Pro series card the last couple weeks. One thing that happens when a file is transferred to the desktop is the desktop software returns whether the transfer was successful or not so there at least is a double check - the card knows it sent the data, the pc acknowledges it received it and if it is valid or not.
DO WANT, i totally need the "endless memory" thing, i need a camera that syncs with my PC automatically when i am within wifi distance, i am terrible for offloading my cameras, if i lost my camera, i'd probably lose the last 2 years of my life.
Always wondered how these work. Is there a config program that you access through the camera?
@optimusprimed
I have a 4GB WiFi explore. You plug the Eye-Fi card into your PC with a USB adaptor that comes with the card (though any USB/SD adaptor will work). Config is handled through the Eye-Fi Manager web-based app: you can set up SSIDs/WEP keys, links to photo-sharing sites, and various other options. It's pretty seamless.
Wow that is actually awesome. I have NEVER seen an SD card up that close before.. it looks so.. real..
You do realize it has WiFi in it right? and that normal SD cards are never a nice bright color.
I wonder why SD cards are all largely the same color anyway, weird, although I think kingston or somebody had beige/white ones, for a bit, but most all I've seen are darkblue or black.
No need, why not make the current sd cheaper and pack with more mermoy?
Video!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNT9eqNe4NQ
These are seemingly amazing little devices!! I've got two questions:
1) Could I just stick one of these guys into my laptop and have an instant local NAS to share files (without a need for ad-hoc networking)
2) Is there any security or encryption on these. I can just imagine a scene in a Bond film or Sandra Bullock hacker movie with somebody at an Airport, Times Square, or risque vegas hotel lobby just flushing thousands of no-longer-private photos and videos onto their personal laptop.
@mutauro
1) It doesn't serve files like a NAS - it doesn't have a gui to view/retrieve selected files from the card. The card sends out signals looking for a proper response and once received it starts transmitting the pictures to that ip. The best you could use it for in a laptop type scenario would be to copy photos to it and have them retransmit to a PC running the Eye-Fi software.
2) There is some security. Basically the Eye-Fi only transmits to SSID's you tell it to - so don't use/select a factory SSID. Additionally (if you were to select a factory SSID and your neighbor had the same SSID) there is another layer of security which is that the card looks for an encrypted response back to a query it sends out and that response is tied to a unique ID on each Eye-Fi card. To hack one you'd want to know the card's ID as well as what SSID's it tries to connect to as well as run the Eye-Fi desktop software (or emulate it).
Pre-ordered @ Amazon yesterday - but still looking for a better price than MSRP or at least some "cash back."
Finally an Eye Fi card with decent space, Class 6 speed + RAW and video support. The 802.11n is a bonus. Sure, It's pricey compared to a regular class 6 8GB card, but worth it just to not have to remove my SD card to import new pics to the computer. Hope I'm not disappointed.
now that does should neat, will have to check this one out..