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Coin ]] The xD-Picture Card is a type of Flash Memory Memory Card . xD stands for e'''x'''treme '''d'''igital. It was developed by Olympus and Fujifilm , who introduced it to the market in July 2002. Toshiba Corporation and Samsung Electronics manufacture the cards for Olympus and Fujifilm . Other brands, including Kodak , SanDisk , and Lexar , now sell xD cards. xD cards are used in Olympus , Kodak and Fujifilm digital cameras. Currently they are available in these capacities: 16MB, 32MB, 64MB, 128MB, 256MB, 512MB and 1GB (Type M). An xD card is 20mm × 25mm × 1.78mm and weighs 2.8 grams. The 16MB and 32MB models write at 1.3MB/s and read at 5MB/s. The 64MB, 128MB, 256MB and 512MB models write at 3MB/s and read at 5MB/s. The 1GB (Type M) model writes at 2.5MB/s and reads at 4.0MB/s. The Type M was released in 2005. It uses Multi Level Cell (MLC) architecture to achieve higher storage capacity than the 512MB. Although Type M capacity will eventually stretch to 8GB, the 1GB card is currently the only card in this range. The Type M suffers some compatibility issues with older cameras (especially video recording) and marginally slower readwrite speeds than the 512MB card. More recently Type H cards were introduced which do not seem to offer significant speed improvements. Pictures are transferred from the xD card to computer by plugging the camera into the PC (normally with USB ) or removing the card and putting it into a card reader. In both these cases, the computer sees the card as a mass storage device with photos on it, although software or firmware can alter this. Card readers may be integrated into the PC or attached by cable. Adapters are available to allow an xD picture card to be plugged into other readers (and in some cases cameras), including PCMCIA, parallel port, CompactFlash and Smart Media. COMPARISON WITH RIVAL FORMATS These are only general trends, as there are many formats of cards, many different brands and many different capacities. For more detail on other formats go to their Wikipedia entry. The xD format primarily competes with formats such as Secure Digital Card (SD), CompactFlash (CF), and Sony Memory Stick s. Advantages
Disadvantages
OTHER NOTES Olympus branded xD cards are the only ones to support Olympus' panoramic function. Although they store data identically, this is an attempt by Olympus to sell more cards. As of 2005, some cameras such as the Olympus E-500 and Fujifilm S9500 use CF in addition to xD, though support is tapering. Never format, copy files to or erase pictures from a xD card via a card readerwriter connected to a computer, only do so via the camera. xD-Picture cards are specially formatted with certain proprietary tags and flags. Formatting or otherwise altering the contents of the card via a card readerwriter connected to a computer will render the card unusable in a camera or erase the special Olympus signature to enable panoramic mode. While the detail specification for xD cards (needed to implement their use) is tightly controlled by Olympus and Fujifilm, it is known that xD cards (like SmartMedia cards) consist of a controller-less NAND flash memory chip embedded in plastic. Thus, xD cards (and SmartMedia cards) can be used by hobbyists as a common source of NAND flash memory chips for custom projects. For example, the Mattel JuiceBox PMP can be booted into Linux using a modified cartridge containing an xD card with the boot image written to it. {Link without Title} Because of limited usage in products category other than digital camera as of 2005, xD has been losing ground to SD, which is broadly used by PDAs, digital audio players, and most other digital camera manufacturers. SEE ALSO EXTERNAL LINKS
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