iPod Camera Connector

This little gadget is a miracle little electronic! I cannot believe that something so small could solve so many problems digitally. What am I talking about? The iPod Camera Connector (CC) of course!

I've been researching the CC for quite a few months now. The main reason is because my camera, the SONY Cybershot DSC-W1 wasn't on the iPod CC's list of compatible cameras, so I didn't want to rush into something I didn't know would work with my camera. Next, I went online to search around if anybody out there has the same camera I had and prayed that someone could tell me that it was compatible with the CC. Unfortunately, the way my luck goes, I couldn't find a single soul with the same camera I had. There were references to other models of SONY cameras, the T5, W5, but not the W1.

Eventually, I had to bring my iPod Video and my digital camera down to the APPLE store. And the Customer Services people were nice enough to let me try it out (they actually have a trial model for just this purpose). It worked like a charm! All I had to do was to plug in my camera's USB cable to the CC and the CC into the iPod and turn my camera on. There will be a Import function on your iPod that lets you download all your digital photos from the camera into the iPod. After the download, the iPod even gives you the option of erasing your camera's memory card! There's only 1 drawback, it sucks the life out of your iPod battery and you might have to recharge it, depending on how many photos you're transferring.

So, when on vacation, all I need do is take as many photos as I like, get back to the hotel and download everything into the iPod, which acts like a portable harddisk. Another huge advantage is that the iPod converts a small thumbnail of your photo so that you can view it on your iPod under the photo section. This is extremely handy to check out your photographic skills, althought stupid, coz your digital camera has a LCD screen to see that, but that doesn't always tell you a photo is clear, coz of the size: The smaller the size, the less you'll see blur lines.

Another advantage of owning the CC is that it eliminates having to buy all those pesky memory cards. In SONY's case, it's Memory Sticks (Pro), which are very expensive. Now, with the CC, all you need are about 2 or 3 memory sticks and the rest you just download into the iPod.

I've listed down a few compatible cameras below and I will personally update this list from time to time, especially when I get the chance to try the CC out with cameras from friends and relatives.

From the trend so far, I'm guessing that as long as your camera has a wire with a USB connector to plug into the CC, plus that your camera's setup can switch to PTP under USB functions, the CC works.

Please note that I've yet to try out the CC with USB card readers, so you might have to venture elsewhere to find out if the CC works with those.

Sony Cybershot DSC-W1 (5.1MP)
Nikon Coolpix 7900 (7.1MP)

Cheers everyone!