Photo Service - Picture CDs from camera disks?

[Cyna]

I'll be leaving on the Amsterdam this week for Alaska. I am hoping to capture some priceless photographs while on the trip. I am taking two cameras and 2 1G disks. I really do NOT want to take my laptop, but I'm afraid that I might run out of room on my disks.

 

Can the on-board photo center transfer my pictures to CD for me? If so, what is the cost?

[TedC]

$15 per CD - depending how you set your picture quality, you'll probably need more than one CD to capture all the pictures.

[jtl513]

It's not usually a while-you-wait service, but may take as long as 24 hours. That means you have to have an extra memory card anyway, so why not buy one more that you can use over and over instead of making one or two one-shot CDs for the same money?

 

Some people who don't want to bring a laptop have bought those portable stand-alone hard drives for about $150 with 40 Gb, $220 with 80 Gb.

[george@sea]

It's not usually a while-you-wait service, but may take as long as 24 hours.

 

I've never had to wait 24 hours to get a CF card put onto a CD. I just wait till the place doesn't have a lot of people around.

 

That means you have to have an extra memory card anyway, so why not buy one more that you can use over and over instead of making one or two one-shot CDs for the same money?

 

I'm going to be gone for 35 days next month. I'll be bringing my 2 cannons. The G-5 and Digital rebel XTI which I'm trying out. Also will be using my camera phone. Which uses a 512meg micro SD card. Both cannons take CF cards and I'll have 6 512meg cards with me. The 512meg cards are enough for me as each card will fill one 700meg CD.

 

Some people who don't want to bring a laptop have bought those portable stand-alone hard drives for about $150 with 40 Gb, $220 with 80 Gb.

 

I'll more then likely bring a laptop with me. And the portable HD that I have can copy CF cards. Or I can copy any pictures from the PC to the portable HD.

[Taxi]

Hi jtl513,

 

Some people who don't want to bring a laptop have bought those portable stand-alone hard drives for about $150 with 40 Gb, $220 with 80 Gb.

 

Please share more information on this.

 

Thanks, Carol

[jtl513]

I've never had to wait 24 hours to get a CF card put onto a CD. I just wait till the place doesn't have a lot of people around.

It often isn't the clerk selling the pictures who makes the CDs, and when the person who does them won't be doing them for another 18 hours because s/he is off doing other things ...

I'll be bringing my 2 cannons. ... Both cannons take CF cards ...

If you fly I think you will have trouble with TSA if you try to bring cannons, and suggest you bring Canons instead! :D (Sorry ... just couldn't resist that! :D :D )

...those portable stand-alone hard drives for about $150 with 40 Gb, $220 with 80 Gb.

 

Please share more information on this.

 

There's many brands of these things, and you can find them at camera stores and many other places. Or you can buy them direct on-line. Here is one example that sells for about $150 with 40 Gb. Here is another, but I don't know the price. Note that I am not endorsing either one ... I don't own either ... in fact I don't own any! I simply bring an adequate supply of supply of memory cards ... or buy another on the trip if by some strange circumstance I do run out.

[iflyrc5]

Epson makes several models that also have view screens. The are more expensive but can also hold videos if you want some entertainment on the to/from trip.

[TedC]

Memory card prices are dropping - I just bought a 2G Sandisk SD card for $19.99 at Office Max - get a couple of these and you can wait 'til you get home to put your images on CDs and save the $15 per CD cost on the ship.

[chasetf]

Memory card prices are dropping - I just bought a 2G Sandisk SD card for $19.99 at Office Max - get a couple of these and you can wait 'til you get home to put your images on CDs and save the $15 per CD cost on the ship.

I agree here. Get more memory. What you pay for a CD copy is about what you will pay for the same amount of extra memory.

 

Another point..... There have been horror stories related on these boards about people who got home and found out all of their pictures did not make it to the CD....... and they overwrote the memory....... result was pictures were lost. Not worth the worry in my mind.

 

The other nice thing is the memory can be used again on your next trip. The CD cann't. ;)

[queenL]

I have often found places in port that will burn them to CD far cheaper than the cruiseship. These days for the $15 the cruiseline charges for CD's you can just buy additional memory cards.

[jtl513]

I have often found places in port that will burn them to CD far cheaper than the cruiseship.

Yes, places like WalMart, Target, and many drug stores start at about $5 for a limited number of shots (300 maybe?) but if you're backing up everything on a 2 Gb card it will end up around $15 anyway. To me the worst part of that, though, is wasting 60 to 90 minutes of my shore time. (I don't understand why their machines are sooooooo slow compared to making a CD on a PC.)

 

It seems like most of us are in agreement that the best approach is just to buy more memory. :)

[noblepa]

A CD only has a capacity of about 700 megabytes, so copying two full 1GB memory cards will require 3 CD's, or $45.

 

If you think that you will fill 2 GB worth or memory, buy more. As others have said, its getting pretty cheap.

[jtl513]

A CD only has a capacity of about 700 megabytes, so copying two full 1GB memory cards will require 3 CD's, or $45.

It's not quite that bad, because it's not $15 per disk ... at least not on some DIY land machines.

 

The one time that I started to do it (but aborted) was at a KMart in Hawaii. The machine told me that it would put only 300 shots on each disk, and the 700 or so that I wanted to backup would have cost me about $15. I aborted (and paid nothing) when I saw that it was taking about 8 seconds per image, and was going to take over 90 minutes to do all of it!! :eek: :eek: (That wasn't on a cruise, so I didn't have my laptop with me, and memory prices were a lot higher than they are today.)

 

On a ship is it $15 per disk? All the more reason not to do it in that case!! :D