Hi Everyone,
I know there are some good photographers on the forum and have a question about using hard drives at high altitude. On past road trips I have backed up digital images on a couple of portable 80 gig hard drives, Wolverine FlashPacs. I anticipated doing the same on an upcoming trip to Lhasa but one of the guide books cautions against hard drives. Apparently the cushion of air on which the disc spins is much less cushiony above 3.000m, possibly seizing up. The advice is to burn CDs at internet cafes, or load up on CF cards. But, small hard drives are easier and cheaper.
Anyone have experience of digital storage at altitude?
Paul
skelch
1
bobtrips
Not higher than ~9,000' - 10,000'.
Personally I'd get some extra cards if I were going to be shooting higher and copy over when I dropped down.
Check Price Grabber for good card prices. (Too bad you aren't using SD cards. They're down below $8US per gig.)
2
klaush
USB memory sticks are also down to $8US per gig. If your brand of cards is more expensive, consider buying a handful of USB sticks and you can use any computer to transfer the data to them.
3
lan
CF cards are cheap. I'll agree that 80Gb isn't - but it's a lot cheaper than it was a few months ago.
I just bought a 4Gb Sandisk Ultra II for 32.99gbp inc VAT + delivery. Compared to just over a year ago when a 2Gb was 150gbp, this is pretty darn cheap.
You could buy a standalone DVD writer like the Apacer Disc Steno. Remember to look after your discs though - they break if you bend them or scratch them - so something like a metal CD case would be a good plan.
Pro tip
Lonely Planet
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