Thursday, April 15, 2010

PRODUCT SEARCH: Need a GOOD USB Bridge.

I will lay out the problem as concise as I can. I am planning to travel abroad, and I am intending to take my 30GB HDD camcorder with me. Now, this camcorder does its best work in its Ultra quality mode, but at 30GB I can only squeeze in about 7 hours of footage in the camera before I have to offload.BUT, I'm trying to avoid taking a laptop with me. I don't have much use for it in my trip, and it's a bit of a ''hot'' item in travel, if you get my drift. Not to mention it's bulky and I lack a suitable travel adapter for it (its standard power block is three-pronged: USA only). What I am looking for, then, is a good USB Bridge--a device that will allow me to connect the camera (USB2) on one end, a USB hard drive into another port, and then offload the works former-to-latter.That said, I have done some research and have determined that the device I need will need the following qualifications:
  1. The device must come with an AC adapter capable of running off of 240V (my destination country is the Philippines--they use two-pronged plugs much like the US but use a 240V/60Hz AC cycle). This is because of the size of the data transfers involved (up to 30GB). Such transfers are likely to wipe out battery-only devices before they finish.
  2. It must work with a Panasonic SDR-H18 camcorder and either a WD, Maxtor, or SimpleTech externally-powered USB hard drive. Though all of the above qualify as Mass Storage Devices, I've noted that many of the ones popularly on the market are finnicky and may not see all devices equally. Also, some of the devices balk at big files (which would be expected from a camcorder).
Can anyone assist me on this and point me to a good device that preferably isn't too expensive, preferably uses USB2 speeds, but most important can get my needed work done?

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