MultiMediaCard to MemoryStick Adapter?

Philipp Markus Alexander Schmid asks: "Does anyone know if there exists a MMC to MemoryStick adapter? There is this wonderful SonyEricsson P800 which comes with a memorystick duo slot. I'm currently building a MemoryStick standard to MemoryStick duo adapter for the phone (because of the non-existing availability of the duo). The next step would be an MMC to memorystick duo adapter, but is there a device or chip that can convert on the fly between MMC and MemorysStick?"

If you want to be proprietary

[shepd]

And build something using Sony technology, you'd better talk with them and pay out the arse like anyone else who deals with those idiots.

My bets are yes, they have something, and yes, they'd love to sell you the specs for the low, low price of $100,000. And if you don't buy them, you'll need to move to Sealand if you think you're gonna build it by reverse engineering.

Sorry to be blunt, but anything made by, created by, or invented by Sony is proprietary over-priced crap. Even when it's good it's crap because it still says Sony on it.

The only thing that ever "revolutionized" anyone's life that ever came from Sony was the walkman, and even that was a big cheat (Andreas Pavel [aventis.com] came up with the idea and patented it years before Sony)!

I suppose one will bring up Beta, which rightly died because Sony made it proprietary and abused their monopoly of the format to stop people using their format for anything "distasteful" (not for long, but who wants to deal with a company that emits even a hint of regulating speech?)

The only thing from Sony I own is a PS2, and that's only because it was the easiest of the three consoles to mod at the time.

IN SOVIET RUSSIA...

[jsse]

I suppose one will bring up Beta, which rightly died because Sony made it proprietary and abused their monopoly of the format to stop people using their format for anything "distasteful" (not for long, but who wants to deal with a company that emits even a hint of regulating speech?)

Funny when you brought this up. Beta was really widely accepted in a place where Government loved to regulate speech - Soviet Russia. I remembered we were shipping a lot of Beta function TVs and video-recorders to Soviet Russia. Sony and few manufacturers made unifunction TV/recorders(Beta) because multifuction, which were already popular at time, were NOT welcomed by Russian Government. Somehow I found they've striking similarity in their believes, heh. :)

I'm not sure whether Russians are still using Beta TV now. Anyone would update me? (begins with IN SOVIET RUSSIA :)

Re:If you want to be proprietary

[Peapod]

Minor issue, and probably slightly off-topic, however Betas did not die. If you go into most television stations, especially the slightly smaller markets than the New Yorks or the D/FW areas, you will find a Betamax VTR. Actually, you will probably find several. Also, if you look at the older line of cameras (older by about one to two years that is) they are Betas. They are slightly different than the originals however. Their tapes move at 3 times the speed than others. But still, the Sony brand is not just a consumer brand mostly because the quality really cannot be matched for the most part. DV (not mini) and Beta cams will mostly use the Sony tapes.

Call Sony whatever you want. Restrictive of free speach etc. It doesn't change the fact that they make great products. I have a Sun Microsystems pure flat monitor sitting on my desktop. What kind of CRT does it have in it? Why, a Sony trinitron CRT. Good products slightly overpriced will insure that they stay in business for a little while longer.

-Peapod

Re:If you want to be proprietary

[shepd]

Yes, their commercial line of products is quite good.

However, their home line of products (which would include everything that has a memory stick adapter) is normally trash. Not all (they did make some trinitron tubes for consumers, however they are now trash because they build up the sides to make them flat, distorting the picture), but most.

I have Sony Trinitron CRTs (but branded with other names -- a Fixed Frequency Textronix workstation monitor comes to mind) that I just remembered about and they are very good. However, even though I admit that, their prices were way off the mark, not to mention totally proprietary again. :-(

But I will give them the Trinitron and Beta innovations, they did make them all by themselves (AFAIK). However, they still haven't a clue on how to market those, and just like MD, they're dead as a doornail in North American homes. Well, maybe not trinitron, but it's within shooting distance.

It involves

[jsse]

reverse-engineering of the operation of a Memory Stick, because Sony only discloses its specifications to their partners, with huge loyality fee. Frankly I'm not sure how big the loyality is, but you don't see much non-Sony Memory Stick compliant stuff around do you?

However, at the risk of being accused of spreading FUD, I believe one might violate DMCA by reverse-engineering it. Ask your lawyer.

Re:It involves

[dreamt]

I don't know, I have a few IO-Data [iodata.com] and Lexar [lexarmedia.com] memory sticks for my Clie.

Memorystick Jenreader

[smallfries]

This is slightly off-topic but seems like a good place to mention the Jenreader which is a little £10 USB adaptor for memory-sticks that allow you to plug them into any USB socket. They work like a treat ... apart from the file corruption that occurs under linux.

The file-system mounts ok using the usb-storage modules but if you try and write to the stick then sony products think the card has been corrupted. Once you lose sync even reformatting the card won't bring it back. Anyone come across this ... got a patch ... any clue whats going on?

Re:Memorystick Jenreader

[smallfries]

I had thought something similar. The way that we've come across to fix it is to force the camera to accept that there are file entries in the FAT table by touching them (*before* a reformat) on the linux side. It does appear that the sony kit is a bit lax about things like formatting and creating fat entries.

Duo Availability

[Oculus Habent]

Notably, you can buy a MagicGate 64 MB Duo Stick [sonystyle.com] at Sony's website - $70 for 64 MB is a little much, but it adds the Duo-to-Memory Stick adapter.

Re:Duo Availability

[Krisbee]

The P800 kit contains a Duo to MemoryStick adapter, i.e. you can put the Duo stick into any other MemeoryStick reader. You can't do the other way round, though.

on the memory stick side

[bagofcrap]

seen www.memorystick.org yet?