The good news is that storage cards have become bigger in capacity over recent years and also much cheaper to buy. However, the pixel count in our digital cameras has also increased and in a pretty standard days shooting I can fill a one gigabyte card without too much difficulty. (Shooting in raw mode)

Give me a subject like motor racing, surfers or some action shots where the continuous setting on the camera is used and that can quickly rise to 3 gigabyte in a couple of hours. So, what do we do with the image storage issue when we go away for a 2 week holiday or like us later this year a 5 week holiday to Australia. Take 2 people shooting high resolution Raw pictures for 5 weeks at 1 gigabyte each per day and with a bit of math's we are up to 70 gigabyte and I think that is a low estimate for a holiday like that.

A solution we have used for some years is to use an old laptop. This is a machine that has been overtaken by the improvements in technology and file sizes, but is still usable as a portable storage device.

However, I am getting tired of lugging a laptop away on holiday with all the security problems at airports, having to take the laptop out of the case and I have heard of occasions when the traveler has been asked to fire it up to prove it was a working machine. However. a pocket sized storage device has always worried me as it seems to be like putting all your eggs in one basket. One failure and you have lost everything. The same can be said for laptops too I suppose, but we do have the comfort of being able to see the images and we know they are as safe as it is possible to be.

A search for an alternative turned up the Aqua Pixman which is a stand-alone, palm size, rechargeable storage device. No PC is required and it comes in capacities of 40, 60, 80 and 100 gigabyte.

We put the 80 gig version through its paces and will concentrate here in the practical use of the device. All the technical information you can handle is available in our shop before you buy, but those who know me also know I don't do technical. Keep it Simple should be my middle name, or three names.

First impressions are important and they where good with the Aqua Pixman. It is 116 x 78 x 23mm in size and for those who think in inches that is 4.5in by 3in by 0.75in approximately. Its comfortably shirt pocket size. The build quality looks good too and that is important even if that just increases our confidence.

After charging the Aqua Pixman we placed a full 1 gigabyte flash card into the slot at the top of the case and turned it on using the smaller of the two buttons on the front of the case. The LCD panel came alive and and told us what storage space remained on the Pixman and we were invited to press copy. One touch of the larger of the two buttons and it all started to happen. A copy to hard drive confirmation message appears and you can see the folder name that Pixman has given to the operation, which in our case was CF003. The green light flashes and the LCD screen states how many files are being downloaded.

We downloaded a full 1GB memory card to the Pixman in 11 minutes. One of the things I really like about the Pixman is that if you were to insert a card into the machine with different images, but perhaps with the same file and folder names, it will not over write what you already have stored. It creates a separate folder for every download operation. If a mistake is made you may get two folders of the same images, but that is better than any risk of over writing and losing images. At the end of the card download process a message appears to say that the download was OK.

Downloading to a PC was easy and we tried our laptop first. We fired up the machine and connected the USB cable. At the PC end of the USB cable are two linked USB plugs. We found that both needed to be plugged in to the laptop, but after a few seconds the Aqua Pixman was found by Windows XP and we received a message that the device could work faster with a USB 2 connection, but as we don't have a USB 2 connection on the laptop we carried on regardless. The Aqua Pixman will work just as well with USB 1 or USB 2 connections, but obviously faster with USB 2. Within a few seconds the familiar download panel appeared on screen.

To download we simply click to view files using Windows Explorer and then hit the OK button and we are taken into Explorer. Highlight the files and select copy, then browse for a location for your files and the process is under way.

We carried out the same operation on a number of desktop computers and all read the Aqua Pixman perfectly and made downloading the pictures easy. Using a USB 2 connection we found that 1 gigabyte of images could be fully downloaded to the PC in 3 minutes 15 seconds. Using USB 1 the same transfer took 15 minutes. Having done those timings I personally do not think time is the issue with image storage of this type. Give me a choice of speed or reliability and I will select reliability every day of the week and twice on Sundays over speed.

Apart from using the Aqua Pixman to store digital images it is also very useful as a portable storage device for many other computer files that we need to copy from one computer to another. We used the Aqua Pixman to transfer 6 gigabyte of files from one computer to two others and in every operation it worked fine.

Stop Press

In December 2005 and into January 2006 we took an extended holiday to Australia where we covered the entire East coast of the continent. With myself shooting with a Canon 1Ds with 11 million pixel files and Carol shooting with a Canon D5 at 13 million pixels, image storage was a problem we had to address before leaving. Even our old laptop would not allow us to shoot and store images in Raw mode without quickly running out of space during the 5 weeks we were away.

We used two Pixmans while away in Australia, the basic Pixman with an 80 gig drive and a Pixman Pro with a 60 gig drive and we found them to be superb. I did put a load of Mp3 music on the Pro to while away the long flight, but never got round to listening to them much, but they were there if the flight got too boring.

We did have to take a laptop away with us as well, but only because I was doing a couple of lectures in Brisbane while away and needed my files to demonstrate with. Other than that, the laptop was not needed.

Both the Aqua Pixmans worked brilliantly and in future I would have not have any qualms about just carrying just a Pixman for any extended holiday. They worked faultlessly and and never lost one of the 6000 + images that Carol and I shot over the 5 week period.

Being small and light we carried the Pixmans in our camera bags at all times. One reason was to always have them available to clear our flash cards on the move, but also for safety sake. Once 3-4000 of our images were stored on the Pixmans we didn't want some thief to take off with all our masterpieces from a hotel or motel bedroom.

What we also tended to do was to download our full flash cards whenever we stopped for lunch somewhere. There was no rush to do this as we did have enough storage cards for a couple of days shooting, but is used the time while waiting to be served and cleared the cards just in case we found an oasis of images around the next corner. It also allowed more time in the hotel pool in the evening to cool down from the Australian heat.

This holiday helped build a lot of confidence in the Pixman and Pixman Pro and I am well pleased that we had them to rely on. We took the opportunity to keep them well charged whenever we got the opportunity and I can now confidently add reliability to the list of likes below.

Likes

Build quality
Ease of use
Will not over write files of the same name
Neat carrying case
Takes up to 12 types of storage card
Charged battery Operation
Multi use for images - file transfer between PC's
Reliability

Dislikes

None

Now check out the latest Aqua Pixman Pro