This isn't the right list, but, since I know the answer anyway . . . Yes, unless the manufacturer has done something truly weird, it will work fine with linux. Almost all of these on the market act as an IDE interface to the smartmedia card. And the filesystem on the smartmedia card is just a FAT partition. The only one I know of that isn't just an IDE interface is the RATOC card, and there's a driver for that too. Personally I use a Microtech pcmcia smartmedia adapter in my Portege. It works really well, since it behaves as though it's a slot-adapter. You just leave it in the pcmcia slot and it won't power up until a smartmedia card is inserted, and it powers down when the smartmedia card is ejected. So pcmcia-cs doesn't notice the card insert until you insert the smartmedia. Just be *careful about what you do with the filesystem. Better yet, the first thing you should do is back up the card. I say this because SmartMedia cards, and CF flash cards too, have a block of data right before the first partition that describes for non-intelegent readers (like Fuji and Olympus cameras) what the geometry of the pseudo-ide device is. It's called a CIS, and it's spelled out in the PCMCIA specifications. (Actually, it has a specification all it's own that the pcmcia spec references, but I forget the name. I do recall that the book about it costs $100 or so) One day, I was fiddling around with something, doing something stupid, and managed to crash my portege while my 32 meg smartmedia card was in use. The partition looked fine, but my camera wouldn't accept it. So I nuked the partition and made a new one, still no go. I could use the card just fine in linux, but not in the camera. So i did a bunch of research, found out about the CIS, etc. What i ended up doing was going to every electronics store in the valley looking for a camera intelegent enough to rebuild the CIS. I finally found a Toshiba PDR-M60 that did the job. Makes sense, SmartMedia is their technology. After letting the Toshiba camera format the card, it worked fine in my Olympus camera again. And then i immediately backed up a bitwise copy of the entire flash card, in case i screwed it up again. So, as soon as you get the pcmcia card, do this. "dd if=/dev/hd# of=smartmedia-backup.bin" where # is the device the smartmedia card registers as - I believe it's hdc in my portege. Then, if you ever do screw up your CIS, you can just "dd if=smartmedia-backup.bin of=/dev/hd#" and have it working agian. - Eric "Leiden, Soren" wrote: > port either. HOWEVER, not a problem. I found this 'pcmcia' style card that > I'm able to just slide the smartmedia card from the camera INTO and then > slide the pc card into the free slot on my libretto. This providing > virtually limitless photo's on the road, whatever...works out pretty nicely, > eh? > > I've yet to receive the pcmcia card mentioned above (should be here early > next week) and am wondering if anyone's doing something similair with their > libretto... Specifically, the pcmcia card solution. I guess my ultimate > question is, since I run solely linux on my libretto (I have a velcro > section of my dash in the card where I usually store the libretto integrated > w/the car stereo for mp3s and various other things...) is-- what kind of > usage/functionality could I expect using this jury-rigged smartcard <-> > pcmcia card device w/linux? I've been using gPhoto @ home which works fine > w/the camera-- but as far as utilizing this 3rd party device to access the > data on the smartmedia cards from the camera...who knows? I'm not sure > exactly how I'm gonna make that work out, ya know? Anyone have any > experience w/my situation and maybe an answer to the supporting linux > question?
