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I have recently acquired an E2N. I learned from an old post that it only supports PC card up to 96Mb. However, I have no luck with my 96MB Sandisk PC card, which is fine on PC but my E2N won't accept it and the LCD display "change" when it is inserted.

I wonder whether it is a card specific problem, or 96Mb is still too large for E2N?

I couldn't find any instruction manual of the camera, but would like to know what does the "SD" on the mail dial means? "L", "S", "C" are common in all modern Nikon camera, while "PB" means Playback, I just can't figure out what is "SD".

Besides, is the video out function only works with a working card inserted? I can't get any image from it without a card.

I would be grateful if anyone can tell me what the "E. Trig" and "D. out" can do (just below the video-out RCA socket), and what is the correct cable.

Many thanks.

Hi,

SD. I forgot what that does. I haven't had an E-series for a while now, and stopped using them long before I sold them off.

The D.Out is Data Out and E-trig is Electronic Trigger, if I recall correctly. There are no cables that I know of. Those were not functions of the camera that were commercially supported as far as I know, being intended for folks that were integrating one of these into something else. Probably was a Fuji function for some industrial use they'd envisioned when they designed the electronics section. Sort-of like the SCSI port that they added later.

I also can't recall just what it was about those cards. Something about a flash hi-speed pin, I think. I bet I wrote it all up years ago in another thread on the board here somewhere. I vaguely recall popping open cards back when and adding a jumper to a pin that then allowed a newer card to work.....

Later!

Stan

_________________
Amateur Photographer
Professional Electronics Development Engineer

Thanks for the information. It is frustrating to have the camera but not the right card to test it. Is there any PC card besides the Nikon/Fuji will works on an E2N. I don't want waste money buying some non-usuable card. Thanks.

From the manual:

SD: Digital output mode. The shutter can be released but no image will be recorded on the Image Memory Card.

PB: Playback mode. Image data stored in the memory card can be played back on a TV monitor.

All the original Nikon/Fujifilm cards should work, in addition to the IBM card mentioned here: viewtopic.php?t=280 (there are others too, but these are the only I've successfully tried in the E2N myself).

Hope this helps. Good luck!

Jarle

Hi,

I had several cards that worked with the E-series at one point. The largest was 96 MB, I think. It needs to be the early hi-speed version, as there's a pin on those cards that tells the device it is hi-speed.

That's as opposed to what was then low-speed. These days, any card is faster than hi-speed was in those days. However, somewhere along the way, the cards stopped asserting (as in logic=1) that hi-speed pin as it became meaningless.

Unfortunately, the E-series *looks* for that pin to be asserted. If it's not, then the camera presumes you've stuck in an old low-speed card and tells you to change it out.

It's silly, actually. The cards you're trying are many times faster than what it needs to write at the 'hi-speed' data rate the camera spits out. But, you can't tell the camera that!

Unless you pop open the silly card and manually wire up that hi-speed pin. I recall doing just that to a couple cards way back when, as in when the D1 was brand-new and I scored a used E2 from a guy that had just upgraded.

I had that procedure documented somewhere. I do not know now if it was on this site or in the archives of DPR or even one of the other DSLR forum sites we used to chat about the E-series on before Jarle came up with this one......

These days finding a vintage hi-speed ATA PCMCIA memory card is next to impossible. Most folks look at those physically large yet logically small cards and simply toss them in the trash can. As opposed to thinking they might still be worth a couple of bucks on eBay to some guy with one of these old DSLR cameras.....

I sold all my various E-series bodies and parts a way back, so I have none of these cards left.

I do recall, though, that Microtech was a really common brand name of these types of cards back then, sort of like SanDisk is today. It's a good search word for eBay and whatnot. You won't see much in the way of the original Nikon and/or Fuji branded ones.

Later!

Stan

_________________
Amateur Photographer
Professional Electronics Development Engineer

Hi,

I just took a look on eBay. Lots of sub-128 MB PCMCIA ATA Flash cards out there.

None have the magic 'high speed' designation on their labels, though.

Later!

Stan

_________________
Amateur Photographer
Professional Electronics Development Engineer

Thanks, Stan.

I have tried another PC card, Sharp 10MB (CE-AF05), reportedly made by Sandisk. It doesn't work either.

After reading Jarle's post, I have ordered an IBM "Solid State File" 80Mb PC card from ebay. I hope it will work, but I won't try another even if it doesn't.

Stan, you mentioned about 'manually wire up' the high-speed pin, would it be easily done? I wonder which pin it is.

I have learned from this that it is much difficult to keep a working vintage digital camera than a film camera. PCMCIA is being replaced by Expresscard; SCSI is no longer popular, my ED-10 will probably be useless in 5 years.

I also have a D1X, batteries are holding lesser and lesser charge, and it is pretty difficult to find replacement. It is also true for CF card, I couldn't find any 2Gb or smaller CF card here in Hong Kong, and I have to order some from the internet in case the one I am using fails one day.

Yes, batteries and memory are the main challenges using vintage digital cameras. Fortunately, most batteries can be easily recelled (for a fair price), and memory cards are still available for most cameras. The early E-series cameras are among the most difficult ones, in my experience. The later E3 bodies are much easier to work with (accepts "normal" CF cards in a PCMCIA adapter).

Also, it shouldn't be difficult to find CF cards for your D1X in the foreseeable future. I believe it will work with larger cards too - it just can't make use of the extra memory (I can check and verify this later, if needed). UPDATE: Cards larger than 2 GB won't work. See more below. You'll also find cheap third party batteries on eBay.

Good luck with the IBM card. Hopefully it will do the trick. Please keep us updated.

Jarle

Hi,

Yes, the E-series is - and probably will remain - the worst of the digital cameras to support when it comes to the memory cards. And, it's all because of that one stinking pin!

I think all the other cameras will be easy to support memory-wise. Most of them use CF cards, and they'll be around forever. Then, there are adapters for other card types to CF that will also work.

The only issue might be that finding a small enough capacity new card for an old camera in the future might be a bit of a challenge. For example, that the old Kodaks have a 2 GB limit. But, there were so many CF cards under 2 GB made that they'll be all over for many decades to come.

Batteries may become an issue in the future, but I don't think so. Most of the older stuff, the D1 series and the Kodaks for example, use NiMH cylindrical cells. They're common and there are a lot of battery specialty places that carry such and many will even pop the sonic welds on the pack housing and re-cell the originals for a reasonable cost.

Only in the case should NiMH cells go away and only Li-Ion cells remain would there be an issue. You can't properly charge Li-Ion with a NiMH charger......

As I recall, the E-series had both NiCd and NiMH cell packs and I *think* all the chargers were smart enough to charge NiMH even if the original pack were NiCd. You know, since I stopped using an E-series years ago, and have sold off all of what I had, I'm starting to forget details.

Was the E-series NiMH aware, or only NiCd? As I sit here and think on it, I think there were two chargers, one NiCd and one NiMH and the NiMH was the same pinout as the D1 series charger. The NiCd was a coaxial plug, right?

Not that it matters. Even with all the gnashing of teeth over Cadmium in things nowadays, NiCd cells are not going to go away. It's the one and only battery technology that can handle rough service, as in police and fire radios, so they will continue to be available. They'll just cost more as time goes on.

As far as asserting that Hi-Speed pin on a PCMCIA card, it is easy. You pop the cover on a type-II card and use a 30 gauge silver teflon coated wire - what is universally known as a 'yellow wire' - from the Vcc (main input power) pin to the Hi-Speed pin. That puts a logic 'Hi' on the pin and makes the stupid camera happy.

Now, I no longer recall which pin numbers those were! I once had it documented somewhere, and I thought it was on here, but I can't find it now. Nor can I find it on DPR, where we chatted E-series a lot at one time. It may have been on Rob Galbraith's site, and that's gone now......

Somewhere in my mess of an 'electronics shop' I have 'feeds and speeds' for all sorts of memory chips and cards. Now, laying my hands on the binder that has that era's data in it might be a bit of a problem. I know I have it *all* still, but much of it is still packed up in boxes from a move 5 years ago!

later!

Stan

_________________
Amateur Photographer
Professional Electronics Development Engineer

Correction: The D1X will not work with cards larger than 2GB. I was able to format a 4GB Sandisk Extreme III card in the camera, but the D1X won't trigger. Same issue described here: http://www.flickr.com/groups/d1x/discus ... 813806455/

Luckily, searching for 2 GB compact flash card returns 279 hits on eBay. There are also plenty of 512 MB and 1 GB cards for sale. You shouldn't have any problems finding memory for your D1X.

Jarle

If you haven't seen it already, I've started collecting a list of all tested memory cards in this thread:

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=479

Jarle

Correct. The last generation used a NiMH battery. This is described in my DS-565 (Nikon E3S article):

http://www.nikonweb.com/ds565/

Jarle

Hi,

Thanks for backing up my wetware. It's not what it used to be. There have just been too many electronics systems I've messed with over the years. Sometimes the details get all jumbled up!

I know I had an E2 and a DS-565 with their batteries and chargers, but in practice I only used the NiCd pack and charger from the E2 with the DS-565 as I had re-celled one of those packs. I used the E2 in a studio environment with the 'AC Adapter' also known as a battery pack with a cord.

I vaguely recall noticing that the charger input on the DS-565 pack looked like the one on the D1 and was NiMH. Or, was it? Now, I know that it was and I'm not dreaming that part.

You should have seen me a few weeks back. I had dug up a Sony Ericsson P910a smartphone out of one of my 'junk boxes'. I had switched from AT&T to Verizon for 3G data because of the coverage issues we see in the ads for those two carriers. Well, the EU guys don't see those ads, lucky guys! Anyway, I didn't need 3G on AT&T any more and could go back to 2G 'on the go', as it were, and the P910a is just what I needed. Plus, I had a couple stashed away.

Well, I got it out and put my SIM in it and then went thru a couple hours of 'relearning' how to use it. And, a few years back, I was on the team that developed the fool thing! There had been dozens of other phones and three technology changes between then and now and I just plain forgot how in heck it worked! Sheese!

later!

Stan

_________________
Amateur Photographer
Professional Electronics Development Engineer

Straying from the topic a bit, the Fuji S2 had the same problem - I sold my D1x with my only 2gb in it, and used the proceeds to try out an S2, and ended up slapping myself on the face for getting rid of the card. The S2 simply refuses to use cards larger than 2gb. I ended up using a 340mb IBM microdrive instead, which was a problem because the S2's raw files were relatively huge for the period (12mb a pop).

I surmise the S1 had the same problem (although less severe, because I think it didn't actually save RAW files, only JPEGS).

Hi,

Yes, the old FAT table bit-depth issue. This one seems to always haunt us at some point or other no matter how large the memory becomes.

It's really associated with 'era'. In this case, the era defined by the late-model Kodaks and the earlier models from everyone else. My Kodak DCS 5xx, 6xx and 7xx series cameras all have the 2 GB limit as well.

However, I recall when we had a 16 MB limit, then a 32 MB limit, then: 64 MB, 128 MB, 256 MB, 512 MB, 1 GB, 4 GB and on and on and on - to go with our 2 GB limit.

Hell, I recall when we had a 16 *kilo* Byte limit! And that was still using Core memory! Sheese!

Anyway, it will never end, I suppose. No matter how many bits we have that seem to be Super Large and good 'forever' it will be neither and someone will be bit by The Limit before too long!

Fortunately, I find I can shoot enough to keep me happy with a 2 GB limit. It's more a matter of having enough of those 2 GB cards and battery packs than anything else. My most used camera, the 760c, is pretty well matched between filling the memory card and emptying the battery.

At least we managed to get away from the microdrives. I used many of those, and their capacity vs. price was sweet, but their fragility always worried me.

later!

Stan

_________________
Amateur Photographer
Professional Electronics Development Engineer