Eye-Fi Pro X2 8GB review

Eye-Fi SD cards pack an amazing amount of technology into a tiny package. Not only do you get a good dollop (8GB) of speedy Class 6 flash storage, but also - amazingly - a Wi-Fi adapter. This newest card upgrades the latter element from 802.11g to 802.11n, with the promise of higher transfer speeds and greater range.

You have to install the Eye-Fi software (resident on the card itself) to the destination PC and set up an account with the Eye-Fi website first - but, once done, using the card is simplicity itself.

Slot the SD card into your camera and, whenever you're in range of a registered Wi-Fi network or hotspot (you can register up to 30 on the card), just turn on the camera and the card will start transferring; a thumbnail usefully pops up with a status bar on the target PC to display download progress.

If a transfer is interrupted halfway through, it will simply pick up where it left off. You can set it to begin deleting transferred files from the card when the card starts to become full. And, this being a Pro card, you can also transfer files directly to your laptop via an ad hoc network.

You don't need your PC turned on either. The card's relayed transfer option will send pictures (or video) via your network to the Eye-Fi server then back to your PC when you switch it back on.

And you can even choose to have it automatically upload to one or more of a selection of photo/video sharing, social networking and printing websites. The choice of services is surprisingly wide too.

Not only do you get the option of uploading to Facebook, Picasa Web Albums, flickr and so on, you can also choose from more unusual services such as Evernote and TypePad.

The introduction of 801.11n surprisingly made little difference to maximum transfer speed. We found it transferred a single 4.46MB JPG photo in around 9.4 seconds, compared to 9.7secs with the Pro 802.11g version. Range is where the real difference is to be found. We managed to successfully connect and transfer the same photo from around 30m away across a busy office, albeit rather slowly, where the previous version gave up the ghost at a third of that distance.

It's an impressive package then, but you have to be absolutely desperate for wireless transfer to make it a viable option since the price is sky high. Even with all these features and the frankly mind-boggling technology, at £93 exc VAT we don't think many will be buying.

Author: Jonathan Bray