Spotlight on Sony Memory Stick Duo at Photokina

21st August - 2002
By Ian Burley

...But the wait for ordinary MS cards above 128MB will be into 2003

A Memory Stick Duo card (right) and adapter (left)
for existing Memory Stick slot compatibility

It’s been talked about for two years and at the giant Photokina trade show in Cologne, Germany, next month, the new compact addition to the Sony Memory Stick memory card family will be publicly highlighted in Europe for the first time. However, there are no products that can use a Memory Stick Duo card without an adapter are yet available or even announced outside of Japan.

Sony is under pressure from the SD/MMC memory card platform that is backed by Panasonic, Toshiba and SanDisk. SD/MMC has already been adopted by more camera makers than any other card type in recent months and is rapidly becoming a standard in other products from PDAs to mobile phones, camcorders and multimedia players. Meanwhile, Olympus and Fujifilm recently rejected both Memory Stick and SD/MMC by introducing their own exclusive proprietary xD (Extreme Digital) micro memory card.

But perhaps of more interest to some owners of Sony digital cameras is the news that there are no plans to introduce Sony Memory Stick cards with any capacities higher than the existing 128MB range-topper.

Speaking to senior Sony UK managers yesterday, DP-Now learned that there are announcements expected regarding larger Memory Stick capacities early next year, but nothing will be announced at Photokina next month. In defence of this, we were told that 128MB cards are selling extremely well and the price had been lowered substantially in the last 12 months from £250 to under £90.

In fact our quick search of card retailers shows that 128MB Memory Sticks can be found for as little as £59 inc.VAT, comfortably undercutting the cheapest SD/MMC cards at around £75. But Compact Flash remains the value leader with 128MB cards for under £40 and some 256MB cards for as little as £65.

Sony’s stance also seems to be that 128MB is large enough for most of its customers at present. What do you think? Are you a Sony CyberShot camera user and is 128MB enough for you or is the news that you will have to wait longer for 256MB and above cards a disappointment? And tell us what you think about Memory Stick Duo - click here to let us know.

Sony UK

[Back to top of the page]

| Feedback | Main news page | Discussion forum | Newsletter |
| Home | Shop |