P2 Prices Dont Equivocate - So make your own P2 Cards

[CORUSA Design]

I don't get it...P2 cards are just 4 SD cards, so a 8GB P2 card is just 4x2GB SecureDigital cards right?

well, I can buy one 2GB SD card for $100...so that's $400 for 4 SD cards...and these are just placed into a PCMCIA cardtype model, so is there anyway to (and don't laugh at this) get a 'make-your-own' P2 card kit? Paying that extra $1,000 for just the enclosure I think is ridiculous since it is the actual camera that is doing the encoding and storing to the card. The card itself doesnt do any of the work of making and sorting the files, the camera does that.

$1,400 is too much of a profit margin to pay for what should be a $400 item in reality

::: Connor

P.S. - I have already seen the iPod modification that guy did to turn it into basically a 60gb Firestore, so don't post about that, I've already seen it.

 

[Barry_Green]

I don't get it...P2 cards are just 4 SD cards, so a 8GB P2 card is just 4x2GB SecureDigital cards right?

No. A P2 card is 4 SD cards and a LSI controller chip and a RAID controller and all sorts of other complex hardware. It's not just simple memory.

well, I can buy one 2GB SD card for $100...

Yes, and I can buy a camcorder at Best Buy for $300. Why would someone spend $100,000 on a CineAlta when they could buy a camcorder at Best Buy for $300? Because there's a world of difference.

You can buy cheapo bottom-of-the-line SD cards for $100, yes. But the P2 card uses top-of-the-line defect-free high-speed 20-megabyte-per-second SD cards. A world of difference.

You mention a $100 2gb card. The Sandisk Extreme III is $140 for a 1gb card, or $280 for 2GB. A P2 card is 4x faster than the Sandisk Extreme III.

There's a world of difference.

so is there anyway to (and don't laugh at this) get a 'make-your-own' P2 card kit?

If anyone would know, it's Spec-Comm, who have been engineering a P2-compatible card system for their CinePorter. And just ask 'em and they'll tell you how complex it is to make a P2-compatible card!

Paying that extra $1,000 for just the enclosure I think is ridiculous

That would be ridiculous, if that was going on. But that's like saying "paying $100,000 for the Ferrari logo is ridiculous because a Hyundai Accent is also a car, just without that "ferrari" badge.

The card itself doesnt do any of the work of making and sorting the files, the camera does that.

Wrong.

$1,400 is too much of a profit margin to pay for what should be a $400 item in reality

Here's what reality is: if there was anything like a $1400 profit margin, this free-market economy we live in would swoop down and offer hundreds of alternatives, with everyone trying to snatch up their share of that $1400 profit. But that isn't happening, because it's not reality.

Look at it in proper context: 4gb of Extreme III would retail for $560. You can buy a 4GB P2 card at a retail of $650, it's four TIMES faster (not a little faster, but four times as fast) and it includes all the raid and LSI controller circuitry.

You may not like the price, and you may not understand the engineering, but those two factors do not equate to "p2 is overpriced."

Besides, this has been discussed a thousand times on this board already...