Saturday, February 21, 2009

Let's See if Canon Can Step Up To the Plate

My sweetie gave me a new digital camera, a Canon Powershot A1000IS. It seems like a really nice camera.

But the software is not compatible with Windows 2000; only with XP ( and that putrid OS known as "Vista").

So I've e-mailed Canon to see if they have a solution. I'd hate to have to send it back, but I'm not buying a new computer just because I have a new camera.

10 comments:

  1. If you're only looking to do something like grab pictures/video off the camera you can dump their software and go the generic route.

    Grab a USB device that'll read the memory card in the camera. Shouldn't be more than $12 for one that'll read just about everything. Just pop the card into the reader and the OS will mount it like any other disk drive.

    In my experience it's much better than using their software for photo management, regardless of what company makes the camera.

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  2. Check if you actually need the software. Since the camera produces JPEG's you don't need software support for RAW images and if the camera appears as a USB file system device you can just pull them off as files.
    Does Win 2000 support USB files, if not your box would probably run some version of Linux which does support USB files.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Have you tried simply plugging the camera in and checking for it as a drive/device under My Computer?

    Or what about an external card reader? You can just take the memory card out of your camera and pop it into something like this or even this. Those two particular readers are compatible with Windows 2000 and up, and there are plenty more out there.

    All that said, Windows XP is a very good, mature operating system. I used to use Win2K, but XP is just so much better. Vista isn't for everybody, but XP is a great OS.

    What else are you trying to do with the photos other than get them off the camera?

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  4. Guys, getting a USB card reader is what the e-mail response from Canon suggested. I'll swing by Staples or Worst-Buy to get one.

    WP,I tried plugging in the camera, but not checking to see if it would function as another drive.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I never install any software that comes with cameras nowdays. The USB card readers are *much* faster and don't require as much fiddling -- the memory card looks like just another hard drive.

    Note that Windows 2000 no longer receives security fixes and is a virus haven. A shame, it was the last good version of Windows that there was -- the only reliable Windows ever.

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  6. why aren't you Mac?

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  7. Doug: Because of WordPerfect.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I've gone the multi-memory-card reader route as it works with winders, linux or Mac.

    If you really need Winder(xp) get a macbook and install VMwareFusion and run it there. It just works.


    Eck!

    ReplyDelete
  9. I picked up a card-reader and it works.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Badtux, there is another year or so before Microspooge stops supporting Windows 2000. (July 2010)

    ReplyDelete

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