Quick PCMCIA question.

[BuzzKillington]

I purchased a PCMCIA card the other day and it wont go into my port all the way. the first half of the card slides in nice and easy but then it hits something and wont go any further.

is there a different type of PCMCIA I'm not aware about? :neutral:


The one I purchased says "express or pcmcia" and my laptop is apparently ExpressCard/54

[artoodeeto]

Yeah. It stands for Pushing Can't Mash Card In Alltheway. LOL...sorry...that was terrible :)

I'm not aware of a different type - my guess would be a pin inside the slot is slightly bent maybe? I used to work in a computer store and saw that kind of thing all the time, and was usually pretty irritating to fix. Try using a flashlight to look in the slot and see, or if you feel especially daring take the slot apart...

[artoodeeto]

that's interesting - I haven't seen that type of PCMCIA before. must be newer than my experience...

[BuzzKillington]

Me either. Apparently there is express 34, express 54 and pcmcia which means I just threw away 30 bucks.

I can't manage to find an express 54 video capture card without terrible reviews. Looks like I have to use a usb 2.0 capture dongle which means I also wasted money on an svideo extention. Sheesh...

[x88x]

Well, there's PCMCIA Types I, II, and III, and Expresscard 34 and 54. Expresscard is the standard that was developed to replace PCMCIA, and uses the PCIe bus instead of the PCI bus that PCMCIA used. Expresscard 54 can take both 54 and 34 cards, but 34 can't take 54 cards (for obvious physical reasons). Think of it kind of like PCIe x4 vs x16. Also, unfortunately neither is compatible with PCMCIA, though iirc the various types of PCMCIA are all backwards compatible (ie, a Type III slot can take Type I, II, and III cards, etc).

Looking at your system specs (assuming that's the laptop in question), it looks like it's almost definitely not going to have a PCMCIA slot. Unfortunately a lot of manufacturers cut costs (and a little space, I suppose) by using Expresscard 34 slots, so if that's the case with yours and you got a 54 card, you're out of luck. :(

[BuzzKillington]

Geeks.com is going to return it for store credit which I'll use for a USB 3.0 expresscard54 then just buy a usb video capture setup.