MB is selling PCMCIA Multi-card Reader for COMAND $102. I think it's way overpriced... Is anyone tried non-MB brand reader and found working? There are so many PCMCIA memory readers in eBay and they are very cheap, but I'm worrying about messing-up COMAND with them...

Forgive my ignorance but why would you need a PCMCIA reader for your car ? The only thing they are good for is to play MP3s stored on a PCMCIA card thought the COMMAND system. I think investing in an iPod would be a better solution for portable music.

Because hard drive portion for music in COMAND is much smaller than my mp3 music collection.
I need additional space. So, I want to put my extra sd card permanently in COMAND for additional space. I don't want my iPhone connected and disconnected when I get in and out of car.

You don't have to use a MB one but I don't think they support HC (high capacity) SD cards.

I'm with nobodYspeciaL on this one. I don't get why you would bother with the PCMCIA slot. Just buy an iPod, load it up with enough songs to be trapped in your car for more than a year and never hear the same song 2x... for probably the same price.

I assume that you are not really connecting and disconnecting your iPhone for the purpose of listening to music. If you plug your iPhone in as a music source you lose the ability to use it as a phone. I don't get it. At all. But grats on the beautiful car!

I'm kinda lazy.... I just want to dump all mp3 files from my media server to my car...

I already have sd card currently not using and can buy pcmcia memory reader less than $20 from eBay. It will be much cheaper than iPod, which I don't want to buy.....

I'm in the market for one because it's an easier way to import contacts since my Blackberry has too many contacts and the MB doesn't support downloading specific groups of contacts so I figure I'll throw all my car contacts on a SD card and import that way.

Yup. Apart from the question of whether or not one ought to use a card reader or an ipod, if anyone has experience with non-MB readers and or sdhc cards please chime in!

This has been extensively discussed at the W204 forum. Myself I'm using a Sandisk 6-in-1 SD HC capable adapter (equally as a Sandisk CF adapter). Sandisk is certainly safe but you have to be sure not to buy the old part, it used to come with the same part number. Other brands mostly work but some report horrible performance from some unknown brand products (does not mean that all unknown brand prodcuts were bad).

Thanks, I'll have a read over there.

I have been using the same one as Diesel since I got the car in May '07 and am using an HD SD card in it (also Sandisk). No problems

I paid $13.00 for an after market PCMCI card (which only reads CF) at local store, and the COMMAND has been working just fine with Sandisk 4GB CF since I bought the car in July. I use the Memory Card mostly and the Media Interface (iPhone/USB card) rarely. I did purchase a second Media Interface cable for the USB card from local MB dealer.

When you end your research for PCMCIA cards, let us know what you find...

I'm having music overload as it is, with a 35 gigs on my classic iPod, then adding satellite radio and all the extra channels of HD radio, all on a fine sound system. Musical heaven :-)

So you are using a HC SD card and you just need an HC adapter correct? I had good luck with the CF adapters but sandisk discontinued them. I had a lot of trouble getting HC cards to work, but this was about 2 years ago I am guessing they are making different ones now.

Thanks

I have a sandisk 6->1 adapter sd hc. The car wasn't able to read HC cards, only up to 1GB. The car is a c-class 2008 , by the way...

To follow up, I found an adapter at my local computer shop for $20 or so, but it uses CF cards. Not a problem as I have lots of these around for our cameras. Seems to work perfectly well.

http://www.socketmobile.com/products...-adapter-card/

I don't believe this, it cannot be the car. Did you test the adapter at a laptop to be sure that the adapter supports SD HC cards? If you did, did you try the exact same music files on the SD HC card as on smaller cards?

Here is an old post that shows the SD HC capable Sandisk adapter:
https://mbworld.org/forums/2483531-post15.html

the other issue is format right? unless your apple music archive is stocked with plain mp3's instead of the encoded apple files, I don't think they'd play anyway off of a card. Would love to hear otherwise.

Fortunately I still had an old 30gb ipod I had before I got an iphone a few years back. I dusted it off, sync'd it and leave it connected in the E550 now.

I'd even think you could find a scratch and dent one on EBAY for less than $100 since its just gonna live in your glove box.

The NTG4 Comand is not limited to MP3, but it does not appear to support AAC. Even if MB supports iPod as an "MP3 player", the appear to support Windows media by current Comand units: "Microsoft Windows® Media Audio V2, V7, V8 und V9 (WMA)".

get it on ebay
mine on my c class costed like 15-20 bucks for a SD card one
good luck!!!

http://cgi.ebay.ca/SDHC-XD-SD-MS-PRO...item35a4edc572

the ones sold by "adapterbest" on ebay work with sdhc (anything over 2gb). awesome with 16gb sdhc card, only loaded a quarter of capacity so far. the best part is the whole setup cost less than $50. album and song navigation is great- beats having to fumble with ipod/iphone...

Question: if you use the PCMCIA route do you encounter the same size limitations as per a USB flash drive.

I understand there are limits on file numbers, number of directories etc

Why would you need a PCMCIA Multi-card Reader? I have a USB cable in addition to the IPOD and MP3 cable which came with the car. U can buy the USB cable from MB for about $55, and connect any USB flash drive if you want to play MP3 music (make the IPOD obsolete) . To transfer your phone/address book, etc use Bluetooth

Hi Guys,

I spent a good amount of time and tried different cards, you need a Sandisk 32GB SDHC card for about $70 and a 16-bit PCMCIA adaptor for about $10 both from eBay to work perfectly, no need for ipod and other stuff. Thanks

Limits, yes but different ones. 4000 tracks max, 255 folders with 255 folders per folder (if you get what I mean). So 32GB is the practical maximum even when larger ones are available.

USB flash drives and HDDs can have up to 8 directory levels with 1000 tracks.