I just bought my first digital camera and accessories and bought a card reader along with it as someone said it's easier to transfer photos, but the cable that came with it is tiny.
Great point, but I'm not 100%
This is an interesting question, and one that has been confusing me for a long time.
It probably goes into the USB port and does not need a long cable. You put the card in it after taking photos and they should appear on the computer screen. You can then save them in a folder. Make sure you save them as 'Jpeg' format, the others take up too much space.
you put the mem card in the reader and plug the reader into the PC. The PC (if you have win XP) will see the reader and install it automatically as a Mass Storage unit and then if you go into my computer you will see a new drive with the picture files on it, then you can copy and paste
If you get a card reader, no additional software is necessary. This is not only faster, but it saves your camera batteries. Your computer or printer may even have a card reader built into it. I have enough USB ports that I just leave it plugged in all the time. First of all, be sure there are some pictures on the card. Plug the card reader into an open USB port. Plug the card into the appropriate slot on your card reader. I use Photoshop Elements and as soon as I plug my card into the reader, it starts its own card reader and displays a thumbnail of every picture on the card. If this does not happen automatically, open your photo editing software. Do whatever you usually do to open a file, but click on the selector where you can change drives. Your card reader will be assigned a new drive name that will be one letter higher than you ever saw before, such as Drive G: or such. Then, just double click on the name of the file you want to open and it will appear in your photo editor.
