The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook • Hacker News Board

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#11

Post by evan_ » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:02 PM UTC

podperson wrote: post #7

Setting aside the price, requiring a tool to remove it is a design fail. What I'd like is for it to have a removal prong that tilts out when pressed on one side (perhaps with a pen). I guarantee that I'd lose the butt ugly gizmo. So it's ugly I'm going to lose the thingy. Oh and it's $35.

That's a red herring. You can remove it with an un-bent paperclip or a bit of string. You could knot the string or loop the paperclip around itself to make it easier to remove frequently, if you wanted to, but the device is intended to be removed rarely.

A tilting removal handle could break off, making it IMPOSSIBLE to remove.

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#12

Post by daeken » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:03 PM UTC

robomartin wrote: post #8

OK, so it's an adapter that's designed to be flush wit the case. I get it. For some this could be of value. From a design standpoint, I would have been far more impressed had they taken the time to engineer a removal approach that does not require a special tool. The first thing it's going to happen is that you'll be on a trip or out of the office without the "key". There are tons of ways to make tool-less removal po…

On my W520, SD cards go in all the way and then pop out when you push them in further (spring-loaded). Something like that could be built into this card itself pretty trivially. Added complexity increases costs a decent bit for something like this, though, I'd imagine.

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#13

Post by evan_ » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:04 PM UTC

jkap wrote: post #10

This would be really neat if the sd slot on my macbook even worked. Has anyone else had this problem?

Yes. I find that I can make it work by applying a little bit of pressure to the underside of the SD card that sticks out of the drive. This is easily my #1 complaint about the MBP.

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#14

Post by mdonahoe » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:05 PM UTC

podperson wrote: post #7

Setting aside the price, requiring a tool to remove it is a design fail. What I'd like is for it to have a removal prong that tilts out when pressed on one side (perhaps with a pen). I guarantee that I'd lose the butt ugly gizmo. So it's ugly I'm going to lose the thingy. Oh and it's $35.

Much like the tool that Apple includes for removing sim cards from your iphone, this tool is a glorified paperclip. Not the end of the world if you lose it.

Also, prongs break.

That said, I don't have a macbook with an SD card. Nor am I running low on internal storage, so this thing isn't for me anyway.

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#15

Post by podperson » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:05 PM UTC

evan_ wrote: post #11

podperson wrote: post #7

Setting aside the price, requiring a tool to remove it is a design fail. What I'd like is for it to have a removal prong that tilts out when pressed on one side (perhaps with a pen). I guarantee that I'd lose the butt ugly gizmo. So it's ugly I'm going to lose the thingy. Oh and it's $35.

That's a red herring. You can remove it with an un-bent paperclip or a bit of string. You could knot the string or loop the paperclip around itself to make it easier to remove frequently, if you wanted to, but the device is intended to be removed rarely. A tilting removal handle could break off, making it IMPOSSIBLE to remove.

I think you could design a tilting removal handle such that if broken off it could still be removed with a paperclip.

In any event, I could.

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#16

Post by mdonahoe » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:06 PM UTC

sciurus wrote: post #4

That's some impressive marketing for a MicroSD to SD adapter, something that comes for free with almost every MicroSD card.

You pay $35 to remove a mild annoyance. It is definitely not for everyone. Neither are macs

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#17

Post by polshaw » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:07 PM UTC

podperson wrote: post #7

Setting aside the price, requiring a tool to remove it is a design fail. What I'd like is for it to have a removal prong that tilts out when pressed on one side (perhaps with a pen). I guarantee that I'd lose the butt ugly gizmo. So it's ugly I'm going to lose the thingy. Oh and it's $35.

The idea is that you don't generally remove it. In reality if you lost the tool you would use a paperclip.

Also I disagree that it is a design fail. What (i think) you are describing is poor industrial design; it would be more prone to break, as well as costing more to produce (bearing in mind this is being done by a startup).

The real design failure is Apple's. My laptop (like nearly every digital camera ever?) has a spring loaded sd-slot, that allows the SD card to sit flush with the edge.

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#18

Post by robomartin » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:10 PM UTC

daeken wrote: post #12

robomartin wrote: post #8

OK, so it's an adapter that's designed to be flush wit the case. I get it. For some this could be of value. From a design standpoint, I would have been far more impressed had they taken the time to engineer a removal approach that does not require a special tool. The first thing it's going to happen is that you'll be on a trip or out of the office without the "key". There are tons of ways to make tool-less removal po…

On my W520, SD cards go in all the way and then pop out when you push them in further (spring-loaded). Something like that could be built into this card itself pretty trivially. Added complexity increases costs a decent bit for something like this, though, I'd imagine.

That's the beauty of designing with plastics. Sometimes you can add significant functional complexity to a design without a corresponding increase in cost. The mold costs are not correlated to functional complexity. Adding the "push to remove" function could, depending on design, cost exactly zero both in terms of mold costs and materials cost.

The same is the case for a number of other options.

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#19

Post by evan_ » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:10 PM UTC

podperson wrote: post #15

evan_ wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a red herring. You can remove it with an un-bent paperclip or a bit of string. You could knot the string or loop the paperclip around itself to make it easier to remove frequently, if you wanted to, but the device is intended to be removed rarely. A tilting removal handle could break off, making it IMPOSSIBLE to remove.

I think you could design a tilting removal handle such that if broken off it could still be removed with a paperclip. In any event, I could.

You're certainly free to market a competing product with a tilting handle.

Re: The Nifty MiniDrive - SD slot hack for the Macbook

#20

Post by relix » Mon, Sep 03, 2012, 9:11 PM UTC

I see a lot of uninformed and unwarranted (apple-)hate in this thread.

The removal tool, is a reference to how Apple includes the "SIM removal" tool with iPhones, which is just a paperclip. To me, it's obvious that you can just use a normal paperclip to remove this as well. This is also demonstrated in the video on kickstarter, which admittedly you need to search for. It's made as a semi-permanent piece, so the fact it's hard to remove doesn't matter here.

It's not "just an SD card adapter". It's something that fits flush with the design, so you can leave it in and it doesn't impact the visual appearance. If you don't care about this, that's fine, it's not for you. I could easily see myself buying this, however.