Eye-Fi cards came out in 2007. The SD cards with WiFi built in would connect to your home's (or work's) WiFi network and copy pictures to your PC or Mac automatically as they were taken.
If the photos were taken while the camera was away from the network then when you got home you could turn on the camera and they would copy to your PC at that point.
The Eye-Fi center software offered other options like to copy images to an online repository or even post directly to Facebook (for those who want to live dangerously.)
The point was it was great tech and "it just worked." I've had the same Eye-Fi card for 8+ years now. It's only 2GB but it works fine.
In 2016 the company sent notice that it was going to be ending support for these cards in favor of their newer "Mobi" cards that worked as direct WiFi hotspots and were designed to transfer pics to mobile devices instead of to PCs. Joining an existing WiFi network was no longer possible. While you could connect by PC to these new Mobi cards it meant disconnecting from your WiFi network for several minutes to select what photos you wanted, completely undermining the entire point of seamless uploading to your computer.
Worse, in the initial announcement, the fact they were shutting down their services for the old card meant you could no longer reinstall the software on a new system, even if you owned the card you could never use it on a new system.
Thankfully someone thought better, whether a class action lawsuit threat was the reason or not, I have no idea, but the company released a Mac and later a PC bare bones application to keep the wireless uploading with these older cards alive.
Unfortunately not long after releasing these apps the Eye-Fi company abruptly shut down. Their website was simply taken offline. No new company who may have bought their assets wanted to forward their domain for the traffic because upset customers would be a bigger headache than the extra views would be worth.
Luckily several sources managed to keep copies of the original software online. One such site is: Eye-Fi X2 July 2017 update (aka )
Anyway, Eye-Fi is dead... Surely though it was such a handy feature some other company has come to market with a similar product?
Apparently not. I can find no product that does what the original Eye-Fi cards do (join an existing WiFi network.) Surprisingly there are a couple of WiFi enabled cards by other manufacturers but they copy the failed "Mobi" model requiring connecting direct to the SD card as if it was it's own Wireless Access Point, and therefore, disconnecting from your main network.
Well, what about used Eye-Fi cards then? There has to be a used market, right?
Sure... Do you want to spend $1000 on a card that originally sold for $100?
Eye-Fi 16GB Pro X2 SDHC Class 10 Wireless Flash Memory Card (EYE-FI-16PCX) 899949001908 | eBay
I will grant you this is an extreme example but all over Amazon and eBay these cards are selling well beyond their original MSRPs even when they're many years old.
Clearly there is a market, clearly there is demand, is it so hard for someone to fill the gap?
PS- anyone selling any Eye-Fi cards?
If the photos were taken while the camera was away from the network then when you got home you could turn on the camera and they would copy to your PC at that point.
The Eye-Fi center software offered other options like to copy images to an online repository or even post directly to Facebook (for those who want to live dangerously.)
The point was it was great tech and "it just worked." I've had the same Eye-Fi card for 8+ years now. It's only 2GB but it works fine.
In 2016 the company sent notice that it was going to be ending support for these cards in favor of their newer "Mobi" cards that worked as direct WiFi hotspots and were designed to transfer pics to mobile devices instead of to PCs. Joining an existing WiFi network was no longer possible. While you could connect by PC to these new Mobi cards it meant disconnecting from your WiFi network for several minutes to select what photos you wanted, completely undermining the entire point of seamless uploading to your computer.
Worse, in the initial announcement, the fact they were shutting down their services for the old card meant you could no longer reinstall the software on a new system, even if you owned the card you could never use it on a new system.
Thankfully someone thought better, whether a class action lawsuit threat was the reason or not, I have no idea, but the company released a Mac and later a PC bare bones application to keep the wireless uploading with these older cards alive.
Unfortunately not long after releasing these apps the Eye-Fi company abruptly shut down. Their website was simply taken offline. No new company who may have bought their assets wanted to forward their domain for the traffic because upset customers would be a bigger headache than the extra views would be worth.
Luckily several sources managed to keep copies of the original software online. One such site is: Eye-Fi X2 July 2017 update (aka )
Anyway, Eye-Fi is dead... Surely though it was such a handy feature some other company has come to market with a similar product?
Apparently not. I can find no product that does what the original Eye-Fi cards do (join an existing WiFi network.) Surprisingly there are a couple of WiFi enabled cards by other manufacturers but they copy the failed "Mobi" model requiring connecting direct to the SD card as if it was it's own Wireless Access Point, and therefore, disconnecting from your main network.
Well, what about used Eye-Fi cards then? There has to be a used market, right?
Sure... Do you want to spend $1000 on a card that originally sold for $100?
Eye-Fi 16GB Pro X2 SDHC Class 10 Wireless Flash Memory Card (EYE-FI-16PCX) 899949001908 | eBay
I will grant you this is an extreme example but all over Amazon and eBay these cards are selling well beyond their original MSRPs even when they're many years old.
Clearly there is a market, clearly there is demand, is it so hard for someone to fill the gap?
PS- anyone selling any Eye-Fi cards?
