Vizo MirrorBox CR Card Reader Review

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Product: MirrorBox CR; MIR-521
Manufacturer: Vizo
Supplied by: Vizo
Price: 19USD/RM65
Launch Date: NA

Memory card is being widely used since past few years for digital camera, handphone, portable audio device and etc. Most of these devices will come with USB cable for data transferring however it will be very troublesome for having so many cables if you have multiple devices hence card reader is one of the good solutions here. Today we will have a quick look on Vizo latest card reader; MirrorBox CR.

Company Profile

VIZO Technology Corporation is a leading global manufacturer and designer of computer peripheral products serving customers around the world. Established in Taiwan in 1992, VIZO has expanded and now operates in the market completely reorganized and prepared to meet the demand for high quality products which are "Made in Taiwan".

We have the best team and own completely innovative technology. Our company's philosophy is simple: share results among the employees, build trust with our customers, maximize efficiency in our work and innovation in our designs. Utilizing many years of experience and a mature skill set, VIZO is able to provide PC users an incredible variety of "Do It Yourself" products and peripherals.

Features

- High speed USB 2.0 (backwards compatible with USB 1.1)
- High transfer rate of up to 480Mbps
- Transfer files between PC and digital devices
- Compact design, Lightweight
- Plug and play for PC platform
- LED indicator for power and status
- USB powered device. Low power consumption , no external power is required
- Support SD High Capacity ( SDHC )
- Access all different cards

Specifications

- Compact Flash Type I / Compact Flash Type II
- Compact Flash ultra II / Compact Flash Extreme
- Compact Flash Extreme III / Compact Flash HS
- Compact Flash XS-XS / Compact Flash Elite Pro
- Compact Flash Pro / Compact Flash Pro II
- Hitachi Micro Drive / IBM Micro Drive
- MagicStor / Memory Stick
- Memory Stick Pro / Memory Stick Duo
- Memory Stick Pro Duo / Memory Stick MG
- Memory Stick MG Pro / Memory Stick MG Duo
- Memory Stick MG Pro Duo / HS Memory Stick MG Pro
- HS Memory Stick MG Pro Duo / HS Memory Stick Pro
- HS Memory Stick Pro Duo / Memory Stick ROM
- Memory Stick Select / Memory Stick PRO Ultra II
- Memory Stick PRO Extreme / Memory Stick PRO Extreme III
- Secure Digital Card
- Secure Digital Ultra II / Secure Digital Ultra-X
- Secure Digital Extreme / Secure Digital Extreme III
- Secure Digital Pro / Secure Digital Elite Pro
- Mini SD Card (adapter required) / HS Secure Digital
- HS Mini Secure Digital (adapter required) / Ultra Speed Secure Digital
- Multimedia Card (MMC) / Multimedia Card II
- HS-MMC / RS-MMC
- Ultra RS MMC / DV-RS MMC
- HS-RS MMC / SmartMedia Card
- SmartMedia RAM / T-Flash (adapter required)
- eXcellent Digital Card / SD High Capacity

Package & Content

Vizo MirrorBox CR is packed in a transparent sealed packaging. The whole list of card supported of Vizo MirrorBox CR is stated at the back of the packaging which is an important message for customer to ensure they will buy a correct card reader. Besides that the packaging content and features are also stated as well.

There aren't much accessories comes along with Vizo MirrorBox CR except one USB cable since card reader is a simple product and doesn't require any driver or software installation except for Win98 OS where driver can be download from Vizo website.

Vizo MirrorBox CR

MirrorBox CR is an improvement version of previous model of Vizo card reader; MirrorBox where the major changes will be the card supported from 32 types to 52 types of memory card. The whole unit of Vizo MirrorBox CR comes with black body with slightly rounded corners. Compare with Vizo MirrorBox, MirrorBox CR is a bit slimmer but it is still slight the same as this is quite standard dimnesion for a card reader except for those expensive slim card reader.

On the Vizo MirrorBox CR, there are only four card reader slots (CF, MS, SM & SD) which can support up to 52 kinds of memory card. For desktop card reader, besides the card readers it will still come with 1 or 2 USB ports but in order to keep the size of MirrorBox CR as slim as possible, USB port is not included.

On the top left corner of Vizo MirrorBox CR, there is a LED for displaying card reader activity; green when the card reader is powered up and orange when the memory card is being accessed. On the other end, there is a mini 5-pin USB port for connecting the MirrorBox CR to PC. The surface of Vizo MirrorBox CR is very shinning which looks very nice but it could be a problem for thumb print if this card reader is not well maintained.

Installation, Testing & Performance

There isn't any special software/driver installation for Vizo MirrorBox CR as card reader is a plug and play USB device. Once the USB cable is connected for the card reader with PC, it is ready to work and in the window drive information, you will able to see four additional removable drives for Vizo MirrorBox CR.

Test Bed

Notebook : Dell Inspiron E1720
Processor : Intel Mobile Core 2 Duo T7500
Memory : 2GB 666MHz DDR2 Memory
Hard Drive : 120GB 2.5" 5400RPM 8MB Seagate
Graphic Card : Nvidia GeForce 8400M GS
Optical Drive : DVD RW
Operating System : Microsoft Window XP SP2
Benchmark Software : HD Tach 3.0
Ambient Temperature : 28 Degree Celsius

Here is the benchmark result of a 512MB SD card on Vizo MirrorBox CR by using HD Tach 3.0. The read & write speeds of Vizo MirrorBox CR are same with the performance of integrated card reader of our test system (the speed will be varied accordingly to the memory card specification).

Conclusion

Most of us will not really pay much attention when come to select a memory card reader because there isn't any unique technology of it so cost will be one of the major factor here besides the memory card supportability. Vizo MirrorBox CR is definitely a good looking card reader that supports most of the latest memory cards. Besides that Vizo MirrorBox CR is only cost around 19USD which is considered cheap for a branded card reader. We'll recommend this card reader to you especially for those are having multiple memory card devices.

Pros:

* Compact Design
* Support up to 52 types of memory card
* Stylish design

Cons:

* None

Thanks to Vizo for providing this sample for us to review.