May 12, 2008 12:01 AM
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Not so long ago we reviewed the Eye-Fi, a 2GB SD card that adds Wi-Fi to any digital camera. Now the company is expanding their product line with the Eye-Fi Explore ($129), Eye-Fi Share ($99) and the Eye-Fi Home ($79). The big news? Eye-Fi is now supporting hotspots and geotagging with the Explore.
It should be noted that even though the cards are set at different pricepoints, the Explore, Share and Home all feature identical hardware (that's actually the same as the original Eye-Fi). So instead of making hardware differentiations, the company is pricing the cards according to the backend service.
The Explore
Through a partnership with Wayport, users will be able to automatically upload their photos in about 10,000 hotspots throughout the US. Through the partnership, the user will not need to accept terms and conditions at every coffee shop, and the user can receive email notifications for successful uploads. But the catch is that the Wayport service is only good for one year (Eye-Fi is looking into longer term partnerships with more hotspot companies, which they may or may not charge an additional fee for).
Geotagging comes with the Explore as well through Skyhook's Wi-Fi triangulation (the same thing we see the current iPhone using instead of GPS).
The Share
This model is pretty much identical in features to the current Eye-Fi. You get automatic syncing with your PC as well as services like Flickr.
The Home
The Eye-Fi home is made for people who just want to sync their photos with their PC, not upload them automatically to the web or hit up hotspots. It's essentially offering a price drop to consumers who aren't interested in the additional services.
The cards will be available starting June 6th. And unfortunately, current Eye-Fi owners will not be able to simply upgrade their cards to have Explore capabilities.
Send an email to Mark Wilson, the author of this post, at mark@gizmodo.com.
Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
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