Looking for information on Amazon can be quite tricky, as you cannot fully trust all the reviews. Moreover, there is review inflation, paid reviews, and other unethical practices, which some companies participate in, thus you have to be real careful!
I just bought a used GoPro Hero4 Silver from eBay and even though the price was good, turns out you have to spend quite a bit to accessorize, before you can use it. Even when you get all the accessories, micro SD card, additional battery, etc., you still need a card reader to transfer the output to your computer. And going with existing USB 2.0 readers is a bad idea, especially when you are dealing with big files, and new file formats, new card types. Thus a need for a relatively new card reader.
While reviewing, I found couple of sites, with useful information:
- Techradar.com review of 6 card readers from March 2015: this is a fairly recent review and recommends Transcend USB 3.0 Card Reader RDF8 as the best value reader, with a rating of 5/5. I found this rating questionable, especially since this reader was launched a while ago in fall 2011 and has plenty of bad reviews on Amazon, with people complaining about it corrupting the files while transferring them to computer. Read this hilarious review, where users frustration is clear! The other 5/5 rated reader they recommend is Kingston Digital USB 3.0 Reader (FCR-HS4). This card is currently the highest rated on Amazon and was released in March 2015.
- Hardware.info 10 card review from March 2016: this is a much more comprehensive review and reviews readers from Kingston, Sandisk, NZXT, Sitecom, Transcend, and StarTech. Overall, it recommends Kingston FCR-HS4 and Sandisk UHS-II SD Reader/Writer. The Sandisk reader is an odd choice, as it has bad ratings on Amazon 3.1/5. Maybe it is customized to perform for UHS-II cards vs. UHS-I and non-UHS cards.
- Other links: alikgriffin.com reviews several card readers on OSX and Windows 8; however, except Kingston MobileLite, all other readers have limited slots (especially no micro SD). Pretzel Logic reviews three readers and recommends Transcend and Kingston models above Anker.
Final thoughts: I was impressed with the thorough review by Hardware.info and will follow their recommendation and most probably go with Kingston FCR-HS4 card reader. At $17.99 it is on the high end of readers currently available, however, I am willing to spend more so as to future proof for next 3 – 5 years. Hope this help you in search for appropriate card reader. Good luck!
pchampn 