Photo shop CDs

[artvandelay]

hello all! i'm preparing for my first trip to europe, and this is my first post here as well I've been in the shadows for awhile learning lots. I love photography and and have a few questions regarding the CDs created at photoshops:

* what is the price of these cds on average? I have seen some posters report around 3 Euros (however was in 2004) and have also seen one at 2.50 (USD?)
* what are the storage capacity of these cds?
* Do most shops transfer to computer, then to cd? (all the cards I have are 1 GB SD or greater, too big for a cd, unless these shops carry the ability to burn dvd as well?)
* Will I have trouble finding/getting to these types of places in my travels?

I am an extremely trigger happy photographer and have specifically bought a new Canon S2 IS and SD450 for this trip, so I want to be able to take a reasonable amount of pictures. I currently have 4 GB worth of SD cards. The price of these cards has dropped dramatically in the last few months, as you can now get a 1 GB Transcend 80x SD (decent card) for around 20 USD. So my question is this, should I buy more memory, or can I rest easy at night knowing i'll be able to easily and cost effectively get cds made?

on a side note... how large are those bean bag things I've seen on here, i can't tell in the picture www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=61591&is=REG ? (trying to decide between that, a small tripod, or nothing)

Thanks for any advice in advance!

[Jules80]

well first of all, how long are you going for and how many megapixels is your camera? i consider myself fairly trigger happy and in 6 weeks took about 1000 photos. now my camera is old (2.1 mp) but i used way less than a gig. my friend thought about transfering pics to a cd at some point on our trip but in the end she didn't. i seem to remember it being relatively expensive (enough to make her hesitate) and we rarely saw anywhere that did it. but i can't say as we were always looking either.

also if you bring a tripod or whatever its something extra to carry. i'm not sure its necessarily worth it... but that's just me.

Jules

[Eagle]

artvandelay, I'm not too familiar with the equipment used in European photo shops as I've never used this option, however the "normal" capacities for storage medium are:

> CD's - 650 MB / 850 MB
> DVD's - 4.7 GB

As you're using 1 MB SD Cards, it will therefore be better to find a shop which offers DVD capability. I don't know how prevalent they are at the present time, but I suspect there will be a fair number of shops offering these.

You could also look at a product such as the www.apacer.com/en/products/Disc_Steno_CP300.htm if you wanted to take the storage unit along with you on the trip. That way you wouldn't have to worry about finding shops at all, but you'd also have to pack a bunch of blank DVD's with you as well. Most of the "experts" seem to recommend burning two copies of each card, and mailing one home for "safety".

On the topic of the Bean Bags, I've never used these so don't have any comments. You might post that question on www.dpreview.com or www.steves-digicams.com or one of the other Forums.

Good luck, happy travels and good "shooting"!!!