It was greatly disappointing to me that my desktop computer did not accept my SDHC memory card (some of the older desktop computers do not, but if you have a laptop, you should be alright) when I pushed it inside the SMC/xD slot. My computer is a couple years old, but not exactly what you would call ancient, but it just would not recognise my SDHC card, and it had some really nice photos from last Christmas that I did not want to lose.

So what could I do, then? Those pictures were very important to me. Was it really worth going through all the money and effort of buying a new, more advanced computer, just for a couple of pictures? Of course not!

Luckily for those who do not own very modernised computers, there is a simple solution as long as the computer has a USB slot (which most computers have). SD card readers can solve your problems almost instantly. All you have to do is push the SD card in the slot and then plug the reader into the USB slot of the computer... and then wait for your pictures to load up. They can also be useful for computers which do not even have an SD card slot.

Then came the job of having to choose an actual SD card reader; fortunately most readers are not that expensive, and I have even seen some being sold in pound stores (though I am apprehensive about their quality). What immediately caught my eye was the Integral USB 2.0 Single Slot SD Reader, because of these reasons:

a) It was a good price; only £2.60 in January when I bought it. This is quite cheap for a good SD card reader, especially if it was a good, well functioning one. What is even better if you are planning to buy this SD card reader is that the price of it is currently £1.75 on Amazon, and that is including postage and packaging. This is quite a good bargain I would say; you only save 85p, but these days every penny counts!

b) It was from the Integral brand, which is quite well known. I figured that a well established company would not want to sell you a bad product so that you could tell everybody how bad it was. I had bought several other Integral products, including an SD card, and they had worked quite well, so I hoped that I would not be disappointed.

and c) It had a 4.5 star rating on Amazon, so the majority of the people who had bought it had obviously found it a good product.

It is in the white colour (I am not sure whether it comes in different colours or not, though the colour of an SD card reader does not matter too much, at least if it is not a disgusting colour anyway) and looks quite aesthetically pleasing. It is shaped like a USB stick (though it is slightly more chunky than an average one) with a slot in its side for the SD card to be slotted in.

It is made out of a lightweight, yet sturdy plastic and it is very portable. It does not have a cap to protect it from dust and dirt, but this is not too much of a big deal, as I keep it inside my camera case when it is not in use. It also has a red light installed inside it, to show whether the card is being read or not.

It seems to be good quality; no cracks or chips of any sort that I have noticed yet, which is good, but no more than I would have expected from an Integral product.

It works well, as well as I would have expected it to. It reads my cards very well, without much hassle at all. When I plug the reader inside the slot, the SD card appears on the 'My Computer' screen in a matter of seconds. I would say that it reads the cards as fast as if you were inserting an SD card into a slot of a computer which was compatible with it. You can view the images or files, and copy and paste them elsewhere on your computer without any problems at all. I think that it is a very decent product for its price.

This reader accepts SD cards (though I do not need a card reader for these; thankfully, my computer can at least read these), SDHC cards and SDXC cards. My main use for this is to read my SDHC memory cards, and this has saved me from a lot of hassle. Sadly, I cannot write about my experience with SDXC cards, simply because I do not own one, (though I may want to look into investing in one in the near future) but I would guess that the performance would be much the same as an SDHC card, if not better.

I would recommend this product highly if your computer cannot read, or has problems with reading SDHC cards or SDXC cards. It is a cheap yet good quality reader, which does the job it is intended to do well, and nothing more. If you are looking into buying a card reader like this, then I would say that it is well worth your while to buy this one, as it is well priced with no defects to it that I can find.