Author: HQH
Released: February 9, 2002
Updated: January 3, 2004
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Here are the two boxes that shelter the Kodak Camera Dock and Kodak DX3600 digital camera:
After stripping the digital camera and Kodak Camera Dock from the boxes, I started to charge the Kodak Ni-MH battery pack that
came with the Kodak Camera Dock. Here's a picture of the Kodak Ni-MH battery pack from Kodak's website:
Didn't bother to use the lithium CRV3 battery that came with the camera.
I had to reset the charging on the camera for a few times, as it was suppose to charge for 2.5 hours. It stopped for a few
times, which was told in the manual. After 2.5 hours, the digital camera was ready for use.
The custom camera insert comes with the Kodak DX3600 digital camera, not with the Kodak Camera Dock. Here's the custom camera
insert for the Kodak Camera Dock besides the Kodak Camera Dock with the A/C adapter and USB plugged into it:
Here's another picture of the custom camera insert and the Kodak Camera Dock up closer:
Here's a picture of the Kodak Camera Dock with the custom camera insert placed in the Kodak Camera Dock:
When installing the Kodak Picture Software v1.4, it demanded a whopping 275 MB of space. I trimmed it down to about 266 MB.
There were a lot of separate programs installed. At a later time, it can be uninstalled in separate entities. I only wished that
Kodak just made one master controlled uninstallation program that gives the option to select which to uninstall instead of
uninstalling programs one by one.
Note: I found that installing the following selections are good enough, given that you already have Apple's QuickTime Player
and Adobe Photoshop (or some photo editing software) already installed and that you just want pictures transferred over and not too
much space is taken up: Kodak Camera Connection Software, Kodak Camera Connection Software Help, Kodak Picture Transfer Software,
and Kodak Software Updater. Make sure you choose Custom instead of Typical when installing the Kodak Picture Software. It'll say
that of the following selections installed, it'll eat up about 93 MB. Not the case. It took up about 29.1 MB. So size may differ on
your end.
After I installed everything, I was hoping to see the camera's virtual drive that lets me access the memory on the camera or
CompactFlash memory (I had an updated firmware from Kodak and read the instructions, and it mentioned something about the digital
camera drive). It was not the case. So I uninstalled the Kodak software and re-installed the software again. I checked the USB cable
connection - found out that it wasn't plugged in all the way in the Kodak Camera Dock. Was tricky when I first plugged it in,
because it felt like it couldn't go in any further, but the second time plugging in, it went in further. After this resolution, I
still didn't see the drive. So I thought the USB cable might be bad. This is going to suck.
After for some time charging, but still not done, I just thought that maybe the camera must be on in order to see the virtual
drive. But I doubted it, never turned on the camera. So, I just felt like doing something out of the ordinary and press the "one
touch button" on the Kodak Camera Dock. It worked! I saw the virtual drive. The virtual drive was given G (the next drive letter
available).
I accessed G and looked at the memory. Neat-o (this is what I get for not reading the manual to find out ahead of time, trial
and error). I then took a couple of pictures and recorded a short video. Works like a charm and looks neat. After this short
testing, I placed the digital camera back into the Kodak Camera Dock to continue charging the batteries. Still on the road to 2.5
hours of charge time.
The reason I wanted to get the virtual drive available is so that I can upgrade the digital camera's firmware. I powered on the
digital camera earlier to check out what firmware it had. The digital camera came with v1.30. I downloaded v1.40 a couple of days
ago. Firmware v1.40 contained some battery life enhancements. It's all good. I then copied the firmware onto the digital camera's
internal 8 MB memory, turned on the digital camera and it asked me if I wanted to upgrade the firmware. I updated it and it's all
good to go. After updating the firmware the the latest version, I set it back into the Kodak Camera Dock and let the batteries
charge.
While still charging, I read through the user guide a bit and uninstalled a few programs that I felt I didn't need to conserve
space on my laptop. Can't wait till the batteries are fully charged so I can fool around with this toy I just got.
Analysis
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