Fujifilm Finepix E550 and USB out

I am interested in purchasing a Fujifilm Finepix E550
Point and shoot camera. it seems to have a lot of
good points eg:

See camera
here............http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/fujifilme550/

shutter lag .05
RAW
Optical zoom
AA batteries
4x optical zoom
fast start-up and operation
ISO 80 to 800

Can somebody tell me if the following negatives
xD Picture Card
and the USB out note it is not a USB 2.
Is USB a big disadvantage compared to a USB 2
in regards how long it takes to transfer from camera
to computer.
Can you solve this if it is a problem by removing
the card from the camera's and using a card reader
to transfer the pictures to the computer

Thanks in advance.
Denny B
Fuj

 

There is a bit of difference between USB 1 and 2 but it wont affect your
ability to transfer pictures. If your PC USB is 1 then the US transfer will
shift down to 1.
You could of course get a USB 2 PCI card added to your computer if you wish
to use usb2.
You can also remove the card from the camera and use a card reader that
supports XD picture cards.

 

None of these things are a disadvantage. I find even with usb1.1 it is
faster to use that than a card reader and xd cards are not expensive
anymore. I download 50 odd photos quite often on mine and don't find it
slow.
Have you looked at the E900. The new model. It has the same body and
lens, but has the s9x00 sensor and usb20 plus usable higher iso.

Have a look at my photos. three there are taken with the E550.

http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~selorme/photos.html

Sel ..........