Card Readers

A memory card reader is a device used for communication with a smart card or a flash memory card. A business card reader is a scanning device used to scan and electronically save business cards. more...

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A magnetic card reader is a device used to scan cards containing magnetic data strips.

Smart card readers

See also: Contact Smart Card and Contactless Smart Card.

A smart card reader is an electronic device that reads smart cards. Some keyboards have a built-in card reader. There are external devices and internal drive bay card reader devices for PC. Some laptops have built-in smart card reader.

Some have a flash upgradeable firmware. The card reader supplies the integrated circuit on the smart card with electricity. Communication is done via protocols and you can read and write to a fixed address on the card.

If the card is not using any standard transmission protocol, such as a custom/proprietary protocol carry the designation T=14.

With latest PC/SC CCID specifications the PC/SC Workgroup (www.pcscworkgroup.com) has defined a new way of smart card framework. It work with USB devices with the specific class 0x0B. All readers with this class need device drivers because the operating system manufacturer supply it by default.

PKCS#11 is an API, designed to be platform independent, defining a generic interface to cryptographic tokens, such as smart cards.

Memory card readers

A memory card reader is a device, typically having a USB interface, for accessing the data on a memory card such as a CompactFlash (CF), Secure Digital (SD) or MultiMediaCard (MMC). Most card readers also offer write capability, and together with the card, this can function as a pen drive.

Some printers have built-in card reader.

Today card readers can be categorized into three by the type and quantity of the card slots: single card reader (e.g. 1x SD-only), multi card reader (e.g. 9-in-1) and series card reader (e.g. 4x SD only). However, there are some kinds of memory cards with USB functions that do not need the card reader, such as the Intelligent Stick memory card, which can plug directly into a USB slot.

The USB device class used is 0x08.

Read more at Wikipedia.org