The QL-SD is finally available. Designed by Peter Graf and with software developed from original drivers from the designer of the Ser-Usb device, QL-SD was built and made available on a no-profit basis by members of the German QL community (http://forum.tlienhard.com/phpBB3/viewforum.php?f=9 ), including producing a manual for it. The units themselves were built by Paul Veltjens, who initially made a batch of 12. Support was through the German QL forums and the devices will be available via SellMyRetro.com, with the price expected to be around €60

The first unit was auctioned off on SellMyRetro.com and apparently fetched a price of £128 in the end after a total of 16 bids starting at £40 – see http://www.sellmyretro.com/offer/details/QL-SD-internal-SDHC-Card-Interface-for-QL-3596 for details, a picture and a copy of the manual!

A few weeks ago, I got to try out an older prototype version of QL-SD which hooks up to a QL via the bi-directional parallel port of a Super Gold Card. Peter sent me a version of the QL-SD software to try it out and I eventually got it working after a few mistakes – read about my experiences with it on my blog at http://dilwyn2.wordpress.com/2014/01/19/ql-sd-for-sgc-par-port/?relatedposts_exclude=164

While this particular version isn’t in production at the moment, perhaps Peter Graf would consider making a few if enough people ask him nicely! Given that early standard QL-SD devices don’t work with all versions of Gold Cards and Super Gold Cards, this might be an alternative route to getting SD cards for QLs if you have a Super Gold Card, or perhaps for those who are not confident of opening up their QL and removing a microdrive to make room to install a standard QL-SD. Please bear in mind that a parallel port version of QL-SD might be a little slower than a standard version, of course. You also have to use the higher capacity SD-HC cards rather than the early SD cards.