Re: Difference between MxR and MxM adapters
 

Apply pressure to the outer edges of the adaptor's rear face rather than the centre. IIRC, there's about 2-3mm either side of the central SDHC card. I can manage that even with my clumsy paws. :)

Re: Difference between MxR and MxM adapters
 

I find the "open" adaptors are a bigger problem in the Macbook slot personally. There's less room and no eject button. So you have to press down on the card to cause the mechanism to eject. Because I keep my Macbook in a hard shell case it makes it more fiddly and more often than not I would end up ejecting the SDHC as well as the adaptor.

With the new enclosed units that problem is solved. Although I still find it prudent to apply the pressure at the edges as the adaptor is more sturdy there.

Re: Difference between MxR and MxM adapters
 

The Efilms MxR was revised in May 2009 and released along with a new adapter, the lockable e-LCR, which both share the same high speed chipset which enables them to read and write to all 16GB and 32GB available on the market.

RELIABILITY

The Efilms MxR adapter PCB is built completely by a million dollar SMT machine with no hand soldering, whereas the MxM adapter still has the Timing Crystal hand soldered to it, which will make it vulnerable to failure.

CHIPSET USED

The Efilms MxR adapter uses a chipset that is able to read and write to the latest SDXC cards, and easily reads and writes to 64GB SDXC cards. The MxM adapter can only recognize the first 32GB of and SDXC card, perhaps because it was built on an earlier generation chipset, which came out before the advent of SDXC, or the design will not allow the camera to access the other 32GB on the SDXC card..

SPEED

The MxR adapter and MxM adapter are fairly similar in performance, and despite claims on the MxM website, (since removed), that MxM adapter was the “Fastest in the world”, we were never able to establish any significant difference. The two adapters were always able to read and write within 0.5Mb/s of each other. One could read one card at 20Mb/s the other 20.5Mb/s, the difference depended on the manufacturer of the memory.

EJECTION AND FIT

The e-LCR adapter is specifically designed to meet requests from professionals on set, who were concerned at “premature ejection”. The e-LCR allows the SD card to be locked into place, and and could not be accidentally ejected in either the camera or a mac.

Although the e-LCR has been very popular, we still see a huge demand for the MxR adapter, as many users prefer to be able to easily remove the SD card at the end of the shoot and give it to the client, and do not want to bother with a flimsy cover that breaks easily in operation.