How to store more movies on your IPAD!

So you want to travel and don't want to bring a bunch of DVDs with you... 

Here is how to get all of your movies on your IPAD in a few easy steps!!!

SD card: $35

Camera Connection kit: $29

Storing an extra 32 GB of movies for viewing on the IPAD: Priceless!!!!!

I purchased a wireless drive ($200) to use on vacation and it worked well but couple of things went wrong.  I can't use it in the airplane because the wireless drive creates a wifi signal and that's how the IPAD connects to the drive (you don't need internet, the drive creates the wifi signal).  It worked great on a car trip but a month later it died on me, big fail.  So I returned it to Costco (love Costco they really stand by their stuff and took the dead drive back for a full refund).

This is not my idea, I researched from a ton of different places and added my tricks and tips.

Copyright - this is a biggie, please only use movies that you legally purchased, bla, bla.  I don't want anyone here to infringe on any copyrights ok? :)  I only used movies I purchased.

Alright so I purchased a Sandisk 32 GB card, with each movie at about 1 to 3 GB I could fit quite a few movies.  

Also please remember to have at least 3 to 4GB of memory free on your IPAD or this won't work.

There a couple of ways of doing this but basically you are tricking your IPAD into thinking you are importing pictures and videos from your camera.

The easiest way I found was to put the new SD card into a camera and take a picture.  Why?  Because it is going to format the card and place the default folders in it.

If you don't have a camera that will take a SD card we can work around it.

Click on image to find it on Amazon

Insert SD card on your computer or if you don't have a card reader on your computer you can buy a SD card reader (about $10). 

Open windows explorer and you should see that the SD card has a DCIM folder and a 100OLYMP folder and there is the pic you took:

Find your movie (has to be in the format that IPAD will play! I have mine as .mp4).  Move the movie file into the same DCIM/100OLYMP folder or the folder that your camera created.  If you didn't use a camera, just copy the same file structure from here.  IMPORTANT: you must rename the movie to 8 characters.  If you don't do this it will not let you import!!!  I renamed mine to something I could identify the movie.

Now "eject" the card. and get your camera card adaptor and plug into IPAD with your SD card.

camera connector kit here

Go to PHOTOS and select IMPORT  (Apple Support for more help) 

You will NOT see the file name - only the LENGTH of the movie that's why I created a cheat sheet where I list all my movies and their lengths (right click on the column header under details in explorer and choose to show LENGTH.  This way you can quickly find your movie by length.  You will not have a screenshot or any other identifier!

Only select one or two movies to import or you will run out of storage on your IPAD.  Click IMPORT SELECTED and then go to your PHOTOS folder, that's right, if you go to your VIDEOS folder they won't be there.  When it asks you if you want to delete from camera say NO so you keep your movie in your SD Card.

PLAY from your PHOTOS folder.

When you are done and want to watch another movie then delete the file from your IPAD and repeat the process.  Importing only takes a couple of minutes for a full length movie so it is a quick process.  You can now carry all your movies in small SD cards and watch them on a plane - car ride - anywhere :)

We also got one of these and it was awesome for the long car ride (for more info click on picture):