The DSC-P73 is fairly old, having been introduced Feb. 04.  I
don't know much about Sony's memory but I know that they've
introduced many different types of Memory Sticks and hasn't gone to
any great trouble to make new devices compatible with older models.
According to DPReview the DSC-P73 uses "Memory Stick / Pro".  Many
cameras sold in 2005 couldn't access more than 500MB, so the chance
of the P73 being able to use 1GB cards is questionable.  It might.
But I'd be very surprised if 4GB cards could be used, if there are
any that size that would work in the P73.  Normally in a case such
as this I'd recommend replacing the camera with a better, new model,
but as card prices have dropped considerably, it might be worth
buying a handful of cheap cards for the P73.

 All of DPReview's tests of Sony's models similar to the P73 were
done using 128MB cards.  The more recent DSC-H1 (2005) was tested
with a 512MB Memory Stick Pro, so perhaps the P73 can use those.
Around here 512MB cards cost little more than the price of a fast
food meal.

Truly. There are solutions like the Epson P2000, but they are more
expensive than memory cards.

The comment about PCs at Internet cafes being full of spyware was
valid. Viruses, too. It was a constant problem for our missionaries in
the Philippines. Some of these viruses can render a card unusable,
although this is unlikely. The way I dealt with it is when the
missionary brought his card into the office I would run a virus scan on
it, remove the offending files, and then burn his CDs for him. When you
get back from your trip you would want to run a virus scan on your card
before you do anything else with it. Most viruses don't hide themselves
very well, so you could simply look for any files that are not picture
files on the card. You would want view hidden files and system files
checked. Or just reformat the card using a complete or long format. The
chief effect of viruses on the card is that they take up space, but
they can transmit themselves to a PC if you try to open them or
something like that. You would also want to check your CDs for viruses
and spyware.

In article <1180344374.410497.205830@h2g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>,
Girish Kulkarni
geeree@gmail.com says...

Why not buy some memory sticks on eBay, and sell them when you come
back?

How about carrying a cheap card reader around with you?  And maybe a few USB
flash sticks?  That way you can copy stuff onto the USB sticks wherever
there's a computer with USB.  It might be good to carry around the driver
CDs, in case you get stuck somewhere that only has a Windows 98 machine - I
noticed in an African capital that everyone was about 3 versions of Windows
behind Microsoft.

Or there are those little boxes where you plug in a flash card and it'll
copy to a hard drive automatically.  But they're probably more expensive.

Theo

Well, I've got enought batteries! Also, charging them won't be a
problem. I'll have electricity. What I won't have is memory.

Girish