A question for the Bernina machine owners.
On the Bernina memory stick can you use any memory stick or does it have to be the Bernina only. I am about to purchase the new embroidery machine and was wondering has anyone tried just a basic memory stick.
Beth

I know that it depends on the model of Bernina you get. On the 730, you can possibly use some of the ones you use from Best Buy and so forth. I do know that the 630 and 640 will ONLY use the Bernina USB stick. The cost of the stick is comparable to the ones you will buy from anywhere else, so why not save yourself the trouble and just get it from your dealer? I also know you can save 50 designs per folder on the stick and there are 6 folders on the stick, (300 designs).

Hello Bernina Girl. I am now wondering if you know how much any of these machines cost? I would love to have one but an afraid it may be out of my range.
Misty

The Bernina memory sticks are pretty expensive $189 and that's way to much for ANY memory stick. You can use any memory stick that's not more than 4gig but you must format it (initialize) before the machine will recognize the media. My step-mom has an 830 and we just went thru this ourselves. She bought 3 4-gig sticks at Costco for $40. Sandisk was the brand she found and their customer support can walk you thru the formatting process.

Hope this is helpful.

I have used a Sandisk for my 630. I have only tried it once and it seemed to work fine. I did try another brand that we had around the house and it did not work.

I don't know about the Bernina but the Pfaff can use another brand just dont have more that 1g of memory - the machines can't handle that.

Just a word of caution you should check with your Bernina dealer before you use any other stick other than the Bernina stick as my dealer told me
if anything went wrong it would void the warranty on my machine not sure if this is all dealers or not but is worth the check
Dodie

I have been waiting 6 weeks for the USB sticks to come in to the dealer from Bernina. I need to make a gift in time for a birthday. So, I think I'm going to try the Sandisk. This is the only issue I have with this machine. If you make it so you can only use their product, then make it available!

I have a Deco 430 and use a regular USB stick. You have to format it, and on mine create a directory called EmbF5, and put your designs in that directory. Sometimes it locks up and says it's out of memory, so I just put on the design I want to use at that time. It's worth it to me because those Bernina branded ones are a whole lot of money that I don't have.

Bernina USB vs other USB
 

I had the Bernina 570QE and I have used a different USB stick without difficulty . I recently upgraded to the 790plus and it seems my USB stocks work with this machine as well .