The Unitech MSR206 is a powerful magnetic card reader/writer that supports up to 3 tracks of data, e.g. decoding/encoding and verifying up to 3 tracks of data simultaneously. Since credit cards omit the 3rd track, you can read and write most credit cards as well.
If you decide to purchase one, please note that the cable interface to the computer is RS232. This really isn't a huge deal since they work perfectly with a serial to usb cable such as the one found here: Belkin USB SERIAL PORT ADAPTER ( F5U409-CU )
The original software that's provided for the MSR206 only works for Windows, so this can obviously become an issue for someone that doesn't want the overhead of a virtual machine and/or wants to customize the code for their needs.
The goal a while back was to develop an application in Ruby that would allow an MSR206 to interact with this scanner on Linux, MacOSX, and hypothetically, Windows. Currently 0.1 alpha only supports reading magstripe cards, however there is a raw command section that will show you the commands necessary to write cards or issue any other command as well ;)
It may also be important to note that "mr_ms_206-01-alpha.rb" was tested against the MSR206-77. I can't say for sure whether it works with other MSR206 models however, I'm willing to bet that for the most part, there are very few differences.
The source code for mr_ms_206-0.1-alpha.rb can be found here:
Download mr_ms_206-0.1-alpha.rb
Any feedback is appreciated. I haven't had a whole bunch of time to spend developing this software, but I'm sure it's enough to grow into something really useful.
Cheers!
Pick a MSR206 up at Amazon:
Unitech MSR 206 Triple Track - Magnetic card reader / writer - USB - ( Tracks 1, 2 & 3 )
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