Yer Welcome, Ron!
Ya, the manual says to use the power pack when you are transferring, but I have not once had a problem with the battery going flat during transfer, even with a full 256 MB card and a battery that was in several days. I would not cut and paste pics from camera to the computer though, just to be safe. Copy and paste, then once they are transferred and intact, go into the camera (via computer) and delete them. After thousands of shots, I did have one transfer to PC bad, for unknown reasons. I copied it over a second time and all was OK. So it's best to leave on the camera, until you verify they are good, if it's a critical image.
I think around 20 pics is about it for hte small card when shooting at high resolution. The 256 MB card holds over 100 pics at the highest resolution and highest quality setting. There is a guide in the book that says what it will hold, but I just leave it at the highest setting all the time. I keep the smaller card that came with the cam in the bag. The idea is if I run out of room on the 256, I'll plug in the smaller card and consider myself on reserve. If I'm on vacation, I'll reduce resolution at that time. I plan a 2nd 256 MB card before I go on vacation for 3 weeks, and hope I will have a enough room.
jon