SanDisk Ultra 400GB microSDXC card


Bonkers, ain't it? When I bought a 4GB CF card for my camera, that was the same size as the hard disc that was in my computer at the time, and 400GB is actually more space than in my current build server, in a size approximately equivalent to my little fingernail (although I do have a 1TB hard disc for doing backups into). I think the smallest card I still have somewhere is a 32*MB* card that came with my first digital camera.
 
I think my smallest is this 10MB card.

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There was a good discussion about this on Hacker News. Turns out these incredibly dense memory cards aren't as long lasting as smaller capacity ones that store fewer bits per flash cell. Looks like cards marketed for dash cam usage are the most reliable, which is what I'll personally look for next time I need a new memory card. I somehow haven't had any storage fail in the last 12 years, knock on wood :oops:
 
Turns out these incredibly dense memory cards aren't as long lasting as smaller capacity ones that store fewer bits per flash cell.
SD cards mainly degrade on writes, not on reads. Large capacity cards are great for storing roms. The smaller capacity cards can be utilized nicely for configuration files, savegames, etc.
The way the Pandora PND system uses filesystem overlays plays very nice with this.
 
I think my smallest is this 10MB card.

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I have a couple of those of similar vintage sitting around somewhere, not sure the capacity (one was low enough that I laughed when I popped it out of the device it came with). I have tried to get all of my older computers and such eating the same thing to help cut costs, and CF seems to be ideal, other than some of the high prices for low capacity cards. Unfortunately at some point it seems many people decided to start using SD (Everdrive and others). I have been stockpiling reliable ones for each of those, so maybe not as much of a problem as I was having several years ago when keeping everything original, or even when I first started using CF for everything. Since this stockpile consists of a mix of full size and microSD, I hope the adapters last. I have a mini or two as well, which was also a bit of a headache to source since I didn't start looking until after those evaporated. I may get rid of the single device I have that uses miniSD, as I don't use it or have any plans for it, and I can get an Everdrive for my GBA to replace the cart that uses miniSD.
 
This new card has an awful 10MB/s write time, so it's pure storage.
 
I pulled out my low capacity cards that I only use for drivers and such, and my lowest capacity are the 2MB Epson PCMCIA I mentioned laughing about finding (with a battery holder*, so, what, not even flash?o_O...but at least it has a write protect switch), and a few 8MB SanDisk and Canon CF cards.


*Out of curiosity I popped out the battery holder to see if it had one in there. Turns out it did, and I dropped it when I opened it up. I guess whatever was stored on that is gone now. :(
 
This new card has an awful 10MB/s write time, so it's pure storage.
That's the class 10 guarantee surely? According to amazon, they don't quote an actual sequential write speed (or any other write speed), so all we know if that it'll bee at least 10MB/s (if I'm remembering how the SD class system works properly).

With this being an Ultra branded card in the microSD/transflash configuration, I wouldn't expect it to be all that fast, but it may still exceed the rate our Pyra will be able to write to that card slot, I dunno yet.
 
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