After the shocking news in June that Lexar would be discontinuing its memory card line, the company was acquired by a Chinese flash storage company called Longsys in September. It now seems that Lexar will continue producing XQD memory cards.
For years now, I've been looking at using the Lexar Hub to efficiently transfer multiple SD cards to my iMac. The reason I never pulled the trigger was that it seemed like it was a bit much. The Lexar hub is pretty large and it requires its own power source which is an inconvenience while traveling and having to back up cards on your laptop. I think I finally found the solution!
Back in June, Micron announced that it would be discontinuing its Lexar retail removable storage business, which makes memory cards used by photographers around the world. But now it looks like the Lexar brand will live on: it has been acquired by the Chinese flash storage company Longsys.
A photographer in San Francisco is offering a $1,000 cash reward with no questions asked for the return of stolen memory cards containing irreplaceable wedding photos. The cards were taken from her car a week ago by a thief who also made off with $15,000 in camera equipment.
SD cards still can't approach the kind of speeds CFast 2.0 and XQD cards boast, but that's not stopping Sony from upping their SD game in a big way. Earlier today, Sony officially announced the "world's fastest SD cards," their new SF-G series.
My name is Jeff Cable, and I'm a photographer based in the San Francisco Bay Area. I previously spent many years of my life as Director of Marketing at Lexar dealing with the ins and outs of the memory card business. And in all that time, I have never written about the do's and don'ts of memory cards. Now that I am not on that side of the business any more, I feel that I can write this objective piece for you without any conflict of interest.
The CompactFlash Association announced the development of a brand new family of high-performance memory cards last month. And even though the so-called "CFexpress" storage is still very much in development, these blazing fast cards should have photographers very excited.
The memory card wars are fought on two playing fields: size and speed. And SanDisk is claiming victories on both fields today with the release of the 256GB SanDisk Extreme microSDXC UHS-I card—the world's fastest 256GB microSD card.
Here's a major deal alert: Lexar 2933x XQD memory cards are currently selling for 50% off right now.
The SD Association has announced its latest SD memory card specification. SD 5.0 features the fastest speed class so far, known as Video Speed Class. The cards will be able to support 4K, 8K, 3D, and 360-degree video recording (in addition to blazing-fast photo shooting speeds).
SanDisk is a huge name when it comes to memory cards used by photographers, but it's actually a relatively small company compared to other heavyweights in the memory chip industry -- one of the biggest of which is Samsung. A new report says that SanDisk is actively exploring the potential sale of its business, with at least two competitors expressing interest in the deal.
Always buy your memory cards from reputable sources. Go for a "sweet deal" through a place like eBay, and you could be in for a lot of pain and embarrassment.
Case in point: Virginia Beach photographer Bryan Myhr tells us he recently purchased what he thought was a 64GB Transcend SD card from an eBay seller. Only after the card corrupted the first time he used it did he realize that something was very wrong.
Actually announced back in September but now finally attached to release dates and price points, Sony recently debuted a new "G" series of XQD cards that feature lightning fast read/write speeds for all the 4K junkies out there.
If you've been waiting for a good deal before you stock up on some CF memory cards, that deal has arrived over at B&H Photo. Today only, you'll be able to get steep discounts on SanDisk Extreme and Extreme Pro CF cards.
As cameras get smaller, one of the places they can choose to save space is in the memory card department. A great case in point is the new Nikon 1 J4, which ditched standard SD cards in favor of their smaller micro counterparts.
The problem with this move is that microSD cards tend to be much slower than standard SD, but that might not be the case for too much longer thanks to Toshiba.
There hasn't been a lot to report vis-à-vis of memory cards lately. With the exception of the occasional limited time price drop and creative idea (like the partitioned "Wise" CF Card from Amulet with its instant backup capabilities) the last few months have been somewhat silent.
Enter Toshiba and its new Exceria Pro series of SDHC cards that will offer "the world's fastest data write speeds," and we again have something to get excited about in the world of storage.
Copy protection and data encryption are standard in most storage media, but you don't often hear of copy protection as it pertains to memory cards. Although all SD cards come with a form of DRM copy protection (CPRM), it's rarely used; and something as common as re-formatting the memory card can erase protected sections that are required to make use of the copy protection in the first place.
Other copy-protected memory card options are marketed to/used mainly by companies, and not typical consumers. Seeing this market as an opportunity, Transcend Information recently announced plans to manufacture its own copy-protected SD and microSD cards and a corresponding reader.
A week ago we shared some reports that Toshiba was developing a re-focusable smartphone camera, but it looks like its sights are set on bigger fish than just Lytro's market. While the photo world was focusing on the tiny re-focusing camera, Toshiba officially announced a new line of high performance CF cards that should blow the competition away and, the company hopes, secure one third of the CF market by 2015.
The new cards -- dubbed the Exceria Pro series -- are set to launch in Spring of this year and bring with them read and write speeds very near the theoretical 167MB/second max provided by the CF's UDMA 7 interface.
Check out the two memory cards above. One of them is a counterfeit card while the other is a genuine one. Can you tell which is which? If you can't, we don't blame you. Japan-based photography enthusiast Damien Douxchamps couldn't either until he popped the fake card into his camera and began shooting. The card felt a bit sluggish, so he ran some tests on his computer. Turned out the 60MB/s card was actually slower than his old 45MB/s card.
While it's not unusual to come across counterfeit memory cards -- it's estimated that 1/3 of "SanDisk"-labeled cards are -- what's a bit concerning is how Douxchamps purchased his: he ordered the cards off Amazon -- cards that were "fulfilled by Amazon."
Just a few years ago, Eye-Fi was the only company at the wireless memory card party; now the dance floor's starting to get a bit crowded. Transcend launched its own line of Wi-Fi SD cards yesterday, joining Eye-Fi, SanDisk, Toshiba, and PQI.
Eye-Fi, a pioneer in the Wi-Fi-enabled memory card market, has announced a new flagship SD memory card. The new Pro X2 doubles the capacity of the old one, from 8GB to 16GB, and increases the speed as well, from Class 6 to Class 10.
A few days ago we shared the story of a memory card that stayed alive after three years at the bottom of a muddy creek. What's important to note is that the card had the luxury of being protected by the Canon XT it was inside -- a camera that was utterly destroyed during those three years.
What if memory cards could be as durable as the weatherproof cameras that are becoming popular amongst compact camera users? That's what Panasonic is trying to do with its new line of sturdy SD cards.
Up until now XQD cards have had a bit of a tough time getting off the ground. With only one compatible camera option in the Nikon D4, one manufacturer in Sony, and prices as large as the speeds they offer are impressive, people may have been starting to wonder if the format is here to stay. The answer, it seems, is yes -- due in large part to Lexar's newly announced interest in producing the cards by later this year.
Needing a way to test the speed of memory cards, Jaroslav of Crazy …
Nikon D4 owners looking to speed up their transfer rates may take well to the news that Sony has just announced its new S-Series XQD cards -- although their wallets probably won't react in kind. The new cards, which will be available in Japan on July 11th, can hit transfer speeds of up to 168MB/s, and will come in both 32 and 64 gigabyte sizes.
Here’s a great little-known tip coming at you via photographer Dan Carr that …
Samsung has released a new line of SD and microSD memory cards that focus not only on speed and …
Perhaps lost amidst the excitement over new cameras at CES 2012 earlier this month was the SD Association’s unveiling …
At the end of last year a new format called XQD was unveiled as the eventual replacement …
Well, well, well, look who’s first to the XQD game. It’s not Sandisk or Lexar, but Sony. On the …
Wanting a cheap and compact way to carry, protect, and manage his SD cards, Instructables member …
In the market for memory cards? B&H is currently offering SanDisk Compact Flash cards at crazy prices. They're listing Extreme Pro cards at less than 50% of the price offered at other retailers. For example, a 16GB Extreme Pro card currently costs $60 (with free shipping in the US) from B&H but $130+ at most other places.
Instead of labeling their memory cards in MB/s, some manufacturers choose to use "Times" ratings (e.g. 8x, 12x, 20x, etc...). While it's pretty clear that a higher number indicates faster speed, what exactly is the number a multiple of?
Did you know that a third of the SanDisk memory cards being used on Earth are actually fake? A SanDisk engineer recently shared this startling fact with a reader over at The Online Photographer:
[...] at any given time, approximately a third of the SanDisk memory cards (made by Toshiba) being used out there in the world are counterfeit. As in, not SanDisk memory cards at all—some other kind of cards dressed up as lookalikes.
Thirty percent, was the number quoted. A third, more or less.
To make sure you're getting the real thing, always purchase your memory cards from reputable dealers.
Samsung recently partnered up with viral marketing agency The Viral Factory to launch 200 paper airplanes carrying SD cards from the edges of space. We first reported on this experiment back in September of last year, but they followed through with the plans and just published this video this week showing how they accomplished it. The balloon was launched in Germany, and each SD Card carried a message for the finder to prove how durable they are.
Here’s a clever trick to keep in mind if you use SD cards for your photography: if the locking …
Here’s an interesting behind-the-scenes video showing how they make memory cards from start to finish. May the ingenuity and …
Lexar has announced two new SDXC memory cards ahead of CES 2011 that tip the scales at a whopping …
Nikon, Sony, and Sandisk have announced that they’re teaming up to develop a set of specifications for the next …
Lexar recently put out this video showing what goes on inside their quality labs. It’s pretty much an advertisement …