Remember microSD cards? While it’s quite rare to find a modern smartphone that can make use of one, things like drones, action cameras and handheld consoles like the Nintendo Switch still very much rely on these cards for storage – and as always, the larger and faster the card, the better.
Samsung is introducing new Pro Plus and Evo Plus microSD cards with capacities up to 1TB. The average Switch game is around 10GB, so you can store around 90 of them (keep in mind there is some file system overhead), though some are larger. For example, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Complete Edition is nearly 40GB.
The new Samsung Pro Plus microSD card
These new cards use a new 28nm controller, which is more power efficient than the 55nm controllers used in older microSD cards. Also, the new controller supports Low Density Parity Check error correction code, which improves the card’s durability when it comes to write-and-erase cycles. The performance enhancement is also attributed to card’s usage of 8th generation V-NAND technology.
The new Samsung Pro Plus cards are quite fast, promising up to 180MB/s sequential read and up to 130MB/s sequential write speeds. The Evo Plus cards are a bit slower at 160MB/s read and 120MB/s write speeds. The cards are rated A2 for application storage, U3 and V30 for general file storage and 4K video recording.
The new Samsung Evo Plus microSD card
These come in several sizes: 128GB, 256GB, 512GB and 1TB. The Evo Plus model also has a 64GB version, but that is much slower – 60MB/s read, 20MB/s write and it only has A1/U1/V10 ratings. All cards have a 10-year limited warranty. They are designed to withstand water, high temperatures, X-rays and magnetic fields.
The new cards are already available globally. The faster Pro Plus models start at $25 for a 128GB card and go up to $154 for the 1TB model. The Evo Plus are cheaper with the 1TB model being $132 (and the 64GB one is $13, but, as noted above, it is much slower).
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