Tech
microSD memory cards in the test: which is the best?
The memory cards of the SD family dominate the removable storage market. Other formats such as CFexpress or Nand are sometimes technically superior, but at the same time are either only supported by a few manufacturers as isolated solutions or reserved for professional photo and video devices as expensive products. SD cards, on the other hand, are generalists. You are currently as SD-, SDHC– and SDXC-Cards with different speeds and storage capacities available.
There are also the “big” SD and the “small” microSD cards. If a tablet, smartphone or dash cam has a removable memory slot, it is usually a microSD slot. For speed, in addition to the controller, that is also BUS interface decisive. It can be recognized by the UHS indication. Memory cards without the UHS mark as well as those with UHS-I have nine contact pins on the back and theoretically achieve 25 or 104 MB/s. On memory cards with the newer UHS-II standard you will find a second row with another eight contacts below the usual nine pins.
Theoretically, UHS-II cards achieve a data throughput rate of up to 312 MB/s. However, this is only of practical use if the mobile device also supports this standard. In our test, we compare UHS-II and UHS-I models with different performance profiles. The tests were carried out in cooperation with our sister magazine ColorFoto. The storage times were therefore measured using series of images taken with semi-professional cameras.
microSD UHS-II
The group of UHS-II cards consisted of four models with a write speed between 45 and 165 MB/s specified by the manufacturer. Accordingly, these cards cut slower than their big siblings. The most convincing showed the Lexar 1800x (150 MB/s), which is difficult to obtain and sometimes extremely expensive – it costs up to 1.6 euros/GB. But it was the fastest in both cameras: 11.5 s in the Canon R5, 17.7 s in the Nikon Z 7 II.
the Sandisk ExtremePro (100 MB/s) took about a second longer in both cameras. Bronze went to the Kingston ReactPlus, which was 3 to 4.5 seconds slower than the Lexar 1800x. Since the Kingston is supposed to achieve 165 MB/s, we expected more. In terms of series length, the UHS-II-capable microSD cards show no advantages over fast microSD-UHS-I competitors – in the Canon R5, both types deliver 72 to 73 consecutive images at best. In the Nikon camera, the series length basically varies little: the difference between the two performance poles was just three frames.
The fourth UHS-II card, a Lexar 1000x, is a curiosity: With a write speed of 45 MB/s, the purpose of the UHS-II bus does not open up to us. Their performance was correspondingly modest and was below that of the UHS-I cards with a higher write speed. Earned the Buy Tip “Speed” in this category Lexar Professional 1800x and Sandisk Extreme Pro UHS-II.
microSD UHS-I
Only one UHS-I card beat 16 seconds in the Canon R5: the Transcend 340S. Four other models needed between 16.2 and 16.3 s and were thus just as fast as the “big” SD UHS-I cards: Kingston Canvas GO!, Lexar 1066x and the two Sandisk models. They took around 30 percent more time than the microSD UHS-II cards, but managed almost the same series length. In the Nikon Z 7 II, the time gain is less and is less than 20 percent.
The Kingston GO! and the two Sandisk models take the lead in the Nikon camera: 21 to 21.7 s. The Sandisk with the slower read speed (100 MB/s) is even slightly faster than the card with the read speed of 170 MB/s. According to the manufacturer, both cards write at 90 MB/s. Transcend 340S comes to 22 s, Lexar 1066x falls behind with 24 s. Of Kioxia we tested two Exceria models with the same write and read speeds.
But in both cameras, the Exceria Plus was a little faster than the Exceria High Endurance. With times around 18 (Canon) and 28 to 29.5 s, the two ended up behind the leading group. the Samsung Pro Endurance took three times as long in the Canon R5 and just over twice as long in the Nikon Z 7 II as the fastest cards, but according to the manufacturer it also only offers 30 MB/s.
If you want to work with microSDs, you should choose UHS-I, because really fast UHS-II microSDs are also really expensive, and the less fast ones hardly offer any advantages. That Price-performance ratio speaks for Kingston Go!, the two Sandisk models and Transcend 340S, which also convince in terms of price at 0.20 to 0.30 euros/GB.
Far East Connection
There are many Chinese memory cards available on Amazon – especially the ones microSD. Unfortunately, concrete speed information is often missing here. Although the prices appear attractive, a certain risk remains. We bought and tested four cards. One of them is no longer available from the original supplier – that’s the other problem with cheap offers from the Far East: complaints are common laborious and not always possible.
Three of the memory cards, from top donkey, AX Memory and Kootion had 64 GB and cost about 0.20 Euro/GB – very cheap. It’s downright cheap Dongchunxi with 512 GB for 33 euros, i.e. 0.06 euros/GB. Dongchunxi apparently copies Sandisk’s design. None of the manufacturers provide information on the speed. In the Canon R5, the first three needed values of 33 to 36 s when saving 20 image pairs. Only the Samsung Pro Endurance (51 s) and the Dongchunxi were slower, which was the slowest card tested at all with 103 s.
Almost the same result with Nikon: Dongchunxi again clearly lagged behind, Topesel and Ax Memory At 45 to 50 s, they took about twice as long as the fast UHS-I microSDs and were slower than the Samsung Pro Endurance this time. the coition we couldn’t use it in the Nikon Z 7 II – the camera reported a memory error. The supposed price advantage of the Far East memory is not really one, because many brand manufacturers offer comparably cheap models with better performance – like the microSD models we recommend.
Conclusion
If you mainly use the memory cards in mobile devices and therefore use microSDs, you should rather UHS-I models Select. Really fast microSD UHS-II cards like Lexar 1800x and SanDisk Extreme pro with 275 MB/s read speed – both get the “speed” buy tip – are much more expensive. Get a value for money recommendation Kingston Go!, Sandisk Extreme Pro (170MB/s), Sandisk Extreme Pro (100MB/s) and Transcend 340S. These models are a bit slower, but significantly cheaper.
