Database Users

MicroSD Question

Hi, sorry if this is a double post. I did look around but could not find much info.
I'm interested to know how well the new 16GB MicroSD cards work on the Xperia. Anyone using one of these? My main concern is that they all seem to only be class 2 atm. Is this too slow to run apps and my videos stored on it etc?
Should I wait till a class 4 16GB card comes out?
Thanks
Edit: I also noticed that SanDisk has a “Mobile Ultra” memory card range. Only up to 8GB though. Anyone using one of these? Is there a big difference in speeds?

i don't think it matters in a phone.

I ordered the eact same Mobile Ultra card today. Should be here saturday, so I will tell when I get it. But assuming it's Class 6 card, it should be fast. I wouldn't go with Class 2, since it's slow. But as Jabe says, it might not matter on the phone.

So as at now no one's using a 16GB yet?

Give me a week or 2. I'm planning on ordering the Sandisk one.

Sandisk Mobile Ultra is good, and it's what I am using for X1. Since it's class 6, the read/write speed is about 20/16 mb/s, which is much faster than class 2. If you wanna watch video storaged in card, this one is your first choice.

wdq30 said:
Sandisk Mobile Ultra is good, and it's what I am using for X1. Since it's class 6, the read/write speed is about 20/16 mb/s, which is much faster than class 2. If you wanna watch video storaged in card, this one is your first choice.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Note that the speed in the end is depending on the host itself. If the host is slow, even if you use class 6 memory card, it's not going to make any difference. Personally I believe the phone itself would be the bottleneck and not the memory card.
I know it's not totally relevant but just for reference, take a look at the link below. As you can see the speed of class 2 and 6 are pretty identical as it's limited by the host. This is even with a dedicated memory card reader. Compare the 2nd and 4th entries from the bottom.
http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/reader_report_multi_page.asp?cid=6007-9438

VaThInK said:
Note that the speed in the end is depending on the host itself. If the host is slow, even if you use class 6 memory card, it's not going to make any difference. Personally I believe the phone itself would be the bottleneck and not the memory card.
I know it's not totally relevant but just for reference, take a look at the link below. As you can see the speed of class 2 and 6 are pretty identical as it's limited by the host. This is even with a dedicated memory card reader. Compare the 2nd and 4th entries from the bottom.
http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/reader_report_multi_page.asp?cid=6007-9438
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If that's the case, what's the optimal speed supported by X1?

So anyone able to compare the 2 classes

ipporek said:
So as at now no one's using a 16GB yet?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm using a 16GB Class 2 at the moment. No probs with apps or music. But I have no videos on the card...

with normal sd cards the pdas were mostly not able to transfer as fast as the sd card supported
as the sd interface in onchip and not that fast
would like to see some tests if the same hold true with newer pda's and class X microSD cards

anyone able to follow this up yet?

I'm using a Sandisk 8gb Class 4 HC. No problems with speed or data read/write (on the phone itself).
Using the phone as a disk drive though (not activesync) is noticeably slower than using a USB adapter, *suggesting* the phone itself is the bottleneck?

I'm using a SanDisk 8GB Class II Card and I had no problems with photos, videos or music so far.
Don't think a Class 4 or 6 is worth the price in a mobile phone.

I got my 16GB Microsdhc today. And everything works. Sad thing is it only shows 15GB.

I find no difference in speed between my 8G class 6 and 16G class 2 (both from Sandisk)
xmoo said:
I got my 16GB Microsdhc today. And everything works. Sad thing is it only shows 15GB.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it's 15G probably because of the way how "G" is being calculated. 16,000,000,000 = 16,000,000,000/(1024*1024*1024) = 14.9GB

im using a 8g class 4 card, music, apps and vids work great.
just a quick question, the x1 has a sd card limit of 32g, when a larger card comes out like the 128gb card that sandisk has said will come out, could windows mobile have a update so that it can read it or is limited to the reader hardware inside the x1

I have 2 cards: Sandisk 16GB Class 2 and Kingston 8GB class 4.
I use Sandisk in Xperia, and the speed is more than sufficient. It reaches 12-15 MB/s writing on USB adapter. Reading - it's no problem reaching even more. So it's ok, speed wise.
I don't think you would need more speed in Xperia )
There's no HD video recording option in there )

one can use pocket mechanics to benchmark the sdcard speed
if the results are lower i would suspect it show the bottleneck speed
of the sd interface of the qualcomm cpu in x1

I have a 16gb micro sdhc and some .avi videos lag (highish quality). Specifically, top gear season 12 episodes from finalgear.com. it might be the divx client though, Im using the WM 6 Pro version available on the divx website.

microSD 32Gb class 6 and Galaxy S

I am thinking about purchasing a 32Gb microSD for use with my galaxy S.
My concern is that, is this too large? Are there any bad side effect like it being too slow to display picture/start up scann/run applications?

Which brand? That's probably more important for the speed than class (a class 2 Sandisk is often as fast or faster than a class 6 from a lesser brand).
The capacity of the card shouldn't affect the speed during most situations. However the phone does scan for media each time it is turned on or after disconnecting from USB connection (Kies or mass storage), the amount of time this takes depends on:
-the amount of media stored on the card and
-(probably) the read speed of the card.
Note that class rating is minimum write speed - so it's not a great indicator of real-life performance.
Also note that some too-cheap-to-be-true cards are actually smaller capacity cards that report larger capacities to fool the customer.
BTW where are you getting the card from (I want one as well ).

Hi flamingpitofhell,
I am looking at Sandisk as well and most likely get it from their online store. I am trying to find more information whether it is worth the trouble.

I don't think Sandisk sell class 6 cards (yet). Buying from their online store's also more expensive than online retailers (I can get one in Australia for AUD155, which is ~USD137, cf their RRP of USD200).

thanks for the pointer. will look around for local stores here in Thailand.
Which city in Australia are you in? I studied in Perth more than a decaded back.

I'm in glorious Melbourne mate, haven't been to Perth yet

the only LEGIT 32GB Sandisk available right now in the market is only Class 2
if you read anything else, it is FAKE, specially from eBay
wait until the other microSD manufactures start pushing out 32GB on class 4 or class 6 before buying.
i'm using 2x 16GB Class 6 until the 32GB class 6 becomes available.

I'm using Class 2 32GB card in mine, its fine.
Its slower when you're transferring to the card from your PC, but for most people thats only particularly problematic the first time (loading music collection), after that you'll not really notice a difference in the phone (the read speeds are basically the same, and the phone can neither read nor write to the card faster than a Class 2 card can cope with). You can see it in the benchmarks taken post-mimocans fix - Class 2 cards are no slower than any other Class within the phone.
Grab one now and be happy.

NZtechfreak said:
I'm using Class 2 32GB card in mine, its fine.
Grab one now and be happy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Where did you get yours from and how much for. I`m interested in getting one myself.
Thanks

my local stores already carry the real Sandisk 32GB class 2
too slow for my taste, i like to run Apps from the SD card, also use it as a SWAP partidion to prevent the LAG problem people complains about, it's a very easy fix
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=724251

i wonder what would be better a 16gb class 6 or 32gb class 2...
is it worth sacrifising double of the memory for the speed?

onbacardi said:
i wonder what would be better a 16gb class 6 or 32gb class 2...
is it worth sacrifising double of the memory for the speed?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it depends what you are trying to do
if it's just to listen to mp3, then Class 2 is fine
if you want to run games, software, watch movies, use it for SWAP drive to have no lag, then minimum a Class 6

Class ratings don't really seem to have too much of an effect on real world performance: http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1468705. Just discount the last result from the SGS (it's most likely mistaken for the internal SD).

i rather trust my experience coming from PalmOS + WinMb where real life situations using a class 4 or slower cards, made a huge word of difference when launching applications from SD and watching movies from SD
funny enough the numbers reported on that topic shows SGS i9000 to have the fastest speed even using the same card that got lower speed on the other phones.
which seems to point out it's directly proportional to the CPU speed, and the multitasking software running in the back end.
however as you see on those test itself, there are speed differences between class 2, class 4 and class 6
the same class # can not be compared to another class # of a different size,
if you imagine a hard drive, the bigger the hard drive the more layers/disk area it has to read, the same is true even for static SD cards.
however as pointed on those test Transcend usually has the fastest SD cards in the market, that's why i always buy that brand for performance, using a 16GB Transcend myself, waiting for the 32 GB class 6+ to come out
Adata has 2 lines, the performance line, and the standard line
if you want speed get the performance SD cards
Kingston and Sandisk are mostly standard speed, they don't release much performance level SD cards anymore, but they do have lots of those on USB sticks.

I tried my Brothers Sandisk Class 2 32GB and it worked perfectly.
Granted it's not as fast as my Sandisk Mobile Ultra Class 4 but that card flies anyway.
Certainly for recording your large movie files taken with the camera it's no different in speed than using the built in SDCard on the phone.

I have no problems watching 720P video on my phone. I have no problems launching applications either.
So much misinformation...

of course there is no problem, the issue here is getting the top performance, any SD card will work just fine.
it's just a matter of how fast/slow are you able to torelate

The only time you will notice any difference in speed is when transferring data to and from the card.
However, when you have double the space of other cards to consider speed should not be a deciding factor.
I'm already looking to get the Sandisk Class 2 32GB card. It will store all of my work files normally kept on my Laptop.
My Sandisk Class 4 Mobile Ultra 16GB will be my spare ~ should the larger card fail...

Thanks for the information s everyone.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

I have the 32GB sandisk card and works perfect. I have a 720p mkv file and my music on there. Playback was superb for the video with no noticeable lag. Mind you the card isn't anywhere near full yet. From my limited knowledge of sd cards, they put data on the fastest part first so the fuller it gets the slower the card is likely to get..
My plan is to put movies and songs on the 32GB file and reserve the internal 13GB for capturing video and taking pictures on the phone.

SD read/write speed causing lag on my HD2 but...

So I downloaded this app call H2testw.exe to test for legit sdcards but it also tells the read/write speed as well. I am testing my 8gb and 1gb cards. I set it to write a 300 mb files to the card and verify it.
Info about Android running on the two cards:
8gb = lags coming out of sleep, touch screen freezes, write~7.5 mb/s, read~12mb/s
1gb = no lags, no touch screen, write~4.3mb, read~13mb/s
I'm confused. The read speed is almost the same yet the 1gb microsd is more responsive running MDJ android compared to the 8gb microsd. Any thought?
UPDATE: Maybe this is what's causing the problem. Stolen from Engadget.
What we've learned from our tipsters and from documents culled from Microsoft, Samsung, and others is that the big issue is random access performance -- a figure that isn't taken into account in a card's class rating. Ironically, Microsoft discovered in its testing that cards with higher class ratings actually performed worse on Windows Phone 7 because the tweaks card manufacturers make to achieve high sequential throughput can actually hurt random access times. There's some rocket science involved here, but basically, it's a tradeoff and a bit of a gamble -- if a manufacturer tunes a card for a high class rating, it takes more time to access the first byte at a new location on the card because it's optimizing access for that area of memory, but once it does that, it can blast sequential bytes at very high speed. If you've got a lot of small reads or writes you need to make to different files at different locations in the card's memory, though, you really start to suffer. Cards with lower class ratings tend to spend less time optimizing sequential access prior to the first read / write operation, so it can move around the card (that is, access it randomly) much faster.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Source:
http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/17/windows-phone-7s-microsd-mess-the-full-story-and-how-nokia-ca/

They are probably different classes, plus it naturally takes longer with a bigger card because there's more files and more space to read and write
Sent from my HD2 Nexus One using XDA App

I get screen freezes with 8gb and up but rarely with new builds, haven't tried a card higher than class 6
Also I'm on radio 2.15
Sent from my HD2 Nexus One using XDA App

Oddly enough, I have two 8gb cards, one class 4 the other class 6, and they hiccup more than my 16gb class 2.
Now that is weird.

I'm lost myself...I'm thinking off just getting me a 4gb card and hope for the best...

I heard the 16gb class 10 is perfect but it still cost to much for nand to be around the corner
Sent from my HD2 Nexus One using XDA App

16 gb class 10 no lag cost me over 100 pounds tho
Sent from my HTC Desire using XDA App

Cheapest 16GB - lags from time to time :/
Maybe defragmentation may help?

tomus said:
Cheapest 16GB - lags from time to time :/
Maybe defragmentation may help?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Defrag wont help...scan for errors...try to have only the android folder and see if it makes a different ..

Btw, guys...
all sd cards are not created equal. all sd cards of the same CLASS are not created equal.
Check out the ongoing drama with win7 phones with SD slots....
class measures throughput, what affects the SOD and related issues is random access speed, not throughput so much.

It's just my 2 cents, but I've tested Class 2, 4, and 6 MicroSDHC cards and found very little noticeable difference once Android is fully booted up and running on the HD2. Moreover, none of the cards create screen freezes or SOD issues or high battery drain problems here. That said, I have noticed that the actual boot time and file transfer speed (from the PC to the card) can be faster on average with quality higher class rated cards of the same size. Also, I've found that the larger the card size, the longer the android boot time, no matter the class. Guess that makes sense, as the system need to read more sectors with larger size cards. Please note that I've only tested Sandisk, Toshiba, TopRam and Samsung cards to date. What's kind of strange is that the Class 2 16 & 32GB Sandisk cards run just as well or slightly better for some reason than some of my higher class rated cards. Go figure...
As far as issues go, I recommend only using quality brand name cards, no ebay fakes or cheap no name brands. Also, I've had great luck formatting all my cards with SD Formatter v2.0 and v3.0, using the quick format mode with the standard 32kb cluster size.
Best to all,
R

rhacy said:
It's just my 2 cents, but I've tested Class 2, 4, and 6 MicroSDHC cards and found very little noticeable difference once Android is fully booted up and running on the HD2. Moreover, none of the cards create screen freezes or SOD issues or high battery drain problems here. That said, I have noticed that the actual boot time and file transfer speed (from the PC to the card) can be faster on average with quality higher class rated cards of the same size. Also, I've found that the larger the card size, the longer the android boot time, no matter the class. Guess that makes sense, as the system need to read more sectors with larger size cards. Please note that I've only tested Sandisk, Toshiba, TopRam and Samsung cards to date. What's kind of strange is that the Class 2 16 & 32GB Sandisk cards run just as well or slightly better for some reason than some of my higher class rated cards. Go figure...
As far as issues go, I recommend only using quality brand name cards, no ebay fakes or cheap no name brands. Also, I've had great luck formatting all my cards with SD Formatter v2.0 and v3.0, using the quick format mode with the standard 32kb cluster size.
Best to all,
R
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Great info here. I think I will just order me a new card from a reputable brand. Maybe my card is just getting old. Maybe a 16gb from Amazon will do. They aren't too expensive nowaday. ~$26.

Does the Radio version effects the lag of the sd card? Or the kernel?

distruct said:
Does the Radio version effects the lag of the sd card? Or the kernel?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, not on the sd but radio does effect how the build will run, your phone calls, your battery.

Could this be the reason why class don't matter on hd2 android? I mean even some class 4 & 6 have lag and sod problem. I pulled this bit from engadget. It's an article on wp7 and memory card issues.
What we've learned from our tipsters and from documents culled from Microsoft, Samsung, and others is that the big issue is random access performance -- a figure that isn't taken into account in a card's class rating. Ironically, Microsoft discovered in its testing that cards with higher class ratings actually performed worse on Windows Phone 7 because the tweaks card manufacturers make to achieve high sequential throughput can actually hurt random access times. There's some rocket science involved here, but basically, it's a tradeoff and a bit of a gamble -- if a manufacturer tunes a card for a high class rating, it takes more time to access the first byte at a new location on the card because it's optimizing access for that area of memory, but once it does that, it can blast sequential bytes at very high speed. If you've got a lot of small reads or writes you need to make to different files at different locations in the card's memory, though, you really start to suffer. Cards with lower class ratings tend to spend less time optimizing sequential access prior to the first read / write operation, so it can move around the card (that is, access it randomly) much faster.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Source:
http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/17/windows-phone-7s-microsd-mess-the-full-story-and-how-nokia-ca/

azzzz said:
Could this be the reason why class don't matter on hd2 android? I mean even some class 4 & 6 have lag and sod problem. I pulled this bit from engadget. It's an article on wp7 and memory card issues.
Source:
http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/17/windows-phone-7s-microsd-mess-the-full-story-and-how-nokia-ca/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Obviously.
Been saying this for a while, myself - I have experimented, and I get SOD every time with my 16gb class 6 card, but rarely with my class 2 8gb, and never ever (and, tbh, better responsiveness overall) with my 2gb NON-HC card

enneract said:
Obviously.
Been saying this for a while, myself - I have experimented, and I get SOD every time with my 16gb class 6 card, but rarely with my class 2 8gb, and never ever (and, tbh, better responsiveness overall) with my 2gb NON-HC card
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I hope so...my class 2 16gb will be here in a couple of days...i hope it's faster than my current 8gb class 4....
Update: my 16gb class 2 sandisk is here. Things have improved alot. Wake up is faster now with less lag, market download speed is faster now (10kb vs 100kb). Hopefully system performance will be better...

SD Card Partitions

I have a Nook Color that is rooted running CyanogenMod 7.1.0 on internal memory. I have a 16GB Class 10 SD Card in it and was wondering what people are using for partitions on their SD Cards. I have pushed pretty much every app over to SD Card but some (not all) applications (Google Maps for instance) seem really sluggish and many times it force closes.
Is the Nook just not powerful enough to run Google Maps or is there something I need to adjust? Maybe a bigger swap partition? I set them up quite a while ago and don't recall what I set them to off the top of my head.
Using CyanogenMod I am overclocked to 1.2GHz with the Governor set to Performance.
VM heap size set to 48MB.
Thanks

class 10 cards are not as good as you'd think for any Android device. Android devices tend to write smaller files... a class 4 card (Sandisk recommended) is actually best for these devices.

DizzyDen said:
class 10 cards are not as good as you'd think for any Android device. Android devices tend to write smaller files... a class 4 card (Sandisk recommended) is actually best for these devices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am mainly using Class 10 as that is what I had laying around in the Micro SD Card Format.
I have a 32 GB Class 4 in my Thunderbolt and it is fine. Do you really think it would slow it down much if it is Class 10? I could always toss it in an adapter and use it in my Canon T3i.

This thread here explains what the issue is and will tell you how to test your cards out to see if they'll work. Basically that Class10 card only gets Class 10 speeds when transferring large files and for small files (like an OS/app uses to write temp files) you get crap speed. it's not normally noticed in everyday use because the files are small and a little delay writing it isn't noticed by the user. Class 4 cards from SanDisk seem to be overall performers for files of all sizes.
- Aerlock

Aerlock said:
This thread here explains what the issue is and will tell you how to test your cards out to see if they'll work. Basically that Class10 card only gets Class 10 speeds when transferring large files and for small files (like an OS/app uses to write temp files) you get crap speed. it's not normally noticed in everyday use because the files are small and a little delay writing it isn't noticed by the user. Class 4 cards from SanDisk seem to be overall performers for files of all sizes.
- Aerlock
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmm, that is interesting. Now does it matter that I am booting off internal memory? I am not dual booted and have CyanogenMod on internal memory. I am running Google Maps which is one of the programs that is really slow on internal memory. My guess is that what you are saying would apply because of the swap space being used on the SD card. I will say that my wife also has a Nook Color that I put my old 8GB Class 6 card from my old Nexus One in and hers seems to perform a little faster than mine. I haven't done the tweaks to VM heap size to hers that seems to have helped mine a little. So you may be on to something. I have a couple of these class 10 cards that I use on my Camera and have been happy with them. I think they are Samsung. The DSLR is 18MP so those files are pretty big so it might be just better to leave those cards for use there and get a couple of those SanDisk Class 4 cards for our Nooks.

Yeah, running apps from the sd would benefit from a fast sd card. When you get one, use CrystalDiskMark (pc) to check the 4k read/write speeds. I bought an 8gb and two 16gb Sandisk class 4 cards from Radio Shack that have reasonable speeds and work well. They're all in the .5 range for writes - not as good as some I've heard of, but they work well! Some (a Kingston and a knockoff Sandisk) I tested were as low as .006! I tried to use the Kingston before I tested its speed and got lots of instability and FCs. hth
Sent from my CM9 NookColor using Tapatalk

Slow SanDisk Micro SD 64gb Extreme Pro

Hey guys. I have a Verizon Note 3. Just bought the SanDisk Extreme 64 GB microSDXC Class 10 UHS-I Memory Card (SDSDQX-064G-AFFP-A) and received it from Amazon. I've used the SanDisk Memory Zone App and it's speed test is saying the read spead is about 30 MB/s. Additionally, I've used the A1 SD Bench app and the results for the Accurate with reboot results are worse. 21.61 MB/s! I put the SD card in and reformatted it in the Note 3. Everything is stock, no root. The claimed max read speed with the card, according to SanDisk, is 80 MB/s. I've even heard some people getting almost 100 MB/s with these cards. What gives? Any suggestions on how to increase the performance? BTW, the card is still blank and I haven't added any files from my old card on to the new one. Thanks!

I would like more info about this also. I am between 64GB Ultra and Extreme...
Sent from my SM-N9005 using Tapatalk

The note 3 doesn't support UHS-1 so you wont get anywhere near the advertised speeds.

Is it a hardware or software thing?
Sent from my SM-N900V using xda app-developers app

darn336 said:
The note 3 doesn't support UHS-1 so you wont get anywhere near the advertised speeds.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is the answer to OP's Question.
Yeah, I too suffer with the same problem and painfully found out that the Card Reader (In our Case the Mobile) should support handling that card as well. My GoPro Hero 3 Supports this flawlessly.

So, our device is high end. But it doesn't support this. What phones do? HTC?
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