Database Users

External SD Card speed

Does it make a difference in terms of Phone performance (Note: Not asking about connecting to a PC for data transfer) for having a External SD card if compare to having Class 5 to better class?

kelvin1704 said:
Does it make a difference in terms of Phone performance (Note: Not asking about connecting to a PC for data transfer) for having a External SD card if compare to having Class 5 to better class?
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I can't answer for sure but if the sotware sd card speed tester is correct mine is very quick (8/11) and i didn't get a very high score at quadrant benchmark with the minocan fix
Now this benchmark is hard to analyse

It would, theoretically, make a difference if you are using a data on SD mod like minocan's fix. Even then I haven't seen a huge difference between people using cheap class 2 cards and people using class 6 cards. Hell, some class 2 cards are as fast as class 6 cards already. You should test the card you have before you buy a new one.
If you're not doing any mods that put the data folder on the SD card, then for the most part no, your SD card is only accessed to store things like pictures or movies, and even only then if you choose to use the external card.
Also, MicroSD cards come in Class 2, Class 4, and Class 6, and Class 10 speeds. Each number corresponding to their minimum write speed.

if i got the answer correct, you guys are saying its negligible, right?
And this applies towards Samsuing Galaxy S which install the application on Internal SD card... right?

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.
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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?
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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
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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...

[Q] tmobile HD2 problem: Microsd 32Gb class 10 copy speed less than 4MB/sec

I got a 32Gb MicroSDHC class-10 memorette card.
I verified the speed with a card reader + h2testw that write speed is : 14.7MByte/sec
read speed: 17.5MByte/sec
But when I used the class10 card in tmobile HD2, I am shocked.
When I copy a 720MB movie the write speed is about 4MByte/sec.
h2testw program when used on hd2 connected to PC, showed write speed as 4.8 MByte/sec only.
It needs to be noted the same card when tested with h2testw and a card reader gave 14MByte/sec but gives less than 4.5MB/sec on HD2.
How to fix this problem of HD2 microsd card speed!
Looks like HD2 usb controller has some problem.
the card is indeed class-10.
Please let me know a solution to this problem on HD2.

downbc1 said:
I got a 32Gb MicroSDHC class-10 memorette card.
I verified the speed with a card reader + h2testw that write speed is : 14.7MByte/sec
read speed: 17.5MByte/sec
But when I used the class10 card in tmobile HD2, I am shocked.
When I copy a 720MB movie the write speed is about 4MByte/sec.
h2testw program when used on hd2 connected to PC, showed write speed as 4.8 MByte/sec only.
It needs to be noted the same card when tested with h2testw and a card reader gave 14MByte/sec but gives less than 4.5MB/sec on HD2.
How to fix this problem of HD2 microsd card speed!
Looks like HD2 usb controller has some problem.
the card is indeed class-10.
Please let me know a solution to this problem on HD2.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The HD2 doesn't read or write to sd cards at that high of speed... that's why it's pointless using class 6 or 10 cards in a HD2. I think most phones are like that. Class 6 and 10 cards are mainly used for digital cameras, where having high sequential write speeds matters.

zarathustrax said:
The HD2 doesn't read or write to sd cards at that high of speed... that's why it's pointless using class 6 or 10 cards in a HD2. I think most phones are like that. Class 6 and 10 cards are mainly used for digital cameras, where having high sequential write speeds matters.
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I have earlier used a nokia 5800 xpressmusic phone with a class 6 16GB card.
The data transfer speeds were higher than HD2.
Generalizing from a single instance (HD2 scenario) may not be correct.

I'm going to go with that the HD2 does not transfer faster than 5.3 MB/sec between the PC and the phone regardless of what the internal transfer rate between the phone and card is.
Using a class 6 card myself, i have noticed that the phone is much more responsive than it was with the class 2 card in there and movies play without stuttering from the class 6 card and applications launch quicker.
my nokia n81 8gb did 8MB/sec from internal 8GB and so did my KM900. The KM900 did 6.2MB from the same classs 6 card

I was under the impression the HD2 maxed at 16 gig. Maybe that's the problem?

Like zarathustrax said, the HD2 isn't capable of read/write any higher than a class 4 card. I think somewhere on the EVO forum there's a fix to unlock the read/write capability for a higher speed but I dunno if anyone here has tried the fix, or if it even works for the HD2 at all.

anhyeuemmaimai said:
I'm going to go with that the HD2 does not transfer faster than 5.3 MB/sec between the PC and the phone regardless of what the internal transfer rate between the phone and card is.
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Click to collapse
This is not true. I've copied large files at over 10MB/s directly to the phone. I can't vouch for every hd2 though as it's quite possible they have different hardware. Also the speed drops dramatically if you're copying many smaller files.

I am thinking to buy memorette 32 gb microsd class 10 for my HD2.
As far as I have understood:
1) No matther what I cannot use it fully Class 10 speed when connected to HD2
2) When I connect it to my PC with card reader I can fully use class 10 speed.
I have sandial 8 gb class 2. When I connect it to my pc with card reader and transfering large amount of data (150+ MB), it cease to operate. I have to reconnect it. Then I shuld transfer in less amount of data or reduce copy speed (such as UltraCopy) . I think that is a safety issue for preventing disk from get burned. My question is, will I possibly have some issues with memorette or some other class 10 cards?
Also would it not better using class 10 card in HD2 for using on SD installed Operating System instead of class 6 or 4?
I would appriciate if someone return about memorette. I have never heard about that trademark. I am planning to bid on ebay today.
Sent from my HTC HD2 using XDA App

lude219 said:
Like zarathustrax said, the HD2 isn't capable of read/write any higher than a class 4 card. I think somewhere on the EVO forum there's a fix to unlock the read/write capability for a higher speed but I dunno if anyone here has tried the fix, or if it even works for the HD2 at all.
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Click to collapse
fix to unlock the read/write capability for a higher speed ????? Really ... i have buy a micro sd 16GB class 10 ........

morfil said:
I am thinking to buy memorette 32 gb microsd class 10 for my HD2.
As far as I have understood:
1) No matther what I cannot use it fully Class 10 speed when connected to HD2
2) When I connect it to my PC with card reader I can fully use class 10 speed.
I have sandial 8 gb class 2. When I connect it to my pc with card reader and transfering large amount of data (150+ MB), it cease to operate. I have to reconnect it. Then I shuld transfer in less amount of data or reduce copy speed (such as UltraCopy) . I think that is a safety issue for preventing disk from get burned. My question is, will I possibly have some issues with memorette or some other class 10 cards?
Also would it not better using class 10 card in HD2 for using on SD installed Operating System instead of class 6 or 4?
I would appriciate if someone return about memorette. I have never heard about that trademark. I am planning to bid on ebay today.
Sent from my HTC HD2 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A good quality class 2 or 4 sd card is usually better for running an operating system off of, as lower class cards tend to have faster random access speed and better random read/write speeds. Class 6 and 10 sd cards are designed to have a higher sequential write speed, but to achieve these higher speeds, the card initializes the part of the card that's about to be used. The initialization takes some extra time to get started, but boosts the sequential write/read speed so it's great for digital cameras or writing files sequentially.
But when it comes to using the card to run an OS off of, like android or wp7, or using the card to run apps off of, you are going to be reading and writing many small bits of data from different parts of the card. When it comes to this, you need a card that has a good random access speed and random read/write speeds. A high class card that is tweaked to have high sequential read/write speeds ends up being slower because it keeps initializing each part of the card before accessing it, while the lower class 2 or 4 card that doesn't do the initialization is a lot quicker accessing many small parts of the card because it doesn't have that extra step... but they don't get the speed boosts with sequential read/write.
Many people just assume that a higher class card is always going to be better, but this isn't true at all. It all depends on what you are using the card for. Higher class 6 or 10 cards are perfect for digital cameras, recording video, or transferring large files, etc... if you are going to be doing sequential reading or writing, higher class is better.
But for running apps off of, or running an OS off of, or using it as internal memory for an OS like wp7, or anything that will be accessing many parts of the card quickly or reading many small bits of data, etc., you want a card with a good random access speed and random read/write speeds, and that is something that is not rated on cards... but generally lower class cards are better than higher class cards... especially if you get a good quality brand, like sandisk. Sandisk class 2 and 4 are very good cards for random access speeds.
I hope some of you find this info useful and stop assuming a higher class card means better for all situations.

buzz killington said:
This is not true. I've copied large files at over 10MB/s directly to the phone. I can't vouch for every hd2 though as it's quite possible they have different hardware. Also the speed drops dramatically if you're copying many smaller files.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You must be special then. In my tests I had no difference in a class 2 and class 6.

morfil said:
I am thinking to buy memorette 32 gb microsd class 10 for my HD2.
As far as I have understood:
1) No matther what I cannot use it fully Class 10 speed when connected to HD2
2) When I connect it to my PC with card reader I can fully use class 10 speed.
I have sandial 8 gb class 2. When I connect it to my pc with card reader and transfering large amount of data (150+ MB), it cease to operate. I have to reconnect it. Then I shuld transfer in less amount of data or reduce copy speed (such as UltraCopy) . I think that is a safety issue for preventing disk from get burned. My question is, will I possibly have some issues with memorette or some other class 10 cards?
Also would it not better using class 10 card in HD2 for using on SD installed Operating System instead of class 6 or 4?
I would appriciate if someone return about memorette. I have never heard about that trademark. I am planning to bid on ebay today.
Sent from my HTC HD2 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am using memorette class 10 32GB microsd currently.
Its affordable and is fully working. I have tested to full capacity read/write using h2testw as I wrote in an earlier post.
Just check the seller's feedback and the description though.

I use TEAM micro sd class 10 on my hero,but after a month my sd card write speed is only 2MB/s.
At the first time,it reach 11MB/s when i tested it with h2testw and sd speed test on my handset.
I only use 640MB for app2sd (ext2) without swap cache.
Could someone explain to me what was happen to my sd card?
Sorry for my bad English

[Q] Will SD Class Improve Speed Of ROM

Hi,
I am using an 8GB Class 4 MicroSDHC card for booting my Android ROM,
Would upgrading to say an 32GB Class 10 MicroSDHC improve the running speed of the ROM or just the data transfer ect.
I am booting Via Haret.exe using stock WM6.5 if this helps,
thanks,
Alex

alex.odell.2011 said:
Hi,
I am using an 8GB Class 4 MicroSDHC card for booting my Android ROM,
Would upgrading to say an 32GB Class 10 MicroSDHC improve the running speed of the ROM or just the data transfer ect.
I am booting Via Haret.exe using stock WM6.5 if this helps,
thanks,
Alex
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Class 4 or 6 is the best for Android

I have class 10 and rom from sd work very good and very quickly

fouadi said:
Class 4 or 6 is the best for Android
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good to here, will save me £70

In my experience I saw that most of the ROMs, scripts and kernels are kind of limited to, or working best, with certain classes of SD cards, i.e. higher is not always better.
Also, in order to get the best performance with your card's SD class you have to adjust the readahead buffer to match it.

alex.odell.2011 said:
Good to here, will save me £70
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There was a thread about this ages ago if I'm not mistaken but as a very general summary, no. Stick with classes 2 and 4 for running SD android. Save yourself some money!
I think it's more dependent on brand. Try Sandisk or Kingston (seeing as you're in the UK) they're good quality. Just a heads up if you ever want to try MAGLDR and dual boot with Windows Phone 7 or NAND Android, Kingston 16GB Class 4 SD cards don't work with MAGLDR for booting SD Android Works fine on winmo though.

From my understanding (I'll try and find a reference) but class 10 cards achieve there speeds through sequential file systems while class 4 and 6 are non-sequential.
This would seem to mean that class 10 would always be markedly faster than class 4/6 but android can only make use of non-sequential so you won't notice the increase in speed.
You will notice the difference when transferring thing across from PC to the card using a reader, but as I understand it class 10 won't increase substantially of a SD card ROM.
Now a follow up question:
If you run a ROM of the sdcard does that mean that the sdcard's lifespan will be greatly reduced as it's constantly being written to and flash memory deteriorates overtime/numerous write cycles?

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