The SD Association has announced the SD 5.0 standard, which will specify memory cards with write speeds capable of recording 8K and 360°/VR video:
The SD Association, the multi-vendor consortium responsible for developing standards for Secure Digital flash memory cards, has unveiled the newest version of the Secure Digital standard, SD 5.0. The latest iteration of the standard has been released specifically to accomdate video capture, particularly the write speeds needed to record 8K (7680x4320) and 360° videos. To that end, the upcoming SD 5.0 memory cards will introduce the Video Speed Class labeling, as well as a newer protocol that takes into account new NAND flash architectures, enables higher transfer rates and supports multi-file recording.
In order to address the needs for video, the new standard will be tackling both transfer rates and the overall nature of writes with video recordings. The new standard does not introduce a new bus - the current UHS-II bus supports over 150MB/sec in full duplex mode, more than any SD card can currently handle - but rather the focus is on the cards themselves and how they behave.
In particular, the SD 5.0 standard takes into account the fact that recent, high capacity NAND flash chips feature larger block sizes (the smallest area of NAND flash memory that can be erased in a single operation) than previous-gen chips. For example, SK Hynix recently released planar MLC and TLC NAND ICs (integrated circuits) with 6 MB page and 9 MB block sizes, whereas upcoming 3D NAND flash from Intel and Micron will feature 16 MB (MLC) or even 24 MB (TLC) block sizes. Erasing a group of larger blocks takes less time than wiping out a huge number of smaller blocks, which is why larger blocks enable faster write operations, something that is needed to build memory cards for UHD video capture.
The Video Speed Class standard includes a set of 37 block sizes that range from 8 MB to 512 MB, which should be sufficient for the foreseeable future. In addition, the SD 5.0 VSC protocol supports simultaneous interleaving of eight different files, which is useful for 360° videos, multiple independent video streams, or even numerous high-quality still pictures taken at the same time.
The new standard adds new write speed classes of 60 MB/s and 90 MB/s. The fastest former class was UHS Speed Class 3, which specified a minimum of 30 MB/s write speed to allow 4K video recording. The whitepaper lists a 120 FPS frame rate for 8K video recording.
SD Association press release (PDF) and whitepaper (PDF).
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Samsung has announced a 256 GB MicroSD card using 3D TLC NAND:
Samsung unveiled its beefy EVO Plus 256 GB MicroSD card, which unseats SanDisk as the current MicroSD density leader. SanDisk introduced its 200 GB Ultra MicroSD card in March 2015, but it is widely believed to employ 15nm planar TLC NAND, whereas the new Samsung EVO Plus features its 48-layer 3D TLC V-NAND.
The UHS-1 Class 10 EVO Plus offers up to 95/90 MBps of sequential read/write throughput, which should satisfy the needs of most common applications, such as 4K video recording, high-resolution photography and other mobile applications. In contrast, the SanDisk Ultra 200 GB offers up to 90 MBps of sequential read speed, but no write speed is listed in its specifications.
It's a new dense SD card you can use to fill up your station wagon, but it costs $250 at launch, whereas the price of the SanDisk 200 GB MicroSD card has declined to about $80.
Related: Secure Digital 5.0 Standard: Memory Cards Intended for 8K and Virtual Reality Recording
Here's another 360° video camera:
There are quite a few 360-degree cameras on the market now and they cover a range of needs. For professionals and major VR buffs, there's the Samsung 360 Round and for more casual videographers there are a slew of options from companies like Ricoh Theta, Garmin and Samsung. But there's now a growing market for those wanting to shoot high quality 360-degree video and decide later on during editing what images to focus on and what to cut out, minimizing how much effort is required during the actual video-capturing process. For that, there's the GoPro Fusion, the Insta360 and, as of today, the Rylo.
Rylo has two 208-degree wide-angle lenses that capture your entire surroundings in 4K resolution. Its stabilization technology even allows you to carry the camera while shooting and still get a smooth image. To edit your video, plug it into your iPhone and use the companion app to easily find what frames you want to include in your HD video or alternatively, download the whole thing for a fully immersive 360-degree viewing experience. You can then easily post your videos on Instagram, Facebook or share them directly with others.
It will ship with a 16 GB MicroSD card. How is that even remotely enough storage for 360° video?
Also at TechCrunch and CNET.
Related: Secure Digital 5.0 Standard: Memory Cards Intended for 8K and Virtual Reality Recording
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Western Digital has demonstrated an SD card that can hit up to 880 MB/s sequential read and 430 MB/s sequential write speeds.
Western Digital demonstrated an experimental SD card featuring a PCIe Gen 3 x1 interface at Mobile World Congress. Meanwhile, the SD Card Association is calling upon the industry to adopt PCIe as a standard interface and to support the development of a complete SD PCIe standard.
Western Digital is demonstrating a system featuring an M.2-to-SD adapter with an SD card that offers 880 MB/s sequential read speeds as well as up to 430 MB/s sequential write speeds, according to the CrystalDiskMark benchmark. The drive uses the existing UHS-II/III pins to construct a PCIe 3.0 x1 interface with the system (via a mechanical adapter) and probably standard PCIe voltage with a converter. The company is not disclosing the type of memory or the controller that power the SD PCIe card, but it is clear that we are dealing with a custom solution. Meanwhile, Western Digital claims that the implementation costs of a PCIe interface is not high as one might expect, as a PCIe x1 PHY is not all that large.
Western Digital further notes that the SD card with a PCIe interface is not standard and will not hit the market any time soon, but is showing off the concept anyhow as they have seen interest from certain parties for this kind of removable storage solutions.
This exceeds the 312-624 MB/s data rates and UHS-III bus specified by version 6.0 (February 2017) of the Secure Digital standard.
Related: Secure Digital 5.0 Standard: Memory Cards Intended for 8K and Virtual Reality Recording
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Huawei's Nano Memory Cards are replacing microSD on its latest phones
Alongside the slate of new phones Huawei announced today was an interesting addition: a new type of expandable storage the company is calling Nano Memory (NM), which replaces the traditional microSD card in the newly announced Mate 20 and Mate 20 Pro.
Huawei says that NM cards, which are identical in size and shape to a Nano SIM card, are 45 percent smaller than a microSD card, and come in at least a 256GB storage and 90MB/s transfer speed version that the company showed off onstage.
On the Mate 20 and Mate 20 Pro, the NM Card goes in one of the slots on the dual-SIM tray, with users having to choose between extra storage or a second SIM card.
The SD 5.0 standard added a 90 MB/s write speed class, intended to allow for 8K and 360° video recording.
The densest microSD cards available store 512 GB, so this 45% smaller 256 GB card could be of a comparable storage density.
Related: Samsung to Offer New Type of Flash Memory Card
Western Digital Demos SD Card Using PCIe Gen 3 x1 Interface for 880 MB/s Read Speed
SD Association Raises Max Capacity to 128 TB, Speed to 985 MB/s Using PCIe and NVMe
(Score: 2) by jasassin on Wednesday March 02 2016, @08:48AM
120FPS at 8k resolution! Imagine how much space that would take! What's the storage capacity of these beasts?
jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 02 2016, @10:53AM
120FPS at 8k resolution! Imagine how much space that would take! What's the storage capacity of these beasts?
The new standard adds new write speed classes of 60 MB/s and 90 MB/s.
Apparently, somewhere around 60-90 MB for a second of video, or 210-316 GB for an hour.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday March 02 2016, @03:04PM
Unless I missed something or they haven't released the info yet, this standard doesn't actually specify larger capacities.
SDXC specified a maximum of 2 TiB (2.199 terabytes). The largest SD card [sandisk.com] on the market is 512 GB and had an MSRP of $800 at launch in 2014. SanDisk put out a 200 GB MicroSD card [sandisk.com] the next year ($400 MSRP).
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(Score: 2) by Justin Case on Wednesday March 02 2016, @11:39AM
A 360° picture or movie is not Virtual Reality.
SecondLife or even MineCraft are a lot closer to VR: you can walk around, build things, talk to people... just like Real Reality (TM) only Virtual.
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(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday March 02 2016, @03:07PM
So are you going to post this comment on every Virtual Reality™ story? Could get old fast.
If you use a headset to experience Barcelona from your basement, are you engaging in Virtual Reality or Real Reality? Or both?
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(Score: 2) by Rich on Wednesday March 02 2016, @02:41PM
Was about to rant about the stupid marketing blurb and just gave the whitepaper a skim. Upside: A "Vxx class" now describes actually in megabytes per second ("xx") how fast sustained writes can be. Downside: The card specifies very large block sizes (e.g. in the 10s or 100s of Megabytes) that have to be written sequentially. Looks like they want to skimp on buffering and controller effort and rather directly expose the silicon architecture instead.
As I understand, this means that there are little to no gains for "ordinary" filing to be had, but a log-based file system could exploit the logic well.