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Samsung Unveils World's First UFS Storage Cards, Could Replace MicroSD (pcworld.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Samsung has unveiled the world's first UFS card that could one day replace microSD cards in devices. The UFS card is based on the Universal Flash Storage 1.0 Card Extension standard and will be available in capacities from 32GB to 256GB. With a UFS card, users will be able to read 5GB of data, or a full resolution movie file, in 10 seconds, Samsung claims. For comparison, a UHS-1 microSD card would take 50 seconds to do the same. UFS cards will be able to fit into a wide range of devices like smartphones, tablets, cameras, and drones, but the devices will need a specific UFS card slot, which could take some time. Samsung claims the 256GB UFS card has a sequential read speed of 530MBps. The random read speed is 20 times faster than a microSD card. The sequential write speed is about 170MBps, which Samsung estimates is two times faster than microSD cards. The random write speed is 350 times faster than microSD, Samsung claims. The Universal Flash Storage 1.0 Card Extension standard is intended to replace the eMMC standard, which is used in low-cost laptops and Chromebooks. Samsung didn't disclose pricing or availability for the UFS storage cards. It's worth noting that Toshiba does also make UFS storage cards, but they have yet to release any based on the UFS 1.0 Card Extension standard.
Samsung has unveiled the world's first UFS card that could one day replace microSD cards in devices.
Great. Another incompatible storage card standard... Just what everybody was asking for.
UFS cards will be able to fit into a wide range of devices like smartphones, tablets, cameras, and drones, but the devices will need a specific UFS card slot, which could take some time.
Of course if can fit into a lot of devices if those devices are designed for it. Would it have killed them to make it backwards compatible with the hardware that already exists? I'm sure it has all sorts of lovely features but is it really too much to ask for the designers of this shit to think about future proofing their designs as well as backwards compatibility?
They do.
MicroSD slot is back in the Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 edge.
Looks like they realized dropping it in the S6 line was a mistake.
You can never know everything, and part of what you do know will always be wrong. Perhaps even the most important part.
What possible incentive is there for them to make it backwards compatible.
Selling cards to the owners of the millions of devices that already exist. Providing an upgrade path will keep people using your standard. By not making it backwards compatible there is a strong risk it will fail to be adopted.
They want to sell and obsolete as many devices as fast possible, one way to do that is with constantly changing and evolving the standards ensuring enough improvements to make a replacement desirable
If they want to sell more cards and hardware, keeping it compatible is the fastest way to do that. Even if I want this technology it is going to be years most likely before I have a device that can use it. So they are pushing any possible sale to me out by a long time. On the other hand if the card is compatible with what I have already, even with reduced performance, there is some chance I buy one immediately.
I don't agree with this strategy but it makes good business sense. Hell they don't even provide OS upgrades for most smartphones.
I don't think it is good business at all. It think it is a very short sighted strategy that has been tried before and usually fails.
And the lack of OS upgrades is one of the big reasons why I tend to shy away from most Android devices (with some notable exceptions). While there is a lot I like about Android better than iPhones, Apple at least continues to support their products after you buy them which matters to me at least. (Given what Apple charges they damn well should support them too...)
Given removable storage and finite data volumes on mobile plans, cloud storage is a niche requirement.
In the case of the iPhone 6S, Apple want from you 749 $ for the 16 GB version and 849 $ for the 64 GB version. Therefore they charge you approximately 2.08 $ per GB. You can buy a cheap UHS class1, 64 GB microSD from Samsung for 21 $ (0.32 $ per GB) or a faster UHS class 3 one from SanDisk for 40 $ (0.63 $ per GB). Moreover, the replaceability of a microSD card means that you don't have to shell more money up front for a bigger device, and you can spend them later if and when the need arises.
So not putting a card slot isn't something that Apple do to reduce the costs for the consumers, they do it to rape their wallets.
A quick back of an envelope calculation suggests that something in the order of 100 million people use underground railways in big cities every year. Until those underground railways have universal wifi coverage, that's a lot of people wanting to listen to music when they're out of range of the internet.
Except for those vendors who try to release a more geeky friendly device. With removable parts rarely seem to make any sucess. Unlike the Desktop PC of old were you paid an average of $2,000 for a system, that you will want to upgrade over time. We are now spending $300 - $600 for a cheaper device that we normally keep for just as long.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Yeah, my phone plan gives me 1 GB/month. That's down from 2 GB/month that my plan originally offered. But that's okay. I don't use a lot of data beyond occasional web browsing. To get 5 GB, I'd have to pay an extra 25 bucks per month. Streaming my music library is out of the question. Or I could take that 25 bucks and get a very large SD card as a one-time purchase. Luckily Samsung realized that this is important to many, many people and brought it back with their latest line. Sorry, but your claims are ridiculous.
WiFi is also commonly unavailable.
For what it's worth, I don't think many people care about having a swappable battery so they can swap it out in the middle of the day. A swappable battery is good for those of us who don't want to throw away our otherwise perfectly functional 800 dollar pocket computer when the battery dies in two years.
at some point people will look at the 1 256GB, 2 128GB, 3 64GB, 5 32GB, 12 16GB, 7 8GB, 3 4GB and 4 1GB SD cards they already have and decide they're good, thanks anyway.
I come here for the love
It seems that UFS at least gets rid of that useless DRM in SD cards.
SD means "secure digital" with "secure" meaning DRM. And not only it is an unwanted feature for most users but it also wastes a significant amount of space (10% according to Wikipedia).
In my opinion, what has made it SD cards niche is Android's crappy storage model which makes using your external card more complicated than it ought to be.
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For the unaware, SDHC maxes out at 32GB. You then have the option of using SDXC which maxes out at 2TB but there is a problem, SDXC specification mandates the use of exFAT which [surprise!] is restricted by patent by Microsoft. What this means is that memory controller may be optimised for exFAT I/O modes which may result in undefined behavior or brick it if you decide "i'll just format this to EXT4". UFS on the other hand, does not specify even needing a filesystem, so it's more like a SSD than a memory card.
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