Samsung Electronics has launched the world’s first JEDEC Universal Flash Storage (UFS) based removable memory cards, intended for usage in high-resolution DSLRs, 3D Virtual Reality cameras, action cameras, and drones. The cards will be available in various storage volumes including 32GB, 64GB, 128GB, and 256GB. Based on UFS 1.0 Card Extension Standard, the memory cards have the potential to provide a considerable performance improvement in the external memory storage sector.
Reading Speed
The new UFS removable memory cards from Samsung are expected to take high-resolution 3D gaming and high bandwidth video playback to an entirely new level. The 256GB memory card promises sequential read capability of more than five times that of a conventional microSD card. Featuring sequential read speed as high as 530 MB/s, it goes head to head with typical SATA SSDs.
For an instance, this card can read a 5GB video file in about 10 seconds, in contrast to more than 50 seconds taken by a conventional UHS-1 microSD card. Furthermore, the 256GB Samsung UFS memory card offers 40,000 Input/Output Operations Per Second (IOPS), which is 20 times more than that of a conventional microSD card which can perform 1,800 Input/Output Operations Per Second (IOPS).
Writing Speed
The UFS memory chip also sets a benchmark in the department of writing capability with the ability to perform 350 times higher Input/Output Operations Per Second (IOPS) than a conventional microSD card. Offering a sequential write speed of 170MB/s, the UFS card doubles the speed of flagship microSD cards.
These significant improvements in performance enable the UFS cards to substantially bring down the multimedia data download time, load image thumbnails faster and enhance the burst shooting capacity, amounting to massive improvements in the camera department. These new generation cards can shoot 24 super high-definition JPEG photographs (1,120 MB approximately) in less than seven seconds whereas, a UHS-1 microSD card takes no less than 32 seconds to do the same.
Multitasking
The UFS card comes with multiple command support and can queue commands allowing it to read and write concurrently using separate paths. This paves the way for optimum performance and best in class power efficiency.
