Lexar Announces World’s First SD 8.0 Card, But No Supported Devices

Lexar has announced the world’s first SD 8.0 card, promising speeds of up to 1,700MB/s read and 1,000MB/s write. Those are impressive numbers, but they would be even better if there were a device capable of harnessing that performance today.

The world of technology is evolving so fast that companies are always racing to get ahead. However, sometimes you can be too fast, and that seems to be what happened with Lexar. SD cards are commonly used in cameras, mobile devices, and other portable devices, and there are currently no SD 8.0-compatible devices.

In other words, the speed of Lexar’s new card is surprising, but it simply cannot be used. The product is compatible with UHS-I, so it can still work, but its speed will be limited to that type of connection: around 30MB/s.

The SD 8.0 standard uses PCIe 4.0 to operate, so it reaches speeds well above other models of its type. It is similar to what CFexpress 4.0 cards already do, but, unlike Lexar’s new card, professional products with CFexpress slots are already more widespread.

Lexar’s bet raises doubts

It’s hard to imagine the manufacturer’s plan with such an early launch for the SD 8.0 card. It’s not uncommon for companies to introduce concept devices with upcoming new technologies, but in this case it’s a finished product for the end customer.

In any case, the card is not yet available. This may have been just a curious way of “letting you know that it is available”. The problem is that it is not known when camera manufacturers will incorporate support for SD 8.0.

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While ever faster cards are needed to record ever better camera files in real time – 8K in RAW, for example, the CFexpress standard seems to already meet current needs.

Source: Tom’s Hardware