Anyone knows much about micro SD cards?

[Mr. Detective]

Hi guys,

Does anyone use or know much about micro SD cards and their specs? I am choosing between the Samsung EVO 32GB and 64GB. Here are the links:

Edit: Okay, for whatever reason, I can't post the link here. I literally can't. It automatically puts the "Media" tag on the link and I can't remove it. Sorry, but can I ask you to search for this on Amazon? Samsung Micro SD EVO Select 32/64 GB (11.99 and 19.99).

So the only difference I see is the writing speed, not sure if the 5MB difference in reading speed means anything much. I'm probably just going to use the card to store games or movies. Doubt I will need over 60GB, but the speed difference makes me curious. Which one should I go for? Does the read and write speed difference have any impact on how fast the files will load and function?

I am not sure if I should even buy one, yet. It's for my tablet, which I don't use often, but I get this urge to put a bunch of games in it, even though I probably won't have time to play. XD For the last hour, I have been putting them into my shopping cart, and then cancelling them, and repeat. I hope Amazon won't get me in trouble for canceling order 4 times in an hour. Just my indecisiveness.

Since we're on the subject, let me ask this too: my tablet supposedly has 16GB of storage, but only about 10GB are free/useable. Is this normal?

 

[Andar]

there is one main difference that a lot of shops and even some technicians fail to understand.

Any card up to 32 GB can be formatted using the FAT32 format, anything larger needs one of three or four alternative extended formats.
And that's where compatibility problems begin.
Everything can read the very old FAT32 format, especially because there never was a good alternative to it at that time (all alternatives went out of business long before the 32GB limit was reached).

Older card readers can't read any of the extended formats, newer ones usually can handle most or all of them (there are exceptions where readers can only read some of the 64+ formats).

You can change the structure of the card on reformatting, which is why it doesn't matter what specific format is preset on the 64 GB card.

But if you want to go for maximum compatibility with any device, you should stay at 32 GB.
If compatibility doesn't matter (because you only have newer devices) then you can go for 64+ GB.

EDIT:
The read-write speeds of card may make a lot of differences, but they require your reader (the slot in the computer or adapter) to be capable of the same speed.
The computer will always use the lower of both card speed and reader speed.

 

[Windows i7]

@Andar I formatted a 64 GB card as FAT32. Older card readers can also sometimes use cards that they don't technically support. Take for example my PS3... it's rated to handle the HC format, but not XC. However, I managed to FAT32 format the 64 GB card (~64 GB partition size) and get the PS3 to use it successfully.

I very much expect there to be potential issues with what I'm doing but I like to push to see what can be done and not just believe specs as exact (sometimes they aren't).

 

[Inuyasha36c]

Hi guys,

Does anyone use or know much about micro SD cards and their specs? I am choosing between the Samsung EVO 32GB and 64GB. Here are the links:

Edit: Okay, for whatever reason, I can't post the link here. I literally can't. It automatically puts the "Media" tag on the link and I can't remove it. Sorry, but can I ask you to search for this on Amazon? Samsung Micro SD EVO Select 32/64 GB (11.99 and 19.99).

So the only difference I see is the writing speed, not sure if the 5MB difference in reading speed means anything much. I'm probably just going to use the card to store games or movies. Doubt I will need over 60GB, but the speed difference makes me curious. Which one should I go for? Does the read and write speed difference have any impact on how fast the files will load and function?

I am not sure if I should even buy one, yet. It's for my tablet, which I don't use often, but I get this urge to put a bunch of games in it, even though I probably won't have time to play. XD For the last hour, I have been putting them into my shopping cart, and then cancelling them, and repeat. I hope Amazon won't get me in trouble for canceling order 4 times in an hour. Just my indecisiveness.

Since we're on the subject, let me ask this too: my tablet supposedly has 16GB of storage, but only about 10GB are free/useable. Is this normal?

it depends all SD cards have a class number usually it look like a number inside a circle. The closer it is to 10 the slower the transfer rates are but more memory storage for example 128 GB SD card is class 10. And those with less like 8 GB so on small memory capacity has lower class like class 1,2,3 etc which is faster transfer rate but low memory capacity. The lower the class the more expensive the card will be the higher the memory capacity the class will also go higher. as for the device look up the device and see what the max installable memory is allowed usually its like 32GB sometimes 64GB. class matters so keep an eye out you'll notice a slight difference when its classes close to each other. if you can wait then any class is fine but if you short on patients then find a class closer to 1 then 10. even if you don't use it often you can use it for any device as long as it doesn't need to be reformatted cause that will delete all data on the card ALMOST all things use FAT32. well hope it helps you out. As for your tablet the TOTAL MEMORY is 16GB but it has the OS (operating system) installed which takes up some of the 16GB which is why you have 10GB available oh and other installed apps that takes up memory as well so its normal. you can look at all tablets and notice you won't have FULL capacity. computers, tablet, phone, even your gaming console will have some memory capacity for OS stored on the memory device.

 

[Windows i7]

As for your tablet the TOTAL MEMORY

Memory and storage aren't the same thing. Memory in the context of computers (and smartphones are a type of computer) refers to RAM. I do strongly believe in using technical terms correctly, so apologies if you already knew this.

 

[Inuyasha36c]

Memory and storage aren't the same thing. Memory in the context of computers (and smartphones are a type of computer) refers to RAM. I do strongly believe in using technical terms correctly, so apologies if you already knew this.

yes, you are right sorry I used the terms loosely. thanks for correcting me.​