Cologne - Sandisk increased capacities and bandwidths of its CompactFlash product line. The cards are now available with up to eight GByte of space and twice the data transfer speed of the previous generation.

The new Extreme II line of CompactFlash (CF) SD reads and writes data at 20 MByte/s compared to the ten nine 9 MByte/s the so far fastest Ultra II series offered. Sandisk introduced the cards with capacities from one to four GByte.

The speedy cards are targeted at advanced and professional photographers who require high-performance flash memory storage cards for new high-end digital cameras. The cards will start shipping worldwide in October-November to high-end, retail photo specialty stores, Sandisk said. Prices range from $140 to $560 for the CF version, the one GByte SD card will sell for $140, the Memory Stick PRO Extreme III cards with one and two GByte are priced at $280 and $600.

Users who do not need quite the speed of these new cards but prefer more space, now also can buy Sandisk Ultra II CF Type I cards with up to eight GByte capacity, up to four GByte Ultra II Memory Stick PRO devices and two GByte Ultra II SD.

All cards are shipping in October and November, according to Sandisk. The eight GByte Ultra II CF card is priced at $960. The four GByte Memory Stick will retail for $960, the two GByte Ultra II SD card will be available for a street price of $240.