Memory Cards, Part 2: SDHC Cards From 8GB To 16GB

Conclusion

There has been less progress on the SDHC front than in the CompactFlash form factor, which now hovers around 100 MB/s throughput. SD 2.0 cards (SDHC) are still well below 30 MB/s, and only one card in this roundup manages to jump over the 20 MB/s line. Although most cards are rated Class 10, SanDisk’s Extreme card is by far the fastest product, both for reads and writes. It also claims the crown on I/O performance.

Lexar, Silicon Power, and Transcend all share second place when it comes to throughput. They all reach nearly 20 MB/s for reads and a bit more than 18 MB/s for writes. However, compared to SanDisk, they deliver less than half the minimum write throughput, which might be important for certain applications.

It’s hardly possible to grant a Recommended Buy Award to any of the three manufacturers. They're just too close to each other. However, SanDisk clearly deserves the Best of Tom's award due to its exceptional performance.