03-11-2005, 12:00 PM
|
|
Swami
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 4,303
|
|
Pretec C-Flash: Yet ANOTHER Flash Format
"With physical size of 17mm x 12mm x 1.0mm, about 1/3 the volume of RS-MMC or miniSD, C-Flash is one of the smallest form factor flash memory cards in the world. . . with capacity up to 2048GB (500 times of MMC capacity) and transfer speed up to 120MB/s (10 times of SD speed). . . Pretec will also offer various adapters for C-Flash such as SD, miniSD, MMC, RS-MMC and USB". . . C-Flash has also been submitted to MMCA to be considered as the next small form factor standard of MMC. According to Gartner Dataquest report, MMC will become #1 form factor of flash memory card in 2005, with market share projection of 34% (SD 30% and memory Stick 20%)."
So, after Sandisk's Transflash announcement, comes Pretec's C-Flash and it has to be said that the specifications look good. SD/MMC have clearly won the current round of card standards, but the battle is in full swing for the next smaller next generation of cards. Some have said that incompatibility is threatening our digital lifestyles, but I'm sure we'll all be fine with a universal 242-in-1 card reader. :roll: I know that a new format is required that is physically smaller than SD. I just wish that manufactures would just agree on ONE standard! New media card standards just keep coming. This is WAY past ridiculous! :evil:
|
| |
|
|
|
03-11-2005, 12:20 PM
|
|
5000+ Posts? I Should OWN This Site!
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 5,616
|
|
Is that supposed to say GB? Cuz if so, I say to 4377 with compact flash, secure digital and all the other semi-ubiquitous formats out there today. I want 2TB on something the size of my little fingernail!
|
| |
|
|
|
03-11-2005, 12:42 PM
|
|
Developer & Designer, News Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 12,959
|
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by ctmagnus
Is that supposed to say GB? Cuz if so, I say to 4377 with compact flash, secure digital and all the other semi-ubiquitous formats out there today. I want 2TB on something the size of my little fingernail!
|
They seem pretty certain on that point by stating it's "500 times the capacity of current MMC cards" - but you have to wonder, how old will you have to be before you see it in the consumer market. :?
|
| |
|
|
|
03-11-2005, 12:45 PM
|
|
Ponderer
Join Date: Jan 2005
Posts: 93
|
|
Jeeze! I will replace all my hard dives with 2TB cards any day! Bring them on!
8)
|
| |
|
|
|
03-11-2005, 02:50 PM
|
|
Philosopher
Join Date: Apr 2004
Posts: 545
|
|
more convinced....
I am getting more convinced as time goes on, the spinning platters of our hard drive will be replaced by solid satte flash ram. Densities are getting better every day and eventually that san won't have disks in it, but it wil have hot swappable flash memory. The only thing remains is current hard disks are already faster then alot of this memory. Once the latencies are better and the price goes down, you'll see IBM, EMC and others move to flash for storage.
|
| |
|
|
|
03-11-2005, 03:40 PM
|
|
Ponderer
Join Date: Mar 2003
Posts: 76
|
|
At the transfer speed quoted, it would take almost 5 hours to read the entire contents of a max capacity 2TB card.
|
| |
|
|
|
03-11-2005, 03:46 PM
|
|
Swami
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 4,303
|
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by david291
At the transfer speed quoted, it would take almost 5 hours to read the entire contents of a max capacity 2TB card.
|
When I glanced at that figure it did not seem right. However when I calcuated it out, it was. We obviously need much faster hard drives (and storage cards) in the future. :wink:
However, to be fair, 120Mb per second is 3-4 times the max sustainable transfer speed of the top end IDE disk drives at the moment. It's technical specs do look good.
|
| |
|
|
|
03-11-2005, 04:00 PM
|
|
Mystic
Join Date: Nov 2006
Posts: 1,887
|
|
I agree there are way too many aspiring flash "standards".
But...
This one *may* have a chance.
Aside from the fact its been adopted by China, Inc in its IP war against foreign tech, there is the fact that it appears to be a snap-in form factor, instead of a slide-in spec.
(This is going by the photo alone...)
This is something I have wondered about for a while since snap-in sockets are by nature cheaper than spring-loaded slot adapters.
And they take up less volume.
So, regardless of the electronic merit of the spec, the manufacturability advantages may create a market for this thing.
Right now I'm thinking of a PC-card adapter that could hold 8 or more of these cards and a PDA with 4 sockets.
If there is a ROM-based version of the spec this could be a content distribution mechanism down the road...
Could doesn't mean will; its obvious everybody is trying to get *their* spec adopted so they can charge royalties instead of paying them. :roll:
|
| |
|
|
|
03-11-2005, 04:16 PM
|
|
Ponderer
Join Date: Dec 2004
Posts: 87
|
|
I was told, generically, to avoid touching the gold pins on an SD card, just to maximize its' life...
now how the heck do you carry this tiny card? It is mostly gold pins and it is the size of a dime!!! 8O
Size shouldn't necessarily change... density should.... talking about a new tiny card that has uber more storage doesn't make a 2 GB SD card any closer to reality... sheesh! (reality means being sold... well, then again, these tiny cards aren't exactly on shelves either...)
|
| |
|
|
|
03-11-2005, 04:53 PM
|
|
Pontificator
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,079
|
|
All I see is a relentless race to show who's smarter... yet most stupid at the same time.
Instead of bringing yet another incompatible format, showing how stupid they are, why don't these ungeneers work enhancing an already universal format aka MMC or even SD (transfer speed-wise, capacity-wise, etc.).
There are many millions of MMC and SD cards out there.
YOU ALL probably own a few of these cards.
What will you do with them IF any of those non standards win?
Are you willing to throw out the window hundreds of $ worth of perfectly working cards?
Obviously enough they won't fit any new device that would integrate such tiny slots!!
It doesn't much matter if you can use these tiny cards in a current device with an adapter, I perfectly understand you can!!
However NONE of your current cards will fit any device using such tiny slot.
Just think about this:
I just went yesterday to the International Geneva Motor Show; I have a CF card fitted Nikon prosumer digicam and a couple CF cards. I also carry everywhere a breast shirt pocket sized Kyocera Finecam; it uses SD cards. When my more capable Nikon ran out of memory, I had to shoot with the less powerful (especially focus-wise and flash-wise) Finecam. I would have had to buy a very expensive SD 2 CF adapter (I eventually will have to), one that's as small as a standard CF card (for it to fit entirely into the Nikon, since it has a door that fully closes). You can find almost everywhere cheap SD 2 CF adapters but they are longer than a regular CF card, plus the SD card sticks out. Panasonic makes tiny CF adapters that completely "eats" the SD Card all the which is a regual CF card size.
Anyway that means a) a "universal" 242-in-1 card reader would be cumbersome (i.e. not very pocketable), b) worst: would NOT be enough because you need to use your cards NOT ONLY with a PC. c) that would imply having to mess with many cross format adapters so you can use card A in a B slot or a C slot, a D slot, etc. AND VICE-VERSA (resulting in an exponential number of adaptors), d) if you forget or loose any of them you're toast. e) the more you have to mess with many adapters, thoe more chances you'll loose or forget them.
Now you also have to explain us why in the world you think YOU "know that a new format is required that is physically smaller than SD."? :roll:
SD is small enough for anything but watch sized electronics, but I don't want to wear 10 watches to 1) hear MP3 songs, 2) take pix (and Casio digicam watches only do 0.032 MPix images :silly 4) phone, 5) TV, 6) MM player, 7) etc.
I can see a big advantage going from the 12.5 ccm needed for a CF card, rails and connectors down to 2.5 ccm for the same in the SD format. BUT obviously if you saved 10 ccm from CF to SD, you only gain no more than 1 to 1.5 ccm going anywhere smaller 8O.
Today's cell phones average 100 ccm, PDAs are even quite bigger; so it's easy to see that further gains are negligeable, YET LOSSES WITH NON STANDARD FORMATS ARE HUGE!!!
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
Linear Mode
