SanDisk announced what it claims to be the world's largest capacity microSD and M2 cards today with 16GB of storage each. The card will be available from Verizon Wireless stores and Best Buy Mobile stores.
The 16GB microSDHC card retails for $19.99 and the 16GB M2 card retails for $129.99. Both cards will be available in November and Best Buy and Verizon are the only two stores that will carry the card in 2008.
“Handsets have become far more than just phones - they’ve become mobile jukeboxes, mobile offices, even mobile movie theaters,” said Avi Greengart, Research Director for Mobile Devices at Current Analysis. “Flash memory cards have increased in storage capacity, but even an 8GB card may be too small for anyone with GPS map data, a few movies, a game or two, a presentation file and other applications. There is an acute need for more mobile storage capacity. 16GB gives consumers the ability to carry their digital content with them and still have room to do more with their mobile phones.”
SanDisk is the same company that fended off a buyout offer from Samsung recently. It also, somewhat boldly, introduced a new music-media format.
Called slotMusic, the music distribution format pre-loads an album onto a microSD card. The point of slotMusic, for which all the major labels are onboard, is to allow users to buy and use music without being dependent on a PC or internet connection. They simply insert the card into their microSD-enabled device to hear it.
The music is DRM-free, of high quality (320 kbps), and can be used instantly with any MP3 player, cell phone, etc. with a microSD slot. The cards will be packaged with a tiny USB sleeve, so they'll be easy to use and compatible with PCs (Windows, Linux and Mac) as well.
