Sony Reveals SD Cards (R.I.P. Memory Stick?)
Could Sony finally be conforming to a more popular standard?
If you've ever owned Sony electronics, you'll know that your device isn't fit for any mere SD card standard. Instead, you'll have to stay within the family and use Memory Stick Pro Duo to save your games, movies, music and pictures. That may all be changing, however, as Sony appears to finally be relenting by releasing its own brand of SD memory flash cards.
Sony Electronics announced it is expanding its line of consumer media with the addition of five new SD/SDHC memory cards for digital imaging products, and three new microSD/microSDHC memory cards for mobile phones. The new SD/SDHC and microSD/microSDHC memory cards, except for the microSD 2GB card, are all class-4-speed for high-definition recording.
Does this spell the death for Memory Stick products? Not yet, apparently, as Sony said that new cards will simply "complement" the existing Memory Stick products.
"The new cards will complement Sony’s existing Memory Stick line, satisfying the needs of a broader range of users, and strengthening Sony’s position as a full line media supplier," said Shane Higby, director of the consumer media business at Sony Electronics.
The full line of SD/SDHC and microSD/microSDHC memory cards, which will ship in packaging that is easy to separate and recycle, will be available this month, at the following suggested list prices:
- SF-2N1 2GB SD Class 4 $14.99
- SF-4N4 4GB SDHC Class 4 $29.99
- SF-8N4 8GB SDHC Class 4 $44.99
- SF-16N4 16GB SDHC Class 4 $79.99
- SF-32N4 32GB SDHC Class 4 $159.99
- SR-2A1 2GB microSD with adapter $14.99
- SR-4A4 4GB microSDHC Class 4 with adapter $29.99
- SR-8A4 8GB micro SDHC Class 4 with adapter $44.99
- Cell Phone Case Reduces Radiation by 60%
- Live TV Coming to iPhone, iPod Touch
- Next Nintendo Portable: High-Res, Motion Sensing
- Tetris + Super Mario = Ingenious Flash Game
- Pink PSP-3000 Official, Heading to Japan First
- Quadricopter Drone Buzzes Heads @ CES
- Sony, IMAX Launching Dedicated 3D Network
- AT&T Closer to HSPA 7.2 Mbps Upgrade
- BeautifulPeople Kicks Off ''Fatties'' Says Founder
- AT&T to Get Dell Phone and Two Palm Phones
- CES 2010: Panasonic HD 3D Camcorder Revealed
- CES 2010: LG Unveils 100mbit Mobile Speeds
- VIDEO: A Short and Sweet Clip of HP's Slate
- Razer, Sixense Bring Motion Controls to PC
- Palm Pre Plus Coming to Verizon This Month
- Polaroid Names Lady Gaga as Creative Director
- Swimmer Plays GTA IV for 55 Hours, Sets Record
- Panasonic 152'' 3D Plasma HDTV is Dreamworthy
- Natal to Use 10-15% of Xbox 360 CPU Power
Well, with SD cards available to sony products. I see no point to buy a more exp, identical functionality of memory stick. imo, memory sticks will soon be gone frm the market.
The first PS3's had SD card slots in them.
Well, with SD cards available to sony products. I see no point to buy a more exp, identical functionality of memory stick. imo, memory sticks will soon be gone frm the market.
Nah Sony will still require them in current and near future devices. Then (hopefully) they will slowly phase out the memory sticks.
Just because they're selling SD cards doesn't mean they'll switch from Memory Sticks for their own products.
Also, no class 6? Tsk tsk.
ffs Sony, only took you 16 centuries...
ffs Sony, only took you 16 centuries...
16 huh?
The memory stick was just what the world needed - another proprietary storage device.
I'm in almost the same situation. I have an upper end Olympus point 'n shoot. I like everything about it except the xD flash memory that no one else but Fuji apparently uses.
Memory Stick pro duo, umd, bluray, betamax, those are the reasons I have never bought Sony anything. They make it real easy for me to say nope. Never a ps1,ps2,or a ps3. Nintendo 64, xbox, xbox 360. Sony could have a machine that allows me to game by raytracing, still wont buy it.
I bought a new digital camera for my wife this past Christmas. I found a Sony model that I liked but I would not buy it because of their stupid memory cards, so they lost a sale.
so there's no Class 6 or higher... I'm just waiting for Class 10 microSD with 4GB+ size
YES lets get rid of all this proprietary bs, make usb chargers and sd cards STANDARD!!!!
Memory Stick pro duo, umd, bluray, betamax, those are the reasons I have never bought Sony anything. They make it real easy for me to say nope. Never a ps1,ps2,or a ps3. Nintendo 64, xbox, xbox 360. Sony could have a machine that allows me to game by raytracing, still wont buy it.
Sony actually makes some great hardware.
However, they are quite full of themselves. (Let us use the full potential of our damned PSP's already!)
Too many vairants.
memory stick duo, pro duo, micro, SD card and the dozen others etc.
Give us a damned standard already!
I was just looking into micro sdhc adaptors that can turn them into a pro duo, in fact there is an adaptor that can turn two micro sdhc's into a single pro duo (and still come out much cheaper than the equivalent). Aparently works well in the PSP.....
Memory Stick pro duo, umd, bluray, betamax, those are the reasons I have never bought Sony anything. They make it real easy for me to say nope. Never a ps1,ps2,or a ps3. Nintendo 64, xbox, xbox 360. Sony could have a machine that allows me to game by raytracing, still wont buy it.
For storage mediums, yes, Sony has a bad track record. Their hardware is still good though. I don't think Blu-Ray will be another betamax but I think Sony's going to find that DD will take over sooner than they expected.
IMO they're going to see two years of growth followed by rapid decline in physical disk sales. Much like iTunes did to the CD, DVD's and Blu-Ray sales are going to tank.
I haven't bought Sony in a long time because of their proprietary and overpriced hardware.
I have a NetMD mini-disk player. I really really liked it. No skips, no scratches, it was its own disc burner, ran on a single AA for almost a week of regular use and at the time it was cheaper to buy a pack of blanks than buy an MP3 player with equivalent storage capacity. It was smaller and tougher than portable CD players and you cold carry your whole collection around in a case of minidisks, with pocket space to spare. There was a lot to like.
Their proprietary software for putting music on the device sucks. Horribly. This is pretty much the universal opinion. And putting mp3s on it was convoluted and lossy (had to convert from mp3 to Sony's format, THEN load it onto a MD...). Then there's no support in my non-Windows laptop, which can rip CDs just fine thanks. Finally, MP3 players with flash storage just got cheap enough that I didn't have to put up with Sony's bullshit anymore.
Thing is, if they had let the system open up a bit I might still be using it. Sony needs to quit shooting themselves in the foot trying to tie everything to their own formats.
Sony and I have a love/hate relationship. I love the products and I hate their customer service and business practices. One example is I bought a new Sony VAIO computer 7 months later it stopped functioning (bad mobo). I had registered it and taken care of everything as soon as I purchased it so I figured I was safe. When I contacted them they wanted to see the origional receipt because the warranty started the date of manufacture otherwise. Well it had been sitting on the shelf for a few months before I bought it I guess and so when I went to claim the warranty it was expired. Sony makes it a practice to not sell hardware for their computers like motherboards and for me to get it fixed I would have to send it in. They wanted to charge me $600+ shipping to fix a computer that should have been under warranty. Pretty frustrating to say the least. Morale of the story buy your Sony products and love your Sony products but don't ever ever lose your receipt
.
Sony's ebook reader has both MS and SD slots.
You, guys, don't get the whole picture. I bet Sony would gladly kill MS card market, not to do unpleasant choices, whether to support only MS cards and lose customers who hate memory sticks or to support both MS and SD = spend more money on hardware.
Saying "we kill memory sticks" would anger most loyal customers, who might have invested money into memory sticks.
Memory Stick isn't even marketed much in Japan. Its been mostly for western markets for some odd reasons.
But yeah, I noticed on some of SONYs new cell phones from last week... SD! It bugged me to spend about twice for the micro-sized MS (M2)card to fit my Sony Phone. Okay, $30 for 4GB back then.
Guess SONY got smart.
1 - Sell ONLY Memory stick to only SONY products and make people grumble. or...
2 - Sell SONY brand SD cards to anyone who wants one? Hmmmmm.
Ever since SONY burned rootkit/spyware into its music CDs that would phone home from my computer, I don't let sony products anywhere near my computer or my network.
And so the overpriced memory stick bites the dust. Sure Sony prolonged it's life by realizing it was charging too much in the beginning, but they didn't do enough to promote it for use beyond it's own devices.
Lol!
Bye bye Sony!
I think I'll take a $5 SD card over Sony's $14 anytime!
Now if ALL Cell phones would go to a MINI USB connector for power and data transfer so we could all use the same charger!
Now if ALL Cell phones would go to a MINI USB connector for power and data transfer so we could all use the same charger!
We could only wish... Same on the PSP too please.
Wow I'm amazed that these comments are doing the rounds in 2010. Laughable really. I'm guessing all you anti Sony zealots have never owned CD's, MiniDV, miniDisc, S/PDIF, Video8, Digital8, 1080i HDV Camera format, Superbit Mapping, etc etc etc without the Sony Walkman there would be no iPod now. To hear people say that BD is going to die on its ass right now is shocking.
Sony memory sticks have faster write times, better on board compression and stability which make them ideal for burst mode photography and HD video. You can buy a 4Gig Duo for £24.99 or a Sony 4Gig SD card for £22.99. The price is negliable.