>>> Memory Card Benchmark Result Database

EngrPaul · 09-24-05, 12:05 PM

I hope that my results help make you a more informed consumer. I hope that others contribute their results as well!

Software: www.antontomov.com Pocket Mechanic, Benchmark Module. This software has a fully functional 10-day trial period.

Processor running at default setting for device. I was running Windows Mobile 2003 for both.

Parameters (From default, check write test and raise repeat to 5):
Read Test, Write Test, Sequential Sectors, Random Sectors, 64 Sectors/block Variable, Repeat=5

NOTE: These results are extremely variable per brand, device, and speed... yet thay are stable and repeatable. In some cases one device uses a card good for read, on the other it writes well. You may think I mis-entered the data: I can assure you I didn’t. I ran my tests twice, and double-checked everything, and triple-checked everything that looked backwards. I also have multiple cards of several listed- the results do not change unless noted by a difference in the label and packaging.

You can’t just expect a fast card to give you fast results. You have to find out how the card performed on the same device you expect to use it in, and hope that they did not change the architecture of the media before you bought it!

Here goes.
In my results, the first number is MB/s, (in parenthesis “X”)

COMPACT FLASH CARDS (Type-I):

Brand: Sandisk CF
Model: Ultra-II (~66X I think)
Size: 8 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-32
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 1.06 (7.2X)
Write: 0.01 (0.1X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.78 (5.4X)
Write: 0.01 (0.1X)

Brand: Ritek CF
Model: Pro-2 80X
Size: 8 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-32
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.94 (6.4X)
Write: 0.06 (0.4X)

Brand: Ritek Ridata CF
Model: 52X/Pro
Size: 4 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-32
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.80 (5.4X)
Write: 0.04 (0.3X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.63 (4.3X)
Write: 0.05 (0.3X)

Brand: Ritek Ridata CF
Model: 52X/Pro
Size: 2 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-32
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.81 (5.5X)
Write: 0.04 (0.3X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.65 (4.4X)
Write: 0.04 (0.3X)

Brand: Sandisk CF
Model: Standard
Size: 512 MB
File Allocation Table: FAT-16
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.33 (2.2X)
Write: 0.05 (0.3X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.30 (2.0X)
Write: 0.05 (0.3X)

Brand: Canon Camera (A80) CF
Model: Shows up as “Hitachi”
Size: 32 MB
File Allocation Table: FAT-16
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.71 (4.9X)
Write: 0.36 (2.4X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.59 (4.0X)
Write: 0.34 (2.3X)

SECURE DIGITAL CARDS:

Brand: Transcend SD
Model: 150X
Size: 4GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-32
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.17 (1.1X)
Write: 0.06 (0.4X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.06 (0.4X)
Write: 0.98 (6.7X)

Brand: A-Data SD
Model: 150X
Size: 4GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-32
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.15 (1.0X)
Write: 0.06 (0.4X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.06 (0.4X)
Write: 0.98 (6.7X)

Brand: Sandisk SD
Model: Extreme-III (133X)
Size: 1 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-16
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 1.17 (8.0X)
Write: 0.08 (0.5X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.20 (1.3X)
Write: 1.01 (6.9X)

Brand: Sandisk SD
Model: Standard
Size: 2 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-32
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.77 (5.3X)
Write: 0.02 (0.1X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.92 (6.3X)
Write: 0.02 (0.1X)

Brand: A-Data SD
Model: Turbo 150X
Size: 2 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-32
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.32 (2.2X)
Write: 0.13 (0.9X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.18 (1.2X)
Write: 0.98 (6.7X)

Brand: A-Data SD
Model: 50X (NOT 150X)
Size: 2 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-16 (As supplied)
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 1.46 (10.0X)
Write: 0.11 (0.7X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 1.01 (6.9X)
Write: 0.11 (0.8X)

Brand: A-Data SD
Model: 50X
Size: 1 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-16
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 1.28 (8.7X)
Write: 0.12 (0.8X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.91 (6.2X)
Write: 0.12 (0.8X)

Brand: Ritek Ridata SD
Model: Pro 66X, Blue Label
Size: 1 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-16
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.30 (2.0X)
Write: 0.10 (0.7X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.17 (1.1X)
Write: 0.09 (0.6X)

Brand: Ritek Ridata SD
Model: Pro 66X, Gold Label
Size: 1 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-16
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.83 (5.7X)
Write: 0.10 (0.6X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.25 (1.7X)
Write: 0.53 (3.6X)

Brand: PNY SD
Model: Standard
Size: 1 GB
File Allocation Table: FAT-16
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.74 (5.1X)
Write: 0.01 (0.1X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.85 (5.8X)
Write: 0.01 (0.1X)

Brand: Canon Camera (SD500) SD
Model: Hi-Speed SDC-32MH
Size: 32 MB
File Allocation Table: FAT-16
Dell Axim X50v Results:
Read: 0.82 (5.6X)
Write: 0.11 (0.7X)
hp iPAQ h2215 Results:
Read: 0.68 (4.6X)
Write: 0.11 (0.8X)

0gopogo · 09-28-05, 12:14 AM

Good move. My results are attached (in ZIPed xls format). The attached spreadsheet shows benchmark results for most of my cards using both PocketMechanic and SPB Benchmark. I stopped using PM a while ago and switched over to SPB Benchmark completely since. If you could run your many cards through SPB Benchmark, that would be great. SPB Benchmark is free for personal use. I also think that unlike PM it is not magic about which tests it performs.

Edit: most cards retested with Spb Benchmark 1.6, checked out different formatting options, added new cards.

EngrPaul · 09-28-05, 07:41 PM

Message including excel spreadsheet removed...

See top post for file attachment

0gopogo · 09-28-05, 10:34 PM

Paul,

Thanks for the spreadsheet. A few questions: the spreadsheet has two pairs of read & write columns - what distinguishes the two? And which firmware revision did you use when running the benchmarks? Finally, was the Axe plugged into the mains while testing?

EngrPaul · 09-29-05, 09:07 AM

Originally Posted by 0gopogo

Paul,

Thanks for the spreadsheet. A few questions: the spreadsheet has two pairs of read & write columns - what distinguishes the two? And which firmware revision did you use when running the benchmarks? Finally, was the Axe plugged into the mains while testing?

Look at the top of the Read/Write columns for which device was tested. A05. Yes.

0gopogo · 09-29-05, 08:39 PM

Somehow I managed to not see the row with the device info

.

As for testing while on mains: I had to retest all my cards after finding out that some cards perform significantly better when connected to main power. I do not think that A03 vs A05 or using Spb Benchmark instead of PocketMechanic have anything to do with it.

10-01-05, 09:27 PM

Just out of curiousity, are there any figures like this for the X50's BIS? How does BIS compare with storage cards in terms of speed?

0gopogo · 10-01-05, 09:34 PM

It doesn't. BIS is sloooow compared to decent flash cards. I don't even have to patience to benchmark it. Did it once in Spb Benchmark. The BIS tests ran so long I had to aborted. Nevertheless, almost all of my programs are installed in BIS. Only the really large and demanding ones I install to CF card: TextMaker and PlanMaker take noticeably longer to start from BIS than from CF card.

MAD52 · 10-03-05, 10:09 AM

Well, I'm to change my 1GB Lexar 80X CF for an SD Sandisk Extreme III 1GB 133X. For the benchmarks I saw here it reads a lot of faster than my Lexar. The Lexar writes a little faster than the SD. So I saw the CF Extreme III how did it perform against Lexar 80X and SD Extreme III 133X? The same? Worse? I can get the SD for 160 u$s and the CF for 150 u$s, so no big differences in price.

0gopogo · 10-03-05, 09:44 PM

I bought my SD EIII for $114. $150 is way too expensive for any 1GB card.

0gopogo · 10-03-05, 11:14 PM

As promised in the other thread, here are the results for my new Transcend 150x 4GB card.

I checked the card for read and write speeds in the x50v using Spb Benchmark and in my card reader using HDBench and running a real world test.

All tests show that the card has really fast read rates. Write rates are OK but not outstanding according to HDBench. The real world test (a write test) in the card reader shows virtually no performance delta between the Transcend 150x 4GB and the Ridata 150x 2GB although the latter shows significantly higher write rates in HDBench. The synthetic benchmark should probably not be overrated.

I am looking forward to seeing EngrPaul's results for the same card. His x50v has A05 firmware which is supposed to increase SD card performance compared to the A03 installed on my x50v.

Anyway, the gory details for the propeller heads follow below. Proceed at you own risk ;).

Tested with Spb Benchmarks ("Copy ..." tests unselected) on x50v with A01 HW and A03 FW. Empty card. Running on battery - i.e. not cradled nor on mains.

Code:

Writing 1 MB file              1679 ms   610 KB/sec  
Reading 1 MB file               383 ms  2.61 MB/sec  
Writing 100 of 10 KB files    16681 ms  61.4 KB/sec  
Reading 100 of 10 KB files      572 ms  1.75 MB/sec  
Directory listing: 2000 files   146 ms  13.7 thousands of files/sec
Speed index                     182

After copying 1.03GB (178 files in 27 folders) from HD to card:

Code:

Writing 1 MB file              2024 ms   506 KB/sec  
Reading 1 MB file               406 ms  2.46 MB/sec  
Writing 100 of 10 KB files    21825 ms  46.9 KB/sec  
Reading 100 of 10 KB files      571 ms  1.75 MB/sec  
Directory listing: 2000 files   146 ms  13.7 thousands of files/sec 
Speed index                     163

To get speed ratings - x factors - divide kB/s by 150, multiply MB/s by 1024 to get kB/s. In comparison, the Ridata 150x 2GB card has these stats:

Code:

Writing 1 MB file              1029 ms   995 kB/sec  
Reading 1 MB file               352 ms  2.84 MB/sec  
Writing 100 of 10 KB files     9591 ms   107 kB/sec  
Reading 100 of 10 KB files      564 ms  1.77 MB/sec  
Directory listing: 2000 files   147 ms  13.6 thousands of files/sec 
Speed index                     214

After copying 1.03GB (178 files in 27 folders) from HD to card:

Code:

Writing 1 MB file              1206 ms   849 kB/sec  
Reading 1 MB file               349 ms  2.87 MB/sec  
Writing 100 of 10 KB files    11690 ms  87.6 kB/sec  
Reading 100 of 10 KB files      577 ms  1.73 MB/sec  
Directory listing: 2000 files   147 ms  13.6 thousands of files/sec  
Speed index                     205

Copying those 1.03GB (178 files in 27 folders) from HD to card took

Code:

Transcend 4GB 150x      - 3:12 minutes
Ridata 2GB 150x (FAT32) - 3:10 minutes

When using the HDBench in my SD 1.0 compliant card reader the Transcend 4GB shows very good sequential and random read rates between 9.3MB/s and 9.6 MB/s. That puts it clearly ahead of the Ultra II and ever so slightly ahead the Ridata 150x 2GB, but not quite up to the Extreme III 1GB.

Write rates in my SD 1.0 compliant card reader are not brilliant, however.

Code:

Read   Write   RRead  RWrite  Drive
9343    7488    9443    1391  Y:\1MB
9490    5366    9633    1204  Y:\10MB
9595    5267    9455    1190  Y:\100MB

To put this into perspective, the sequential and random write rates compare to the Lexar Pro 1GB 60x and Ridata 1GB 66x cards. Ridata 150x, and particularly Ultra II and Extreme III, achieve clearly superior write test results in HDBench.

I expect the results to be significantly different in a SD 1.1 compliant card reader - but were can I get one?

Choirguy · 10-03-05, 11:19 PM

Just as reference, we did a bunch of tests back in January...seems so long ago...the results are in a pdf file here...

www.choirguy.com/memory.pdf

EngrPaul · 10-03-05, 11:28 PM

Whoa, I got my work cut out for me... running all my cards (including two new ones) through SPB benchmarking on two devices. Then once again on the X50v after the WM5 upgrade !!!!

0gopogo · 10-04-05, 12:05 AM

Choirguy,

I am very much aware of that. Glad you chime in. It was your storage card benchmark collection which directed my attention at the X Digital Media PROFormance CF card! I subsequently bought it and have had no regrets.

You seemed to treat the benchmark collection as a one-off experiment, though. The list has not been updated in a long time. As far as the x50(v) goes there aren't any results for A03 or newer firmware...

Well, if you wish to resurrect the collection you are welcome to use any info I posted here. If you need photos of the cards for the list, or other support, let me know.

0gopogo · 10-04-05, 12:31 AM

EngrPaul,

Please make sure you run the tests on battery power, not in the cradle. Benchmarking while the PDA is connected to mains gave me significantly superior and unfortunately also unrealistic results for some cards.

As for the "Whoa", yes, since you have more cards than I have and twice the number of PDAs you are looking at an awful lot of testing. On the other hand:

If you compare the Ridata 2GB results in my last post with those in my first post in this thread (#2) you'll notice I could not reproduce those fantastic write rates. I have no idea why not. Did I simply record the wrong numbers or are the earlier results real? Somehow I think I ought to know...

So I am contemplating to hard-reset my Axe this Saturday, install just Spb Benchmark and PocketMechanic, and retest all cards with both benchmarks. Next, install A05, install just Spb Benchmark and PocketMechanic, and retest all cards. Eek. And to think to repeat the exercise with WM 5 in a couple of months...

This will be interesting from a scientific angle but I am not sure I'll have the patience. Sunday or Monday will tell.