What is the difference between MicroSD and MicroSDHC

Buy­ing a new mem­o­ry card for a smart­phone or some oth­er mobile device can turn into a real “quest”. As it turns out, flash dri­ves dif­fer not only in vol­ume! There are also speed class­es and types of mem­o­ry cards.

MicroSD and MicroS­D­HC are just types of mem­o­ry cards. And now let’s see how they dif­fer.

Three types of memory cards — MicroSD, MicroSDHC and MicroSDXC

All these types of mem­o­ry cards look basi­cal­ly the same and are a reg­u­lar MicroSD. They dif­fer in pro­duc­tion tech­nol­o­gy and capac­i­ty.

MicroSD (MicroS­D­SC) — the first type of flash dri­ves. They were invent­ed some­where else in the 90s, at one time they were wide­ly used, but then it turned out that 2 GB is extreme­ly small. And the max­i­mum capac­i­ty of such dri­ves is just 2 giga­bytes.

microS­D­HC — a more up-to-date ver­sion. New tech­nolo­gies for the pro­duc­tion of sil­i­con “mem­o­ry” cells and con­trollers have made it pos­si­ble to increase the vol­ume of a flash dri­ve. The max­i­mum capac­i­ty of these “cards” is 32 GB.

MicroS­DXC - the next stage in the devel­op­ment of stor­age devices. These dri­ves have a max­i­mum capac­i­ty of 2 TB (ter­abytes) and a min­i­mum of 64 GB. In addi­tion to advanced tech­nol­o­gy, it offers a redesigned exFAT file stor­age sys­tem that pro­vides high speed access and no file size lim­its.

The stan­dards are back­ward com­pat­i­ble:

1. XC, HC, and SC dri­ves can be insert­ed into an XC-enabled device;

2. In the “receiv­er” HC, you can install HC and SC;

3. Only SC can be installed in the “receiv­er” SC.

At the same time, the MicroS­D­HC stan­dard is cur­rent­ly the most wide­ly used in the bud­get seg­ment. Its sup­port can be found in inex­pen­sive phones, MP3 play­ers, game con­soles and sim­i­lar devices. But MicroS­DXC is more com­mon in cam­eras, flag­ship devices, even high-res­o­lu­tion car DVRs.

If you do not know what type of mem­o­ry cards your device sup­ports, but at the same time it was released in the last 10–15 years, feel free to take MicroS­D­HC. They will be com­pat­i­ble — except per­haps with the rarest excep­tion.

What else to look for when choosing a memory card

When choos­ing a “card”, you should also pay atten­tion to the speed class. This is an impor­tant char­ac­ter­is­tic that deter­mines the com­pat­i­bil­i­ty of the dri­ve with record­ing or play­back devices.

The fol­low­ing class­es exist:

1. Class 2. Extreme­ly slow “cards”, which can only be used for log­ging — and then in text for­mat;

2. Class 4. Slight­ly faster ver­sions that are suit­able for use in MP3 play­ers, e‑books and oth­er devices where record­ing is prac­ti­cal­ly not used;

3. Class 6. Also designed for mobile play­ers or e‑books. They can also be used in smart­phones — but only if they do not store appli­ca­tions or “throw” pho­tos;

4. Class 10. Already suit­able for smart­phones, includ­ing use for stor­ing appli­ca­tions, record­ing videos, pho­tos, and oth­er mul­ti­me­dia con­tent;

5. UHS‑I. For SLR and mir­ror­less cam­eras of the low­er and mid­dle price ranges;

6. UHS III. For mir­ror­less, reflex cam­eras, cam­corders, high price range action cam­eras.

If you install a “slow” card in a “fast” device, var­i­ous prob­lems may occur dur­ing record­ing — from the loss of cer­tain data to the com­plete destruc­tion of files.

But oth­er tech­ni­cal char­ac­ter­is­tics, such as pro­tec­tion against vibra­tion or expo­sure to radioac­tive rays, should be cho­sen depend­ing on your goals and pref­er­ences.