By 

Gene P. Louie (Seattle) –

  

For price, warranty, speed, and dependability, look no further. This is the best of the bunch. To be fair, it is not perfect. There are pros and cons.
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PROS
1. The unit comes with an SD adapter. As a result, it is usable for many electronic devices.
2. The speed is fast for a Class 4.
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The write speed range is between 2.8-5.3 mb/s. Most of the write activity is at 4.0 mb/s.
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The read/data transfer rate is between 13 and 25 mb/s. Most of the transfer activity concentrates at 19 mb/s.
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I use this storage device in my Sansa MP3 Player. I can not tell the difference in speed between the built-in 8 gb. internal memory or the Transcend 32 gb. In fact, I prefer the recordings on the latter. The music sounds better.
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3. It is the only product with a lifetime limited warranty. So, the material and construction have to be high quality. . . . Transcend is not stupid. Too many defects and short life make the product unprofitable to sustain.
4. The manufacturer is a multi-billion Taiwan based firm. It is not a “fly-by night” company that is going to disappear and not fulfill its legal service obligations.
5. The bulk of Amazon.com reviews on this product is good, with the exception of two or three who received their products D.O.A. All other consumers are very happy with their purchases.
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CONS
1. The true storage volume is 29.7 gb., not the advertised 32 gb.
2. Transcend does not market a Class 6 or 10 MicroSDHC, but three other Amazon.com vendors do at very good prices. Of course, there are issues with their products.
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For $15 more, PNY has a Class 10 with 32 gb. The customer reviews are not as good as the Transcend product, and it has a one-year warranty. . . . Again, Class 10s, as a group, are known to have read and write problems. This is true for all brands. So, until the industry improves on the stability issues that are inherent in Class 10s, it may be better to avoid them.
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3C Pro sells a Class 6 with 32 gb. Customer reviews are better than Transcend. Unfortunately, the company is not listed on Google.com and does not have a website, although many online companies sell its products. Its biggest problem is product warranty. There is none. This was verified by Amazon.com’s customer service.
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Komputerbay markets a Class 10 with 32 gb. with a lifetime warranty. One set of Amazon.com customer evaluations gave high ratings, while another gave average marks. Despite the reviews, I never heard of this company – so I conducted an online investigation. The firm is a small importer of Chinese-made electronic devices. It buys up cheap stuff and sells them under its brand. The quality is not consistent because the manufacturing sources vary. As a result, there are consumer complaints listed on the internet.

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By 

D. Truong “Duke of New Mexico” (New Mexico) –

  

  

I bought this Transcend 32GB MicroSD card for use in my 7″ Galaxy Tab. It’s a class 4 speed, which means that it has to have a read/write speed that is at least 4MB/s sustained. I clocked mine at around 4.5MB/s to 5MB/s which is consistent with their claims. It’s been working well in my Galaxy Tab and I really can’t complain. I’ve had great luck with Transcend brand memory cards in the past. They are cheap, reliable, and high quality cards. I don’t think I’ve ever had one fail on me yet. I like that this card comes with an included adapter that lets you use this as an SDHC card too. This means that you can use it in Micro-SD and regular SDHC devices.

Here is some more information about SDHC cards and speed classes. This excerpt is taken from my own review of the 8GB Transcend SDHC card.

IMPORTANT SPECIAL NOTES ABOUT SDHC MEMORY CARDS:

-SDHC cards are not compatible with most older SD cameras, SD devices, or SD card readers.

-SDHC cards are rated by speed using different “classes”. There are currently 4 data transfer speed classes available for SDHC cards. These classes are “class 2, class 4, and class 6, and the new class 10. For example, “Class 2″ would have the slowest read/write speed while “Class 10″ currently has the fastest read/write speed. So if you have a device in which speed may play a crucial role, make sure you buy a higher “class” SDHC card. Please note that this SDHC card no longer has the fastest read/write speed available. There is now a new class, called “Class 10″. Class 6 has a minimum read/write speed of 6MB/sec… while Class 2 has minimum speed rating of 2MB/sec, and Class 4 is 4MB/sec. Starting to see the pattern?

-SDHC cards are not only for digital cameras. Any device that is compatible with SDHC cards should work with this card. Just make sure that it takes a full-sized SDHC card. For example, there are some devices that use smaller cards… like Micro-SDHC or Mini-SDHC. If you have a Micro-SDHC or Mini-SDHC card already and want to use it in a full sized SDHC device, you can buy an adapter that can make those cards larger so that they can fit into a full sized SDHC card slot. However, you cannot make a full size SDHC card fit into a Micro-SDHC or Mini-SDHC slot.

SO WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN “SD CARDS” AND “SDHC CARDS?

SDHC is basically an upgrade to the older SD cards. The reason they upgraded it was to achieve greater data transfer speeds AND capacity than previously possible with normal SD cards… and to do this, they had to redesign the card (which is why it’s not compatible with normal SD devices). This was necessary because digital cameras and digital video cameras these days have higher resolutions, which equate to larger file sizes and faster data transfer needs.

Now that many digital cameras also can record HD video, you may consider getting a larger capacity card because video takes much more space than photos. The size of the video varies from camera to camera depending on what resolution and video compression the camera uses. If you plan on taking lots of video (especially HD video), I would consider getting at least a 16GB card. Check your camera specifications to see how many minutes per Gig of memory your camera can capture …to gauge how big of a memory card you’ll want to get to meet your needs.

Special Note on regular SD Cards:
If you primarily take casual photos and don’t need a exceptionally fast read/write capable card, you should know that newer cameras that take “SDHC” cards will also work with older normal “SD” cards. These older cards are cheaper than the new SDHC cards, so this may be something to consider. So to sum things up, newer cameras will take SDHC and regular SD cards, but older cameras that use SD cards may not be able to use SDHC cards. This is because newer technology is usually made to be compatible with older technology (the technical term used to describe this is “backwards compatibility”) … but older technology may not have the hardware necessary to run newer tech (technical term used is “obsolete”… just kidding!

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By 

J. Emmanuelli –

  

Bought this micro SD card about 6 months for my smartphone. Stopped working all of a sudden. Tried it on my laptop and was not even recognized. Fortunately had all original packaing so very easily went to Transcend’s website to get an RMA form. Shipped the product with the form, a few days later I get a package back. Well: they sent me the memory back with a little sticker pointing to a MICRO SCRATCH ON THE PLASTIC, BARELY VISIBLE WITH THE NAKED EYE. They sent a form letter with a check mark next to “physical damage to product” and a parapgraph quoting their warranty. I couldn’t believe it. I was not even awre there was a superficial scratch evidnetly from normal wear and tear until they sent this thing back to me. I literally had to get my wife’s reading glasses to find this. Then I decided to take a picture of it with a MACRO lense so I can show everyone here what it is but can’t seem to find how to post a picture here (if interested send me a note or comment here and I can email you the pictures). I really really wish I could post the pictures here because you will literally fall on your behind laughing!
Bottom line, Transcend is cheaper because they skimp on quality and look for anything they can hang on to to avoid honoring a warranty. Talk about buyer beware! Pay a few bucks more and get a reputable known electronics company to get your memory from!!!!

UPDATE: Uploaded product pictures for your viewing pleasure (under product page, images)

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