[CES 2017] If there is one advantage that Android devices have over iPhones is the support for expandable storage. OEMs can choose if they want their phones to support memory cards like microSD, which means that on top of the native storage, users can expand it further cheaply and use it to store songs, videos, photos, and more.
In fact in 2015, Android Marshmallow allowed users to install apps on microSD cards, although this wasn’t exactly ideal as the read/write speeds weren’t up to scratch. The good news is that if you do plan on using your microSD as a place to install and run apps from, you might be interested in SanDisk’s latest offering.
Making the announcement at CES 2017, the company unveiled the 256GB SanDisk Ultra microSDXCTM UHS-I card, Premium Edition. This is a microSD card that meets the A1 performance standard which basically means that it has the necessary read/write speeds to open and run apps smoothly, while at the same time allowing users to quickly access other files like photos, video, and music at the same time.
If this sounds good, here’s the not-so-good news. The SanDisk microSD card will not come cheap as 256GB of storage will set you back $200, so we guess you’ll have to ask yourself if you’re really that tight on storage where you can justify spending this much on just memory alone.