Transcend Ultimate UHS-II U3 32GB SDHC Card Review

The Transcend Ultimate UHS-II 32GB SDHC card offers 285MB/s read and 180MB/s write performance. It is rated UHS Speed Class 3 (U3) making it suitable for 4K video recording. Transcend Ultimate UHS-II cards are available in 32 and 64 GB capacities. This review covers the 32 GB SDHC version (TS32GSD2U3), while the 64GB version was previously tested.

The UHS-II interface offers up to three times the speed of the fastest UHS-I cards, and even better all UHS-II cards are backwards compatible. They offer legacy support for UHS-I and standard SD devices, however the high speed will only be experienced in devices that have UHS-II support. In UHS-I mode this card supports SDR104 with a bus speed of 104MB/s, whereas the UHS-II interface operates at up to 312MB/s bus speed (HD312).

Outside, the Ultimate UHS-II card has an matte black label with gold accents. Inside the card is NAND flash memory of the multi-level cell (MLC) variety to provide the performance and durability necessary for the most demanding applications. The card tested is made in Taiwan. Transcend Ultimate SD cards have a limited lifetime warranty.

Performance

In benchmark tests, this Transcend UHS-II 32GB card performed very similar to the 64GB capacity version previously tested. A maximum sequential read speed of 307.1 MB/s and write speed of 186.3 MB/s surpass the advertised ratings. Curiously, the card's read performance was not nearly as good in the Transcend RDF9 UHS-II card reader, reaching only 245.4 MB/s.

Performance in UHS-I devices was tested in UHS-I card readers, where the Ultimate UHS-II card measured up to 93.2MB/s sequential read and 91.2MB/s sequential write speeds.

Card: Transcend Ultimate UHS-II U3 32GB
Benchmark: CrystalDiskMark 3.0.3 x64
Program settings: 1000 MB, 5 passes, random test data
Operating system: Windows 10 Pro
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H
Processor: Intel Core i7-3770K @ 4.40GHz
RAM: 32GB DDR3 1600

In the Fuji X-T10, the card operates in UHS-I mode and averaged 55.1 MB/s write speed. Additional cameras will be added to the results in the table below when they are tested with the card.

Cameras tested with this card: Canon EOS R, Canon 5D Mark IV, Canon 77D, Canon 80D, Canon EOS M5, Canon Rebel T7i, Fuji X-T3, Fuji X-Pro2, Fuji X-T10, Nikon D500, Nikon D7500, Nikon D5600, Nikon Coolpix P1000, Olympus E-M1 II, Olympus PEN-F, Panasonic GH5, Sony A9, Sony A6300

The following table contains information encoded in the SD card.

Available sizes and prices

Compare prices on the Transcend Ultimate UHS-II card. The lowest prices are highlighted in the table below. Prices are updated daily.

The Transcend UHS-II U3 32GB SDHC card TS32GSD2U3 is also available from following retailer:

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