Lexar Professional 1800x UHS-II 32GB microSD Memory Card Review

Introduction

The Lexar Professional 1800x UHS-II microSD card is the fastest microSD card offered by Lexar as of early 2016. The Lexar 1800x card claims 270 MB/s read and 245 MB/s write speeds. UHS-II microSD cards are backwards compatible and operate at UHS-I speed in devices without UHS-II compatibility. Lexar 1800x microSD cards are available in 32, 64 and 128 GB capacities. The 32GB version (LSDMI32GCRBNA1800R) is tested in this review.

To support the new high-speed UHS-II bus, a second row of contacts is added next to the normal microSD contacts. These correspond to extra pins in UHS-II compatible microSD devices. The Lexar LRWM05U-7000 microSD UHS-II card reader is included with Lexar 1800x cards. A microSD to full-size SD adapter with UHS-II contacts is also included. The adapter is important because many of the current UHS-II SD card readers only support the UHS-II interface in the full-size SD slots, but not in the microSD slots.

Performance

The Lexar 1800x microSD card was tested in several UHS-I and UHS-II card readers. In UHS-II card readers the 1800x microSD card reached 301.3 MB/s sequential read speed, just passing its 270MB/s quoted read speed. Sequential write speed measured 247.9 MB/s, slightly less than the 245 MB/s rating. In UHS-I card readers, the 1800x card reverted to UHS-I mode and was limited to 96.5 MB/s read and 78.5 MB/s write speeds. Still fast, but not quite as fast as the fastest UHS-I microSD cards.

Note: In multi-card readers, this UHS-II microSD card was tested in the incuded microSD to SD UHS-II adapter. Although several multi-card readers support UHS-II, it is only in the full-size slot and not the microSD slot. Testing in non-UHS-II microSD slots provides only UHS-I speed.

Card: Lexar Professional 1800x microSD UHS-II 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

The table below will show in-camera speed tests as new cameras are tested with this 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, Nikon D500, Nikon D7500, Nikon D5600, Nikon Coolpix P1000, Olympus E-M1 II, Olympus PEN-F, Panasonic GH5, Sony A9, Sony A6300

Lexar Professional series memory cards have a limited lifetime warranty. The card tested was made in Taiwan.

The following table contains information encoded in the SD card.

Available sizes and prices

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