Lexar ships first 128GB SDXC card

Lexar Media has begun shipping the industry's first 128GB SD card to camera shops, the storage company said on Tuesday.

The company's Professional Secure Digital Extended Capacity (SDXC) cards come in capacities of 64GB and 128GB — the latter, Lexar claims, is an industry first. The cards have a Class 10 speed rating and a minimum guaranteed speed of 133x, or 20MB per second. According to Lexar, they are suitable for rapid-fire photography and lengthy 1080p high-definition videos.

"With the new Lexar Professional SDXC cards, we developed a product that will enhance the professional photography workflow," Lexar senior product marketing manager Pachi Chen-Wong said in a statement. "With capacities of 64GB and 128GB, photographers can capture, store and transfer more images and HD video in one place than ever before."

The SDXC format was unveiled at the start of 2009, and manufacturers such as SanDisk, Panasonic and Toshiba have all released 64GB versions, but no major manufacturer had before Tuesday begun shipping a 128GB variant. The format should be able to allow SD cards with capacities of up to 2TB.

Lexar's new SD card has similar specifications to those of a 128GB CompactFlash card announced by SanDisk at CES in January. However, it has two key advantages over that card: the ubiquity of SD card readers in consumer electronics, and its price — SanDisk's 128GB CompactFlash costs $1,499 (£931), while Lexar's 128GB SD card costs $330. The 64GB variant of Lexar's new Professional SDXC card costs $200.

Interestingly, Lexar seems to have dramatically cut its pricing for the cards before they even appear in-store. When it first announced the cards at CES this year, it said the the 64GB variant would cost $400 and the 128GB flagship $700.