SDCardSpeedTests
How to test the SD card
These test results were obtained in the following way:
- Make sure you have USB debugging enabled on the device.
- Make sure you have the Android SDK and have ADB.
- Connect the device to the computer.
- On the computer, open up terminal, and run the following commands::
adb shell- NOTE: The following command will test the WRITE speed. Run it at least 10 times to get a proper average.
echo 1 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches && dd if=/dev/zero of=/sdcard/empty.file bs=100000 count=2000 2>&1 | grep bytes- NOTE: The following command will test the READ speed. Run it at least 10 times to get a proper average.
echo 1 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches && dd if=/sdcard/empty.file of=/dev/null bs=100000 2>&1 | grep bytes- NOTE: Your internal sdcard will be mounted at /sdcard, but your external sdcard may be mounted at /mnt/emmc, /sdcard/sd/external_sd, or other locations depending on your phone.
- Average the results.
- Divide the average by 1048576 to get MiB per second.
- Fill in the results that you got into the table below.
Results
| Card Brand | Card Size | Card Description | ~ Write MiB/Sec | ~ Read MiB/Sec |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Class 2[2] | ||||
| SanDisk | 1 GB | 4.22 | 10.18 | |
| Transcend | 1 GB | Stock card for G1 | 2.88 | 12.32 |
| SanDisk | 4 GB | 4.91 | 11.63 | |
| SanDisk | 8 GB | 5.38 | 19.12 | |
| SanDisk | 16 GB | 6.51 | 13.98 | |
| SanDisk | 4 GB | Stock card for MyTouch 3G | 4.96 | 19.49 |
| MicroCenter House Brand | 16GB | 6.70 | 17.68 | |
| SanDisk | 16 GB | SDSDQ-016G-E11M | 4.36 | 18.18 |
| Sandisk | 8 GB | Mobile Ultra[1] SDSDQY-8192-E11M |
4.46 | 18.30 |
| Sandisk | 4 GB | Mobile Ultra[1] SDSDQY-4096-E11M |
5.43 | 18.30 |
| SanDisk | 4 GB | SD SU04G Rev.8 Prod.11/2009 Stock card for Nexus One |
5.51 | 11.78 |
| SanDisk | 4 GB | Stock card for HTC Desire (t-mobile brand) | 3.61 | 8.60 |
| AVERAGE | 5.04 | 15.54 | ||
| Class 4[2] | ||||
| Sandisk | 8 GB | 7.59 | 18.08 | |
| Sandisk | 8 GB | 8.61 | 22.93 | |
| Kingston | 4 GB | CO4G | 2.40 | 14.32 |
| Kingston | 8 GB | CO8G | 5.72 | 19.64 |
| Kingston | 32 GB | 2.80 | 13.34 | |
| SanDisk | 32 GB | SD SU32G Rev.8 Prod.12/2010 | 5.62 | 15.05 |
| AVERAGE | 5.47 | 17.23 | ||
| Class 6[2] | ||||
| Samsung | 16 GB | MB-MSAGA/EU microSDHC Essential |
4.62 8.40 in recovery mode |
14.79 15.14 in recovery mode[3] |
| Transcend | 2 GB | MMAGR02GUECA-MB Stock card for ZTE Blade |
6.80 | 11.48 |
| A-Data | 8 GB | MMAGR08GUDCA-DB | 6.59 | 12.34 |
| A-Data | 16 GB | AUSDH16GCL6-RM2 | 5.67 | 15.07 |
| Sandisk | 8 GB | Mobile Ultra[1] | 8.71 | 19.21 |
| KINGMAX | 8 GB | 9.43 | 16.61 | |
| Transcend | 8 GB | TS8GUSDH | 9.36 | 16.42 |
| Transcend | 8 GB | TS8GUSDC6 | 7.55 | 16.76 |
| Transcend | 16 GB | TS16GUSDHC6E | 7.07 | 11.46 |
| AVERAGE | 7.77 | 15.41 | ||
| Class 10[2] | ||||
| Patriot | 32 GB | Signature PSF32GMCSDHC10 | 10.48 | 17.87 |
| A-Data | 16 GB | AUSDH16GCL10-RA1 | 8.75 | 16.35 |
| WinTec | 16 GB | 3FMUSD16GBC10-R | 8.20 | 17.27 |
| PNY | 16 GB | P-SDU16G10-EFS2 | 11.77 | 18.43 |
| Transcend | 16 GB | TS16GUSDHC10 | 14.96 | 17.86 |
| PNY | 32 GB | P-SDU32G10-EFS2 | 7.26 | 16.97 |
| Samsung | 32 GB | MB-MSBGA/EU | 9.34 | 20.32 |
| Kingston | 16 GB | SDC10/16GB | 4.02 | 18.11 |
| AVERAGE | 9.35 | 17.90 | ||
[1] Sandisk has reduced the class rating of the mobile ultra line in recent productions. Originally the class rating of the mobile ultra line was class 6, it was then moved to class 4 and in current productions the mobile ultra cards are class 2 cards.
[2] Class rating is a way - not the way - of benchmarking flash storage devices and measures the minimum transfer speed using very small random file transfers across the entire capacity of the card. The speeds tested here are with larger files sequential read/write transfers, which is a more real world application. Class rating only determines what the minimum transfer speed and has no affect on the maximum transfer speed of the card.
[3]Best read results achieved by changing /sys/block/mmcblk1/queue/read_ahead_kb value from stock 128 to 4096.
