Introduction

I would like to thank A-DATA for supplying the review sample.

A-DATA is mostly known for its high end DDR memory aimed at the enthusiast market, which is a shame because they manufacture some other memory products that are really good and sell for a decent price. The company also offers various SDHC cards, which range from 4 GB to an incredible 16 GB. The Turbo Series of these cards is the fastest, as these are so called Class 6, with a minimum write speed of 6 MB/s

Today we will be taking a look at the A-DATA Speedy 32 GB Compact Flash card. This is currently the largest shipping size for the flash memory format. Note that the card is not of the "Turbo" brand, which means it is not the fastest. But such a large capacity calls for different uses than simply benchmarking it. We will actually use it as a hard drive and will use a CF to IDE adapter for performance comparison. The features listed on the A-DATA website underline such a use:

Specifications from ADATA Technology:

• Conforms to Compact Flash Card specification standard
• Fully compatible with PC Card ATA specification
• Support for 8-bit or 16-bit host data transfers
• Support PIO mode 4
• Support Error Correcting Code (ECC) function to detect and correct errors.
• Support In System Programming (ISP) function to load the firmware.
• Supports power down commands and sleep mode
• Support Wear Leverage function to maximize data endurance.
• MTBF > 1,000,000 hours
• Durability: Minimum 10,000 insertion/removal cycles

Packaging

The card ships in a sealed plastic mold. There is a cardboad inlay, with the A-DATA logo on it and a large round circle stating the size of the memory card. On the rear you will find further details about the card in various languages.

A Closer Look

A-Data also included a semi-transparent box, made of plastic. While this is something which is included with most memory cards, there are companies out there, which omit such a protective box.


Taking a closer look at the card, it features the same color theme found on the package. The backdrop is orange and the important information like the A-DATA logo, the word "Speedy" and the capacity of 32 GB are clearly visible. On the rear you will find a white sticker with a few lines on it. This is where you could write down what is stored on the memory card, or maybe even place your address on it, just in case you happen to lose the unit somewhere.


The card's serial number can be found on the little edge opposite of the connector. The above image has been altered a bit to make this serial plainly visible. You will be hard pressed to read it under normal lighting conditions.