MicroSD cards are small but slow; M.2 sticks in your computer are fast, larger, and completely enclosed. Now, a new SSD from a Chinese manufacturer may offer the best of both worlds — and it's ready to go in two cutting-edge gaming portables.
Chinese storage manufacturer Baiwei Technology calls it a "Mini SSD," while another manufacturer calls it the "1517"; at just 15mm x 17mm x 1.4mm thick, it's smaller than a penny and slightly larger than a MicroSD. Nonetheless, it offers sequential read speeds of up to 3700 MB/s (or 3400MB/s write speeds) over a PCIe 4x2 connection, and is available in 512GB, 1TB, and 2TB capacities.
Image via GPD
The new MicroSD Express card for the Nintendo Switch 2 has a theoretical top speed of 985MB/s, which is less than a third of that. Although the full-size SD Express card can theoretically reach a speed of 3940MB/s, surpassing the Mini SSD, it is almost twice the size of Baiwei products.
However, the nano-SIM cards used in recent smartphones are still smaller, and the M.2 hard drives are also faster. The following table can be used to compare various memory cards and SIM cards:
| type | length | width | high | Theoretical maximum speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| mini solid state drive | 15mm | 17mm | 1.4mm | 3,700MB/sec |
| MicroSD | 11mm | 15mm | 1mm | 985MB/sec |
| SD | 24mm | 32mm | ~2 mm (varies) | 3,940MB/sec |
| M.2 2230 | 22mm | 30mm | ~2 mm (varies) | About 8,000MB/sec |
| M.2 2280 | 22mm | 80mm | ~2 mm (varies) | About 14,000MB/sec |
| Nano SIM card | 8.8 mm | 12.3 mm | 0.67 mm | not applicable |
| Micro SIM card | 12mm | 15mm | 0.76mm | not applicable |
| Mini SIM card | 15mm | 25mm | 0.76mm | not applicable |
It's unclear whether Biwin's Mini SSD is a true standard that other storage manufacturers can easily adopt. But the company is extending it to laptops, tablets, phones, cameras and more, with a dedicated slot that works exactly like a smartphone SIM card slot: insert a pin and the tray can be removed.
The company claims it's IP68 water and dust resistant, which is especially handy for a phone, and has three meters of drop resistance.
Two cutting-edge Chinese gaming handhelds appear to have become customers, with both launching new products at last week's ChinaJoy. One is the GPD Win 5, and the other is the giant battery-powered backpack handheld with a Strix Halo processor we introduced in July and which you can see in the video at the top of this article is equipped with a new solid-state drive (SSD).
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We don't know pricing for these new SSDs and haven't seen a product listing for them yet.