XD-Picture Card

Last updated
XD-Picture Card
XD-Picture Card Logo.svg
XD card 16M Fujifilm front.png
A 16 MB Fujifilm xD Card
Media type Memory card
CapacityMaximum 512 MB (original)
maximum 2 GB (Type M/M+, Type H)
Developed by Olympus, Fujifilm
Dimensions20 mm × 25 mm × 1.78 mm
Weight2.8 g
Usage Digital cameras, voice recorders
ReleasedJuly 2002
Discontinued2009

The xD-Picture Card is an obsolete form of flash memory card, used in digital cameras made by Olympus, Fujifilm, and Kodak during the 2000s. The xD in the xD-Picture Card stands for eXtreme Digital.

Contents

xD cards were manufactured with capacities of 16  MB [lower-alpha 1] up to 2  GB. [lower-alpha 2] [1] The standard was phased out in the late 2000s in favour of the SD card, which had been its primary competitor. [2]

History

The cards were developed by Olympus and Fujifilm, and introduced into the market in July 2002. Toshiba Corporation and Samsung Electronics manufactured the cards for Olympus and Fujifilm. xD cards were sold under other brands, including Kodak, SanDisk, PNY, and Lexar, but were not branded with the respective companies' logos, except for Kodak. Previously, xD competed primarily with Secure Digital (SD) cards, CompactFlash (CF), and Sony's Memory Stick. Because of its higher cost and limited usage in products other than digital cameras, xD lost ground to SD, which is broadly used by cellular phones, personal computers, digital audio players and many other digital cameras.

Olympus began to move away from the xD format with the mid-2009 [3] announcement of the E-P1 camera, which supported only Secure Digital memory cards. [4] As of Spring 2010, all new Olympus cameras announced at the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show and Photo Marketing Association International Trade Show can use SD cards. [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] This changeover to the SD card format has never been officially announced by Olympus Corporation. The higher-end DSLR cameras such as the E-3 and E-5 among others continue to use CompactFlash cards as well. Certain final Olympus cameras using xD cards are also supporting microSD cards with a special adapter.

Fuji released its last digital camera accepting that card, namely Fujifilm FinePix F200EXR (a variant of 2008 FinePix F100fd), being released back in Q2 2009, as being moving away from xD format since Q4 2008.

Comparison with rival formats

Amazon Best Sellers in xD-Picture Cards reports no products offered with a Date First Available since 4 August 2009. [11] [12]

Advantages

Disadvantages

Type M/M+ and Type H cards

xD-Picture Card, 1000 MB, type M XD card typeM 1G Fujifilm.JPG
xD-Picture Card, 1000 MB, type M
xD-Picture Card, 512 MB, type H XD card typeH 512M Olympus.JPG
xD-Picture Card, 512 MB, type H
A size comparison of an xD-Picture card with a MicroSD Card XD-MicroSD.JPG
A size comparison of an xD-Picture card with a MicroSD Card

The original xD cards (Type S) were available in 16 MB to 512 MB capacities. The Type M card, released in February 2005, [13] uses multi-level cell (MLC) architecture to achieve a theoretical storage capacity of up to 8 GB. As of June 2010, Type M cards are available in sizes from 256 MB to 2 GB. However, the Type M suffers from slower read/write speeds than the original cards.

The Type H card, first released in November 2005, [14] offers higher data rates than Type M cards (theoretically as much as 3 times faster). As of 2008, Type H cards were only available in 256 MB, 512 MB, 1000 MB, and 2000 MB capacities. Both Fuji and Olympus discontinued the production of Type H cards in 2008, citing high production costs. [15]

The Type M+ card, first released in April 2008, [16] offers data rates 1.5 times that of Type M cards. As of 2008, cards are available only in 1 and 2 GB capacities.

Olympus says that its xD cards support special "picture effects" when used in some Olympus cameras, though these software features are not intrinsically hardware-dependent. Type H and M+ cards however, are required in newer models to capture video at high rate (640×480 @ 30fps). Due to changes in the cards' storage architecture, newer Type M and H cards may have compatibility issues with some older cameras (especially video recording). Compatibility lists are available for Olympus: Olympus America's [17] and Fujifilm's. [18] Newer cards are incompatible with some card readers.

Theoretical transfer speeds

Pictures may be transferred from a digital camera's xD card to a personal computer by plugging the camera into the PC by a USB or IEEE 1394 cable, or by removing the card from the camera and inserting it into a card reader. In both cases, the computer sees the card as a mass storage device containing image files, although software or firmware can alter this representation. Card readers may be integrated into the PC or attached by cable. Adapters are available to allow an xD picture card to be plugged into other readers (and in some cases cameras), including PC card, parallel port, CompactFlash and SmartMedia. A chart showing which sizes and types of xD cards were available can be found below.

TypeWrite speed
(MiB/s)		Read speed
(MiB/s)		Capacities available (MB)
16326412825651210002000
Standard1.35YesYesNoNoNoNoNoNo
35NoNoYesYesYesYesNoNo
M2.54NoNoNoNoYesYesYesYes
H45NoNoNoNoYesYesYesYes
M+3.756NoNoNoNoNoNoYesYes

Reverse-engineered specifications

Detailed specifications are tightly controlled by Olympus and Fujifilm, which charge licensing fees and royalties and require non-disclosure agreements in exchange for the technical information required to produce xD-compatible devices. [19]

The memory format used is not well documented. It is difficult to study it directly, since most camera devices and most USB card readers do not provide direct access to the flash memory. Since the cards are controller-less, cameras and card readers must perform wear leveling and error detection. They normally hide the portion of the memory which stores this information (among other things) from higher level access. [20]

However, a few models of xD card readers based on the Alauda chip do allow direct access (bypassing the above mechanisms) to an xD card's flash memory. These readers have been reverse-engineered and Linux drivers have been produced by the Alauda Project, [21] which has documented the on-chip data structures of the xD card. [22] According to this information, xD card headers are similar to those used by SmartMedia, and include chip manufacturer information.

Raw hardware

The back of an xD card, showing the 18 pins XD card 16M Fujifilm back.jpg
The back of an xD card, showing the 18 pins
xD card reader for USB XD Card to USB adapter with cards.jpg
xD card reader for USB

At the raw hardware level, an xD card is simply an ordinary NAND flash integrated circuit in an unusual package. Comparing the pinout of an xD card [23] [24] to the pinout of a NAND flash chip in a standard TSOP package, [23] one finds a nearly one-to-one correspondence between the active pins of the two devices. xD cards share this characteristic with the older SmartMedia cards, which are also basically raw NAND flash chips, albeit in a larger package.

xD and SmartMedia cards can be used by hobbyists as a convenient source of NAND flash memory chips for custom projects. For example, the Mattel Juice Box PMP can be booted into Linux using a modified cartridge containing an xD card with a boot image written on it. Additionally, SmartMedia and xD card readers can be used to read the data from NAND flash chips in electronic devices, by soldering leads between the chip and the card reader. [25] [26]

Panoramic mode

Some Olympus cameras offer camera-based panoramic processing. In those cameras that support both xD and CompactFlash cards, panoramic processing only works with images stored on the xD card, if installed. Newer Olympus cameras have neither xD cards nor this restriction.

Unsubtantiated reports claim that some cameras such as the E-450 only support panoramic processing when using Olympus branded xD cards. The model numbers have not been documented. In this case, there appears to be a workaround: it appears that the card manufacturer information is simply stored in the flash memory, in the Card Information Structure. [21] [22] Thus, it is possible to alter another brand of xD card to present itself as Olympus xD card by accessing the raw flash memory. This can be done by using a hacked device driver for a USB card reader. [27]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ one megabyte (1 MB) is equal to one million bytes (10002 B)
  2. ↑ one gigabyte (1 GB) is equal to one billion bytes (10003 B)

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Flash memory</span> Electronic non-volatile computer storage device

Flash memory is an electronic non-volatile computer memory storage medium that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed. The two main types of flash memory, NOR flash and NAND flash, are named for the NOR and NAND logic gates. Both use the same cell design, consisting of floating gate MOSFETs. They differ at the circuit level depending on whether the state of the bit line or word lines is pulled high or low: in NAND flash, the relationship between the bit line and the word lines resembles a NAND gate; in NOR flash, it resembles a NOR gate.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Digital camera</span> Camera that captures photographs or video in digital format

A digital camera, also called a digicam, is a camera that captures photographs in digital memory. Most cameras produced today are digital, largely replacing those that capture images on photographic film or film stock. Digital cameras are now widely incorporated into mobile devices like smartphones with the same or more capabilities and features of dedicated cameras. High-end, high-definition dedicated cameras are still commonly used by professionals and those who desire to take higher-quality photographs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Memory Stick</span> Sonys removable flash memory card format, launched in July 1998

The Memory Stick is a removable flash memory card format, originally launched by Sony in late 1998. In addition to the original Memory Stick, this family includes the Memory Stick PRO, a revision that allows greater maximum storage capacity and faster file transfer speeds; Memory Stick Duo, a small-form-factor version of the Memory Stick ; the even smaller Memory Stick Micro (M2), and the Memory Stick PRO-HG, a high speed variant of the PRO to be used in high-definition video and still cameras.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Memory card</span> Electronic data storage device

A memory card is an electronic data storage device used for storing digital information, typically using flash memory. These are commonly used in digital portable electronic devices, such as digital cameras as well as in many early games consoles such as the Nintendo Wii. They allow adding memory to such devices using a card in a socket instead of protruding USB flash drives.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">CompactFlash</span> Memory card format

CompactFlash (CF) is a flash memory mass storage device used mainly in portable electronic devices. The format was specified and the devices were first manufactured by SanDisk in 1994.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">SD card</span> Type of memory storage for portable devices

Secure Digital, officially abbreviated as SD, is a proprietary, non-volatile, flash memory card format the SD Association (SDA) developed for use in portable devices.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MultiMediaCard</span> Memory card format

MultiMediaCard, officially abbreviated as MMC, is a memory card standard used for solid-state storage. Unveiled in 1997 by SanDisk and Siemens, MMC is based on a surface-contact low-pin-count serial interface using a single memory stack substrate assembly, and is therefore much smaller than earlier systems based on high-pin-count parallel interfaces using traditional surface-mount assembly such as CompactFlash. Both products were initially introduced using SanDisk NOR-based flash technology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">USB flash drive</span> Data storage device

A flash drive is a data storage device that includes flash memory with an integrated USB interface. A typical USB drive is removable, rewritable, and smaller than an optical disc, and usually weighs less than 30 g (1 oz). Since first offered for sale in late 2000, the storage capacities of USB drives range from 8 megabytes to 256 gigabytes (GB), 512 GB and 1 terabyte (TB). As of 2023, 2 TB flash drives were the largest currently in production. Some allow up to 100,000 write/erase cycles, depending on the exact type of memory chip used, and are thought to physically last between 10 and 100 years under normal circumstances.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">SmartMedia</span> Memory card format

SmartMedia is an obsolete flash memory card standard owned by Toshiba, with capacities ranging from 2 MB to 128 MB. The format mostly saw application in the early 2000s in digital cameras and audio production. SmartMedia memory cards are no longer manufactured.

A hybrid drive is a logical or physical computer storage device that combines a faster storage medium such as solid-state drive (SSD) with a higher-capacity hard disk drive (HDD). The intent is adding some of the speed of SSDs to the cost-effective storage capacity of traditional HDDs. The purpose of the SSD in a hybrid drive is to act as a cache for the data stored on the HDD, improving the overall performance by keeping copies of the most frequently used data on the faster SSD drive.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lexar</span> American brand of flash memory products

Lexar International is a brand of flash memory products, formerly American-owned, now manufactured by the Chinese memory company, Longsys.

This table provides summary of comparison of various flash memory cards, as of 2017.

AVCHD is a file-based format for the digital recording and playback of high-definition video. It is H.264 and Dolby AC-3 packaged into the MPEG transport stream, with a set of constraints designed around camcorders.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Memory card reader</span>

A memory card reader is a device for accessing the data on a memory card such as a CompactFlash (CF), Secure Digital (SD) or MultiMediaCard (MMC). Most card readers also offer write capability, and together with the card, this can function as a pen drive.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">SanDisk portable media players</span> Line of portable media players

SanDisk has produced a number of flash memory-based digital audio and portable media players since 2005. The current range of products bears the SanDisk Clip name. SanDisk players were formerly marketed under the Sansa name until 2014.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eye-Fi</span> Company producing Wi-Fi enabled memory cards

Eye-Fi was a company based in Mountain View, California, that produced SD memory cards with Wi-Fi capabilities. Using an Eye-Fi card inside a digital camera, one could wirelessly and automatically upload digital photos to a local computer or a mobile device such as a smartphone or tablet computer. The company ceased business in 2016.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">BeagleBoard</span> Single board computer

The BeagleBoard is a low-power open-source single-board computer produced by Texas Instruments in association with Digi-Key and Newark element14. The BeagleBoard was also designed with open source software development in mind, and as a way of demonstrating the Texas Instrument's OMAP3530 system-on-a-chip. The board was developed by a small team of engineers as an educational board that could be used in colleges around the world to teach open source hardware and software capabilities. It is also sold to the public under the Creative Commons share-alike license. The board was designed using Cadence OrCAD for schematics and Cadence Allegro for PCB manufacturing; no simulation software was used.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fujifilm FinePix HS10</span> Camera model

The Fujifilm FinePix HS10 is an ultrazoom bridge camera from Fujifilm that was announced in February 2010. It is the first model of the Fujifilm FinePix HS series.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">CFexpress</span> Memory card format

CFexpress is a standard for removable media cards proposed by the CompactFlash Association (CFA). The standard uses the NVM Express protocol over a PCIe 3.0 interface with 1 to 4 lanes where 1 GB/s data can be provided per lane. There are multiple form factors that feature different PCIe lane counts. One of the goals is to unify the ecosystem of removable storage by being compatible with standards already widely adopted, such as PCIe and NVMe. There already is a wide range of controllers, software and devices that use these standards, accelerating adoption.

References

  1. ↑ SanDisk Introduces One Gigabyte xD-Picture Card; New High-Megapixel Olympus and Fuji Cameras Spark Demand for High-Capacity xD-Picture Cards
  2. ↑ "Memory cards past, present and future – What you need to know about the different card formats". 7 December 2017.
  3. ↑ "Introduction of OLYMPUS PEN E-P1 Micro Four Thirds interchangeable lens system camera". Olympus Corporation. 16 June 2009. Archived from the original on 16 April 2010. June 16, 2009 [..] Olympus [..] is pleased to announce the OLYMPUS PEN E-P1
  4. ↑ Olympus America Inc. – CCS Department. "Archived Products &gt E-P1". Olympusamerica.com. Archived from the original on December 22, 2010. Retrieved 2011-07-05. Memory: SD Memory Card(SDHC compatible) [xD cards are not included in entry]
  5. ↑ "The New Olympus FE Series Just May Be The World's Smartest Entry-Level Cameras". Olympusamerica.com. 2010-01-07. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  6. ↑ "Return From Life's Everyday Adventures With High Definition Proof: The New Olympus STYLUS TOUGH-3000". Olympusamerica.com. 2010-01-07. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  7. ↑ "Are You Ready For Your Closeup? Three Olympus Stylus Cameras Zoom In With Style". Olympusamerica.com. 2010-01-07. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  8. ↑ "New Olympus Stylus Tough Cameras Dare To Go Where Other Point-And-Shoots Fear To Tread". Olympus America. February 2, 2010. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  9. ↑ "Extreme Power In A Portable Package: Olympus SP Series Ultra-Zoom Cameras Delivers Up To 30X Wide Angle Optical Zoom". Olympus America. February 2, 2010. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  10. ↑ "Powerfully Simple: Introducing The Incredible Olympus PEN E-PL1 Camera". Olympus America. February 3, 2010. Archived from the original on 2011-06-06. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  11. ↑ "Best Sellers: Best xD-Picture Cards". Amazon . Retrieved 6 September 2021.
  12. ↑ ASIN   B0000YVEHE
  13. ↑ "Olympus 1 GiB xD". Steves-digicams.com. 2005-02-15. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  14. ↑ "Olympus Type H xD". Steves-digicams.com. 2005-11-28. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  15. ↑ "Faster xD Picture Cards launched: Digital Photography Review". Dpreview.com. 2008-01-23. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  16. ↑ "Olympus Introduces New High-Speed xD-Picture Card For Digital Cameras". Olympus Press Pass. 2008-01-22. Archived from the original on 2009-02-20. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  17. ↑ "FE-Series : xD Compatibility Chart". Olympus America. Archived from the original on 2011-06-29. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  18. ↑ "Card Adapter". Fujifilm Global. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  19. ↑ How to obtain xD-Picture Card License Archived July 3, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
  20. ↑ "JuiceBox UMDCart". eLinux.org. 2011-04-11. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  21. 1 2 "Alauda Linux Driver Development". AlaudaProject. SourceForge. Archived from the original on 2010-09-24. Project complete: merged into upstream Linux kernel.
  22. 1 2 "XD Media Specification". AlaudaProject. SourceForge. Archived from the original on 25 September 2010.
  23. 1 2 "xD card pinout". Pinouts.ru. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  24. ↑ NAND Design Guide
  25. ↑ "xD NAND Flash Reader". Brandonu.googlepages.com. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  26. ↑ "Read Embedded Flash Chips". Uchobby.com. 2007-05-05. Retrieved 2011-07-05.
  27. ↑ "Olympus Panorama Header". Robert Haus. 2007-12-09. Archived from the original on October 27, 2009. Retrieved 2011-07-05. Restore the panorama feature on Olympus smartmedia, with a hex editor, a Zio USB smartmedia reader, the smprep.exe program that is installed with it, and Windows 98/ME/2000.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.