Lisa Compact
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In general, SD cards are consumer devices and the manufacturer is constantly under high price
pressure. To cut production costs the manufacturers look at cheaper components. These newer cards
are built with cheaper electronics, but get sold under the same product name, making it impossible for
the end user to identify.
For example, Transcend started using cheaper flash memory (TLC) to reduce costs. This type of flash
memory has a lower endurance limit than the previously used MLC memory. TLC is a good fit for low-
end basic products, but is not recommended for important applications which require frequent updating
of data.
So, although generally available SD cards might very well be acceptable for some basic consumer
electronics, certainly not all of them are acceptable for professional applications. Testing and certifying
all these SD cards would be an impossible task for Streamit. Instead Streamit contacted Transcend, the
manufacturer of the best-performing SD card at the time. Transcend agreed to custom-supply Streamit
with strictly-specified cards for professional applications.
Streamit will only officially support the use of these custom-supplied Transcend SD cards. Other
cards may always be used at own risk. Streamit will not offer free support for other memory cards.