sdspeed
Software to verify the integrity of a flash SD card or USB device
![[cml_media_alt id='230']sdspeed-icon[/cml_media_alt]](https://www.flagsoft.com/cmswp/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/sdspeed-icon.png){kind=icon}
![[cml_media_alt id='2863']Download_on_the_Mac_App_Store_Badge_US-UK_165x40[/cml_media_alt]](https://www.flagsoft.com/cmswp/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Download_on_the_Mac_App_Store_Badge_US-UK_165x40.png){kind=icon}
You can test SD (secure digital) cards but also USB flash drives, even hard drives that are connected through USB.
Are you looking for SD card speed test on a Mac, how to check speed of memory card, SD card speed test,
flash card read write test, how to check SD card speed or software to measure micro SD performance?
Is your SD Flash Memory Card or USB Flash Drive fake?
SD Card Speed Test, H2testw for Mac), Pen Drive, USB Flash Drive, SD card benchmark
Download via PayPal below, first like it 😉
![[cml_media_alt id='2894']sdspeed-2.0.1-10-1GB-report[/cml_media_alt]](https://www.flagsoft.com/cmswp/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/sdspeed-2.0.1-10-1GB-report.png)
Features
Note: Use at your own risk. Make always a full backup first of your OS X system and your external cards you are testing.
- Allows you to disable Spotlight searching for devices. This does improve performance on your SD card or USB memory devices
- Does support USB flash drives as well as external USB hard disks
- Full report for your documentation
Hello, just take a little poll, just 1 (one) question:
![[cml_media_alt id='2883']sdspeed-wordmap.001[/cml_media_alt]](https://www.flagsoft.com/cmswp/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/sdspeed-wordmap.001-1024x768.jpeg)
[yop_poll id="1"]
This little tool sdspeed let's you speed test your USB and SD Flash Drives Cards. There are many Flash Frauds and a need to fight them. This utility can check SD Flash Cards, USB Flash Drive, Pen Drive, Memory Stick. It does an extensive write and read test. So every single bit will be tested if it can be written and afterwards read back. It does this by test for Counterfeit or Fake USB flash drives, and check your USB Flash Drive for errors. It works basically with any USB memory device like USB harddisks.
Fake flash, data corruption from flash memory chips, class speed under performing, fake memory card, fake memory chips altered to lie about their true size (Hacked Memory). The black market is strong. More then 1,000,000 flash memory chips are "upgraded" and manipulated every month and many brand name manufacturers such as: SanDisk, Transcend, Sony, ADATA, Kingston Technologies, Lexar and RITEK have been impacted.
sdspeed is the only product that measure the read and write rate of your SD memory card you can trust based on open-source software
(Deutsch:) sdspeed ist das einzige Produkt das Hersteller unabhängig die Lese- und Schreib Rate Ihrer SD Speicherkarte misst, basiert auf open-source software
Need for Speed
The SD Association 1 defines standard speed classes indicating minimum performance to record video. Both read and write speeds must exceed the specified value. The specification defines these classes in terms of performance curves that translate into the following minimum read-write performance levels on an empty card and suitability for different applications (Source: Wikipedia):
| Class | Minimum performance | Application |
|---|---|---|
| Class 2 | 2 MB/s | SD video recording |
| Class 4 | 3 MB/s | High-definition video (HD) recording including Full HD (from 720p to 1080p/1080i) |
| Class 6 | 4 MB/s | -- "" -- (same as above) |
| Class 10 | 5 MB/s | Full HD (1080p) video recording and consecutive recording of HD stills (high-speed data bus) |
| UHS Speed Class 1 (U1) | 10 MB/s | Real-time broadcasts and large HD video files (UHS bus) |
| UHS Speed Class 3 (U3) | 30 MB/s | 4K video files (UHS bus) |
How to spot a fake product
So you bought an USB Flash Drive of tremendous gigantic capacity (up to 2 terra bytes) and you are not sure if it can store really such a huge amount of memory?
There are many different variants.
Category: Empty parts
This is funny! There are products which are just empty.
Symptoms
- The device looks perfect. But it's only the housing
- The device is in fact empty. There is no electronics chip inside or whatsoever. Just a peace of plastic
![[cml_media_alt id='1352']Empty device[/cml_media_alt]](https://www.flagsoft.com/cmswp/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/64GB-empty-1024x768.jpg)
Category: Broken parts or Drive's Showing the Wrong Capacity
![[cml_media_alt id='1460']IMG_5470[/cml_media_alt]](https://www.flagsoft.com/cmswp/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/IMG_5470-1024x768.jpg)
Well, the product does look perfect - and it is maybe, probably. BUT it's maybe a broken or rejected device, which then was dropped out from the factory which does indeed produce real storage products. But as usual, not any product makes it to the customer. Why? Because they fail to pass the final quality control test. These are failed, broken devices.
Symptoms
- The device does in fact report 64 GB free space on your system but it can not read back such an amount of space
- The device will show for example 64 GB free space but in reality it can store (read) only 7 to 8 GB
- The device can store maybe 64 GB, but you will not be able to read back all data later on
- Often there is a label glued on it which says 64 GB or whatever.
It's not clear if these are just broken parts or if it's possible to use special software to make the device report much more space then it really has.
![[cml_media_alt id='1371']sdspeed-fake-size[/cml_media_alt]](https://www.flagsoft.com/cmswp/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/sdspeed-fake-size.png)
See what's inside.
FAQ
Q: How to disable Spotlight manually?
You can exclude a specific folder from the Spotlight index from System Preferences, by adding .noindex to the end of its name, or by creating an empty file named .metadata_never_index inside it.
- adding
.noindexto the end of the folder's name, or - creating an empty file
.metadata_never_indexinside the folder (eg withtouch yourfolder/.metadata_never_index)
Q: How to reenable Spotlight indexing on an SD Card?
A:
Spotlight: How to re-index folders or volumes
Learn how to re-index a folder or an entire volume for Spotlight.
- From the Apple () menu, choose System Preferences.
- Click Spotlight.
- Click the Privacy tab.
- Drag a folder or an entire volume (your hard drive) to the list.
- If prompted for confirmation, click OK.
- Remove the item or volume you just added to the list by clicking it and then clicking the minus ("-") button.
- Close Spotlight preferences.
Spotlight will re-index the contents of the folder or volume.
Source: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201716
Q: I can't write on my SD card, it's read only even if you put the switch to unlock position.
A: Finder says "you can only read" or so. Maybe the switch on the SD card is not good and/or does not held in place. Maybe fixating with a thin tape can help. Other reported it worked for them to put the micro switch in a middle position. I don't think this will help but you never now. Just try it.
![[cml_media_alt id='2115']sd-card-lock-unlock-switch-problem.001[/cml_media_alt]](https://www.flagsoft.com/cmswp/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/sd-card-lock-unlock-switch-problem.001.jpg)
Q: Can a SD Card get broken by ESD, Electrostatic Discharge (Educational Video from Apple)?
A: Yes. So make sure you are discharged before handling with memory like SD Cards, USB Sticks, etc.
Any none conductive materials like plastic can be electrically charged. For example a simple foil, synthetics fabrics, walking on the floor, etc.
So it's best not to touch any device if you are charged to handle it safely.
More over, it can be working but fail later on the field.
For more information see teaching Video from Apple about ESD:
Q: My SD Card / USB Stick does not get recognized any more. What can I do?
A: First, clean the blank connection pins with pure alcohol. I had an USB-Connector on an SONY MICRO FAULT TINY 1GB Stick which was not recognized at all. I just cleaned the blank pins a bit and it works fine now.
Q: How can I create a huge file with random numbers in it?
A: Just use this command in a Terminal
Enter the command without the leading $ sign. This is just your prompt.
Why 1048576? This is just 1024 * 1024 which is 1 mega byte. And 1024 megabytes are 1 giga byte.
$ dd if=/dev/random of=file.txt bs=1048576 count=1024
$ ls -lh file.txt -rw-r--r-- 1 myself staff 1.0G Oct 2 12:50 file.txt $
Q: My SD Card does not format! Please help!
(You can not format your SD Card. Can't format SDHC card.)
A: Try SD Formatter from the sdcard.org Association itself.
Download SD Formatter 4.0 for SD/SDHC/SDXC
https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_4/index.html
This software formats all SD memory cards, SDHC memory cards and SDXC memory cards. SD Formatter provides quick and easy access to the full capabilities of your SD, SDHC and SDXC memory cards.
The SD Formatter was created specifically for memory cards using the SD/SDHC/SDXC standards. It is strongly recommended to use the SD Formatter instead of formatting utilities provided with operating systems that format various types of storage media. Using generic formatting utilities may result in less than optimal performance for your memory cards.
The SD/SDHC/SDXC memory cards have a "Protected Area" on the card for the SD standard's security function. The SD Formatter does not format the "Protected Area". Please use appropriate application software or SD-compatible device that provides SD security function to format the "Protected Area" in the memory card.
Q: How to speed up your Pen Drive up to 30% on Windows
A: Format with NTFS
This will speed up data transfer by up to 30%. Also format your pen drive with NTFS, as FAT32 has restrictions.
1. Right click the pen drive properties from my computer
2. Under the hardware tab you will find your pen drive. Highlight and click properties.
3. Under "polices" change the option from "optimize for quick removal" to "optimize for quick performance"
4. Done!
More
About the SD and SDXC card slot (Apple HT Page)
"Some Mac computers feature an SD (Secure Digital) or SDXC (SD extended capacity) card slot that enables these computers to read and write data to SD media inserted in the slot. Learn more about the SD and SDXC card slot." For more information visit: https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT204384
Support
Just leave a message below.
Helpful?
Notes:
I have just tested the sdspeed app on a 16GB Class 4 SDHC card and found that it takes about 30 seconds or so to speed up to the actual WRITE speed of the card and the results then stabilise, giving an accurate reading of 4.8MBps.
However, at that point it is only about !% through testing the Write speed and I want to test the READ speed.
It looks as though I would have to wait a very long time before the READ test begins.
Is there any way to switch to the READ test quickly?
Hmm… I think it’s because the test application does first write data then read it. So you have to wait after it has written the whole space on your SD card for a serious read test of *all* your “sectors” on your SD card.
It’s true that you have to wait for a long time if your SD card is slow and/or has much space to offer.
BUT: After all you can be sure that it has tested the whole SD card memory space. If you can read and write the first few mega bytes does not mean that you can read and write the whole SD card space.
With this test, you can be sure about it.
Other tests read and write only the same file over and over again which is surely faster but does – in my opinion – not measure the true put through speed of read and write cycles over the whole space available on a SD card.
Also if other tests read and write the same file over and over again: They can fool the testing by internal caching mechanisms.
For version 1.0.1 please check GitHub.
The version 1.01 doesn’t recognize my cards, the 1.0 was good.
Please download it again. The .app file of 09.OCT.2013 was faulty. Should work now.
both apps quit when i hit start. every time.
Hmm… start it from command line (terminal) with
$ ./sdspeed.app/Contents/MacOS/sdspeedand see if it prints out some errors. Do also a
$ file ./sdspeed.app/Contents/MacOS/sdspeedwhich should give you:
./sdspeed.app/Contents/MacOS/sdspeed: Mach-O 64-bit x86_64 executable———
I think I found it. It happens when you did insert a Card, then after the run has been completed, just removed it (by hand, not unmounting it)… the Start button remains clickable.. if you then hit Start, the app will quit.
You can force to redo the status by just clicking on the sdspeed icon within the window on top lef, the black logo of a symbolic SD card.
Hey…thanks for your reply.
I have not been able to even do a first run.
I tried clicking the sdspeed icon on top left and tried again but nothing.
I am not very good at terminal and do not understand what you mean when you put $ . or $ file . so the tests on terminal come out as -bash: $: command not found
Hello HL
Let me explain what I mean so you can understand:
Terminal: It’s just a so called Shell, like DOS-BOX etc. where you can type in commands, list and view and execute applications, etc.
So if you open Terminal, the “black hole” window will appear. There the so called Prompt starts always with a dollar sign ($).
(What someone would type in within the Terminal is in bold here.)
So if I write please type in:
$ ls
that means that you type in “ls” within the Terminal application to execute the command ls which stands for listen files within the current folder.
Just try it!
Let me know if you succeed.
Type in also uname -a like so:
$ uname -a
(without the leading dollar sign)
which gives you your precise machine name and system you use. Example, if I type in this command my Terminal looks like this:
——————-
$ uname -a
Darwin michael 12.5.0 Darwin Kernel Version 12.5.0: Sun Sep 29 13:33:47 PDT 2013; root:xnu-2050.48.12~1/RELEASE_X86_64 x86_64
$
——————–
The same you can do to start sdspeed right from within your Terminal like so:
(Your screen will be then something like this)
——————
$ /Applications/sdspeed.app/Contents/MacOS/sdspeed
——————
(Remember without the dollar sign)
Then let me know what the output (your screen) shows up… maybe it gives us a clue what’s going on.
Best regards, Michael
BTW: There are good video tutorials out there on youtube, etc.
Thanks for explaining Michael.
Once i typed the command without the $ sign this is what showed up.
First it opened up the app and this appeared:
Andress-MacBook-Pro:~ hardline$ /Applications/sdspeed.app/Contents/MacOS/sdspeed2013-10-23 11:54:14.424 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:14.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:14.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:14.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:14.427 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:14.427 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:14.427 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:16.424 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:16.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:16.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:16.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:16.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:16.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:16.427 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:18.424 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:18.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:18.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:18.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:18.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:18.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:18.427 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:20.424 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:20.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:20.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:20.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:20.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:20.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:20.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:22.423 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:22.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:22.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:22.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:22.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:22.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:22.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:24.423 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:24.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:24.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:24.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:24.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:24.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:24.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:26.424 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:26.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:26.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:26.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:26.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:26.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:26.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:28.423 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:28.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:28.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:28.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:28.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:28.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:28.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:30.423 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:30.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:30.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:30.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:30.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:30.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:30.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:32.423 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:32.423 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:32.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:32.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:32.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:32.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:32.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:34.423 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:34.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:34.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:34.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:34.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:34.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:34.426 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:36.422 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:36.423 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:36.423 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:36.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:36.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:36.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:36.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:38.423 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:38.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:38.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:38.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:38.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:38.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:38.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2013-10-23 11:54:40.422 sdspeed[9716:707] DEBUG:
2013-10-23 11:54:40.423 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:40.423 sdspeed[9716:707] – Name (local) = HARDLINE
2013-10-23 11:54:40.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 14.9 (GB)
2013-10-23 11:54:40.424 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes)
2013-10-23 11:54:40.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Capacity = 16013066240 (Bytes UI)
2013-10-23 11:54:40.425 sdspeed[9716:707] – Read only = 0
2
over and over again …it wouldnt stop.
Then once i hit the start button, the application quits and this appeared on the terminal:
Creating file 1.fff … sdspeed: Can’t create file /Volumes/HARDLINE/1.fff: Permission denied
Creating file 1.fff … sdspeed: Can’t create file /Volumes/HARDLINE/1.fff: Permission denied
——-
Check if you can write a file on you card. Check also under which user account sdspeed runs. Just go to applications folder click or select sdspeed. Then hit cmd+i for information. In the bottom you can see under which username and group sdspeed will be executed. Show me a screenshot and change it to your username and group.
Hi Michale,
Firstly, thank you for the software as I’ve had rather questionable SD cards in the past but had no real way of testing!
I ran sdspeed and it ran the Write test fine but stayed on 100% and would not run the Read test! One thing I noticed was that the button had changed to “Please wait Start Speed test” and was still greyed out. I left it like this for 5 minutes and nothing happened so I quit the app. My spec’s are:
Model Name: Mac Pro
Model Identifier: MacPro3,1
Processor Name: Quad-Core Intel Xeon
Processor Speed: 2.8 GHz
Number of Processors: 2
Total Number of Cores: 8
Memory: 14 GB
Mac OS: 10.9 Mavericks
I do apologise for mis-spelling your name!
It’s validating the files afterwards, which can take time, it seems.
Does the choice of card reader affect the results? If so, any recommendation on a reader that gives best (ie. most accurate) results?
Hello David. The card reader does in fact affect the results. Some users reported this. I do not have a special card reader, but basically I think it’s best to use the built in card reader on your mac. (Basically as less wires in between your card and your computer.) If you test your card on USB make sure you use the *nearest* one to your computer (builtin) not external USB adapters for best results. Hope that helps.
Thanks, Michael. Yes, I found that the results were different whether I use the built-in SD reader or an external USB one. Thanks for the explanation.
I have a SanDisk Extreme Plus 32GB SDHC (Read: 80MB/s, Write: 60MB/s). When I use sdspeed 1.0.1, it shows Read: 49MB/s, Write: 46MB/s. However, when I use AJA System Test, it shows Read:82MB/s, Write: 46MB/s. AJA System Test is showing the correct read speed. Is this a limitation of sdspeed?
AJA System Test – http://www.aja.com/en/software
1) Just try “Version 1.1 (BETA)”, and disable and remove Spotlight for your SD-Card. Spotlight starts automatically for some SD-Cards if you plug in an SD-Card which slows down measurements.
Let me know how the results reads after disabling and remove Spotlight on your SD-Card.
2) Depending on how the testing is done, it can be that the results may vary. (Note that sdspeed tests your whole SD-Card, bit for bit just to make sure that any bit on your SD cards works just fine. So it fills up the SD card first and then reads it back and check if the pattern written is equal with the pattern read.)
I just found this little gem, and was reading through the comments section.
Michael, I just wanted to say thank you for being so awesome and patient in explaining in detail what needs to be done! You sir, are a great person!
Thank you for being you 😉
Warm regards,
Isa
Thank you!
I tried this with a SanDisk Extreme 128GB on Macbook Pro mid-2010 (7,1). The card should read and write at 45MB/s according to the spec.
Write test took several hours, and came up with about 14MB/s. Based on what I read on the internet, that’s a limitation of built-in card reader.
It now says “Do read test please wait”, but no read test is happening. Instead, the whole computer has gone very slow and the processor fan is running fast. I left it for several hours and still it is the same. Looking in Activity Monitor, sdspeed seems to use only around 2% of CPU and very little memory. It has got up to 8 threads now though. To get the computer back to normal, I had to do a full reboot – closing sdspeed alone didn’t help. So sdspeed has somehow really messed up the OS! Oh dear!!
In any case it seems like for some reason sdspeed doesn’t work with my computer or with this card.
Thank you for your report. It’s difficult to say what the problem could be from a distance. Is this device you have tested (“SanDisk Extreme 128GB”) an external harddrive? 128GB is a huge amount of data. If you test external harddrives (basically any device with movable parts in it) with such a huge amount of data can get very very hot… be sure you cool down it if needed during the test with good air-flow around the device. This is all I can say at the moment. sdspeed does check any data on a disk. Best use is for a little amount of data. Maybe in future version there needs to be an option where you can setup the amount of data which should be tested, to limit it to about 2 GB or whatever.
The device I tested is a flash SD card like any other (UHS-I to be precise) so no moving parts. Here’s the manufacturer’s page: http://www.sandisk.co.uk/products/memory-cards/sd/extreme-uhs-1-45mbs/?capacity=128GB
Also, it was completely empty when I tested it: no data at all.
I should also say that this was under OSX Mavericks, in case that makes any difference.
Ok, thank. I am not running on OS X Mavericks. Still Mountain Lion. Don’t know if it’s make a difference… Maybe testing with just a normal USB-Memeory Stick with 4 GB or less to compare.
I ran the beta version and I was getting just over 5MB/S.
Then I installed and ran 1.01 and now getting just over 6 MB/S
Same card on mavericks os.
Which is correct ?
Hmm… strange. I really don’t know. The only difference is that you have the option to disable spotlight on the external drive with the beta version.
So maybe checking again with spotlight disabled for both versions just to make sure that you run your testing in the same conditions / same environment. Maybe also some chaching take in place.
Sorry got another problem in the 1.01 version the read test does not start.
Its been about 3 hours (32gb card) and nothing is happening.
Ignore that, it just gave me a read speed.
It would be nice to know its doing something whilst waiting.
thanks
This is a great tool, however i’m just trying to understand the logic behind running the test by writing across the entire SD card, this makes sense with HDDs since the read/write speed varies from the edges towards the center. but thats not the case with SDD as far as i know.
Your comment system is faulty. Blocked a useful comment as spam!!
I need to manually approve any comments.
sdspeed can take a few minutes during the read test without feedback to the user, which should be improved with a progress bar or so.
Thanks for the useful tool! It works great and revealed some problems with one particular CF card which were shown by writing the files to the whole card. The slowdown only happened on 20% of the card. –
Hi, is this app supported on Mac OS X 10.6.8?
I cannot get it to work – my Mac says there is no application to open the downloaded app/file.
What do you mean by “my Mac says there is no application to open the downloaded app/file.” ? – You can not start the application? Send me a screenshot.
Start the application also within the command line:
My-MacBook-Pro:~ $ /Applications/sdspeed.app/Contents/MacOS/sdspeed
… log here…
BTW: Send me your e-mail address on the Contact formular. I built a version for 10.6.x. But I can’t test it. You are welcome to do it.
Hi again, here’s my email address for your eyes only:
***
I tried reinstalling the app and opening it again, this time my mac says that it needs os x 10.7 and above. Not sure how I got the previous error message, but it basically said something like, “There is no application to open this type of file”.
Thanks!
Hi there, I tried the software and it showed me speed after the test, however I am not able to use the card anymore in the camera. I tried format use camera it won’t help. And the card can’t be formatted in PC. I checked the card is not locked.
Any idea how can I fix this problem?
Thanks
See below for answer for more information.
Try SD Formatter from the sdcard.org Association itself
https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_4/index.html
Any idea why after running the app to test my SDHC card, the card seems locked, I can find the card in camera, Mac or PC with proper size, however I can’t use in camera or format. Any solution for this? Thanks
Hello
Maybe your card is corrupted.
Try the following in this order:
1) Use SD Card Formatter from sdcard.org SD Card Association
From there notes:
—-
This software formats all SD memory cards, SDHC memory cards and SDXC memory cards. SD Formatter provides quick and easy access to the full capabilities of your SD, SDHC and SDXC memory cards.
The SD Formatter was created specifically for memory cards using the SD/SDHC/SDXC standards. It is strongly recommended to use the SD Formatter instead of formatting utilities provided with operating systems that format various types of storage media. Using generic formatting utilities may result in less than optimal performance for your memory cards.
The SD/SDHC/SDXC memory cards have a “Protected Area” on the card for the SD standard’s security function. The SD Formatter does not format the “Protected Area”. Please use appropriate application software or SD-compatible device that provides SD security function to format the “Protected Area” in the memory card.
—
Download SD Formatter here for Mac and Windows https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_4/index.html
2) Try Uisk Utility on a Mac first and create new PARTITION on your SD Card
But try Disk Utility first, make a new PARTITION first, then FORMAT with FAT or whatever. Let me know it it worked. Try to FORMAT with FAT32.
3) If all this fails, it could be a corrupted card and you should be able to return to the store for exchange.
Thanks, I will try tonight. The card was ok before the test, but I pull it out after the write test, I thought the app stopped working at that time.
But strangely I have no problem rerun the test use your app, just can’t use it anywhere else.
Seems my card is write protected, even though I have not set the switch to “lock”. Somehow the sdspeed app can still write/read and calculate the speed.
I am able to see the files in the card and copy to my desktop…..
Very strange, really appreciated if anyone can help, thanks.
Hmm… maybe it’s because the “lock pin” on the SD Card is sometimes very loose. Please check that first. Try to fix it in the read/write position with some little tape.
If this not helps, try this:
On a Mac system:
(TBD To be defined)
On a Windows system:
Start command line “cmd”. Start, enter “cmd”
Type in: diskpart // start diskpart util
DISKPART> select disk 1 // Note: replace the number with your number of your SD card
DISKPART> attributes disk clear readonly
DISKPART> exit
Let me know if it worked.
I also find out that sometimes an SD-Card can block doing anything – just it was formatted on an other device (Digital camera for example). So go back to the device you had formatted the card, and try to format it from there. Anything then should be OK.
Another thing is: I was able to read an other SD-Card on my Mac but not on a Windows machine. Strange things can happens. Maybe it has to do how the sd-card reader slot and the OS handles it.
hiya
first thing – thanks for this app. It’s really really helpful. I’m testing a 128gb SD card I bought in hong Kong. The write test seems to go ok and gets to 128gb, but then it seems to stop before doing the read test. I left it to run overnight but in the morning it looks like the app has gone back to the start of the process with the read and write speeds at zero and the button saying “start”. There is no message abut success or failure of the read test. What should I be seeing after a successful or failed read test?
Hello, thank you for your report! I know this problem, 128 GB SD is a bit huge for this application but more and more commonly used sizes. – Best thing you can do is copy a 1 GB file (.avi .mov or so) a movie or so to the SD Card again and again and see if it can play back… if it’s faulty (read-failure) then it will store maybe up to 6 GB but not more. It’s not a fully read/write test I know, but you can do it this way for now – new version is on the way.
Hi!
You mention a new version able to check 128GB cards some months ago. I tried version 1.1 Beta now, and it did the same for me as mentioned in the original comment. Is there a newer version which I could not find? If so, could you revert with a link to this version?
Thank you for the software! Bying fake cards aint fun!
Regards Frank
“and it did the same for me as mentioned in the original comment.” – can you repeat please, I can’t remember, too much going on right now. (I think it was too slow… etc. or don’t show progress for the read-process?) – There is no new version right now. It also should do maybe a short write/write just at the beginning to have an idea what the expected results might be in terms of speed measurement. Then a full test should be performed, to see if the card is throughout read and writable till the last bit on it.
Thanks for the app! I have a questionable 64Gb card that tested fine, and the first 8Gb of the card seems to work, but any files copied onto the card after the 8Gb are corrupted. Any ideas? Using a MacMini running Yosemite.
Hello, thank you for using SD-Speed. If it fails to get-back data after about 8 GB: This is a typical problem so called FAKE or defect SD-Cards has.
Problem A) Maybe the chip was originally designed to hold up to 64 GB and you are able to write to it up to 64 GB without any problems, but you can not read it back. In this case the card came defect from the production and are through away for so called backdoor-selling.
Or, problem B) The card was never ever be able to hold up to 64 GB, instead someone used a special tool to look-like it can hold that much space, but it can’t. This is faking the total amount of memory shown by your computer operating system.
I think it’s problem A), the product was defect after a test right after the production process and through out for backdoor-selling. Just ask the seller for a refund, by showing them screenshots of your extensive testing.
I bought a pack of 10 “San Disk” micro SD cards on Ebay. They are described as “Class 4” and are marked as such (The number 4 inside the “C”). I ran the sdspeed test (version 1.1(1) on one of the Micro cards. The test was conducted after (presumably) removing spotlight (I re-inserted the card when instructed), in the SD card slot of my iMac late 2009 version.
The results show capacity as 7.4 GB with a write speed of 8.06MB/s and a read speed of 15.48MB/s.
These last two numbers are much higher than I was expecting. Class 4 is supposed to have a minimum read&write speed of 3MB/s.
I tested the same disk a second time and the write speed came in at 7.89 MB/s and the read speed at 18.31MB/s
These results beat those of both class 6 and 10, yet it is only supposed to be a Class 4 SD card.
What’s going on here? Is it normal for a San Disk SD card performance to be so far ahead of its specification?
What comment should I make on the Ebay seller?
Hello, hmm… interesting. As far as they are really faster be happy 🙂 But just to make sure it really is that way, you maybe need to do a manual test. Just copy a 1 GB file with random contents (or a movie/video) to the card up to it’s full size. Then try to “view” them or to write back somewhere on your computers hosts hardware. (This is just to see if it really works… or does it read-back zeros?) – Or simply insert one of them in a DSLR camera and enable the “paparazzi-mode” I call it which is just continues-shot. Then do the work, shot as long as you can and see and feel how it performs compared to other cards you already have. Then maybe you can comment a better more accurate statement for the seller.
A second Class 4 disk from the same batch gave the following readings:
Write 3.83 MB/s
Read 16.43 MB/s
The SD cards are supposed to be identical, but the readings are different.
I think these are good values. Class 4 means 4 MB/s at least.
Not sure if my previous message got through. I was flagged as “SPAM”, so here it is again with the words of that auction seller starred out:
I bought a pack of 10 “San Disk” micro SD cards on Eb…y. They are described as “Class 4” and are marked as such (The number 4 inside the “C”). I ran the sdspeed test (version 1.1(1) on one of the Micro cards. The test was conducted after (presumably) removing spotlight (I re-inserted the card when instructed), in the SD card slot of my iMac late 2009 version.
The results show capacity as 7.4 GB with a write speed of 8.06MB/s and a read speed of 15.48MB/s.
These last two numbers are much higher than I was expecting. Class 4 is supposed to have a minimum read&write speed of 3MB/s.
I tested the same disk a second time and the write speed came in at 7.89 MB/s and the read speed at 18.31MB/s
These results beat those of both class 6 and 10, yet it is only supposed to be a Class 4 SD card.
What’s going on here? Is it normal for a San Disk SD card performance to be so far ahead of its specification?
What comment should I make on the Eb….y seller?
Hmm… thanks for your report. At least this one did go trough. – Interesting results. I assume that you don’t have a read/write buffer in between the chip and your Mac. So maybe you are just lucky and / or they did put a wrong label on it… you never know… 🙂
(I would do an other test just to make sure that it feels also faster… take a huge 1 GB file, and copy it as many as possible on the SD card or put it on a hi-speed DSLR digital camera and enable the trigger for continues shots. Then press the shutter down and hold it and see if the your SD card saves your images as fast as the shutter opens and closes… about 3 or 4 times a second… and measure how long this will last. On a fast chip you will be able to shoot many images in continues mode within a few seconds.)
—
See above FAQ how to create huge files with random bytes in it.
The test ended with these lines:
Removing old file 13.fff …
Removing old file 14.fff …
Removing old file 15.fff …
2015.11.29 22:12:45 – all done.
2015.11.29 22:12:45 – ——————————-
Does it mean the files were saved correctly or not?
Yes, this is the end of the test. If there is no error above in the log, everything seems to be Ok.
I understand that this application is mostly to test the speed of the SD card, but how can I know if it’s a fake SD card, hacked to display a larger storage amount? Does it alert you if it cannot write anymore files, or the files are corrupt? I’m using version 1.0.1
Good point. A newer version is on it’s way… delayed… with a detailed report.
Hi. I downloaded the app from mac app store.
When I open the app i get a message saying:
“There seems to be Spotlight on your device. You can disable all Spotlight search activities on your drive and let sdspeed remove the remaining Spotlight cache folder at .Spotlight-V100 on your device.
For better performance and better speed measurements you should disable Spotlight and plug in again your device so that Spotlight is not working on your device and slows down measurements.
Note: If you later want to re-activate Spotlight for your device then just delete the file
/Volumes/DISK_IMG/.metadata_never_index and plug in again your device.”
If I click cancel, it just pops up again and doesn’t let me continue.
If I follow the instructions:
You need to plug in again your device to disable Spotligt. So please unmount your device and plug it in again. This also makes sure that there is no caching re-used. Then come back here and click OK.
Once I click “OK” the first message pops up again and I go through the cycle once more.
If I manually delete spotlight folder from the sd card, then open sdspeed i don’t get the spotlight message, but when I click “START” the app closes.
Any help??
Where did you get the software? Just contact support and send proof of purchase to get an up and running version.
Hi, The new download worked, I’ve tried to run it twice but when it get’s to about 1% complete (taking 5-10min) it crashes and says “sdspeed quit unexpectedly”
It writes about 4.5gb of .Tiff files.
This can’t be the case, it does not write some .Tiff files.
How about a good ol’ direct link for download? I don’t use the MAS nor social media.
There is an older version with direct download from PayPal. But then you miss some updates… this is a problem if you need updates. I have not technical solution to send you updates on that version, unfortunately right now. (If you have any idea or solution, let me know.)
There is a direct download version via PayPal on this page.
Hi I tested a Samsung 64gb class 10 micro sd card using your software the results were : started out fine at around 11MB/s write speed then at 12% write speed drops to around 5MB/s and continues to decline. Would you suggest the sd card is a fake? Thanks.
Difficult to say. Make sure that no other task like Spotlight is running on your sd card. Maybe you can fill up the space with a huge file with random numbers, how you can create one is I think shown somewhere on this page or just copy and paste a movie from youtube or whatever up to the point where you think it’s a problem with speed. Then you should recognise the speed loss also. Make also sure that you can watch the copied movies (=read back the data). If not, then something is corrupt.
Hi Bought the product but crashes as soon as it starts test please help
Please report it in the CONTACT section, report OS version, etc.
I am thinking of buying this app but I am put off by reports of having to rate it after every use. Is this still the case?
Is rating required? No, of course not. This is not the case and it never actually was. Just an other hate-speech comment, ignore them.
Recently I purchased SDSpeed, it gave me a great clear report on a legit SD card, it verified that the sd card was legit…..however my question is in regards to SDSpeed as it pertains to a non-legit card.
I obtained a SD card from a foreign vendor, I am running it thru the SDSpeed test…. it is suppose to be a 256 gb card….the SDSpeed has run for 12 hours and reports 100% complete but it is still running…… would a bogus SD card trap the tool in an endless loop? How long should I give SDSpeed time to complete its test?
Problem with sdspeed hanging/looping.
From Mac App Store I bought & installed sdspeed v.3.2.6 (16) for my macbook (2014) running MacOS Catalina 10.15.1
I tried running it on a 128GB SD in that Macbook’s SD card slot.
It appeared to work ok at first, for the first few minutes, until it got to 2.6% progress, then it just appeared stuck there, even many hours later, the window information flickering away (presumably with repeated updates). At that time, the CPU time was reported (by Activity Monitor app) as 2.75 hours.
During that time, CPU was around 2% and the card was not hot (barely lukewarm).
The write-test appeared to measure nearly 60 MB/sec. The SD card itself is specified as ~250 MB/sec (I guess the Macbook SD card interface was a bottleneck?)
Even at that (bottlenecked) rate (60 MB/s), a 128 GB card test ought to take 128000/60 sec = 2133 sec = 0.6 hours i.e. 36 minutes. Is that correct?
Of course, I’d very much appreciate help to resolve this issue.
As a final test always use your device within the target device. For SD-Cards for photo camera within your photo camera device. etc. Else you can not say if it’s fast enough or not. It all depends on the target hardware with software in conjunction. Hope that helps. You can also grab a huge file and copy it over… but these operations are very optimized depending on your OS you are using and depending on your cable you are using, etc.
Great program.
Instructions could be a little better. Somewhat confusing with the multiple screens when it starts and with disabling Spotlight.
I bought a large “stash” of new 128GB-512GB USB drives and microSD cards this year on Black Friday. Testing all of them without issues. However, I was very disappointed on the speeds of a couple of them (not your fault or problem), especially the Sandisk Ultra Fit 256GB drive – VERY SLOW.
Otherwise, it is nice to be able to entirely test the media, albeit slightly slow.
Hi, the program looks very promising however I got stuck while testing the first flash.
I’m testing PNY 256GB flash on build-in card reader on iMac 27, Late 2015, macOS BigSur 11.6.6 (20G624).
Writing test took some time and displayed 63MB/s but reading test has been working for around 24h and still in progress.
I was able to copy-paste the contents of log to TextEdit (as it is impossible to review it in sdspeed while it’s working and it’s very difficult to copy/paste as you need to be very fast as speed refreshes the log frequently).
And in the log I see the end of writing test and I believe start of reading test:
“99.99% @ 64.94 MB/s”,”99.99″,”64.94″,”MB/s”
Free space on device: 0.00 Byte
Average writing speed: 62.72 MB/s
Sectors: OK,corrupted,changed,overwritten
Validating file number 1 …
1, 0, 0, 0
10216, 24, 0, 0
28502, 42, 0, 0
The “Validating file number X” sections are going on and on. Currently this is number 105 and counting.
Look, it is 24h as of now!!!
There is no progress bar. How long it will take?
What is the plan of the application?
Couldn’t it simply display current progress like “105/xxxxx steps done”?
OK, continuing my previous comment about PNY256 flash.
Now I am more than happy. sdspeed is great!
My flash was proven to be wrong.
The only big complain is lack of progress bar.
That was REALLY annoying as the whole test took about 44h.
Additionally a quicker mode in such case would be nice or possibility to cancel and providing partial result (I didn’t tested cancel as I didn’t want to loose hours up to the moment).
Bellow is the beginning, the middle and ending of the log.
2022.07.30 09:14:04 – ——————————-
2022.07.30 09:14:04 – Start testing volume /Volumes/PNY256
2022.07.30 09:14:04 – Capacity 234.365 GB
Free space on device: 231.60 GB
“0.00% @ 2.00 KB/s”,”0.00″,”0.00″,”MB/s”
“0.00% @ 4.00 KB/s”,”0.00″,”0.00″,”MB/s”
…………
“99.96% @ 64.94 MB/s”,”99.96″,”64.94″,”MB/s”
“99.99% @ 64.94 MB/s”,”99.99″,”64.94″,”MB/s”
Free space on device: 0.00 Byte
Average writing speed: 62.72 MB/s
Sectors: OK,corrupted,changed,overwritten
Validating file number 1 …
1, 0, 0, 0
10216, 24, 0, 0
…………
Removing old file number 231 …
Removing old file number 232 …
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – all done.
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – **: Report Begin —————————————–
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 1: Volume intact ………….. : NO
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 2: Volume name…………….. : /Volumes/PNY256
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 3: Capacity (GB)…………… : 234.365 GB
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 4: Capacity (Bytes)………… : 251647754240 Bytes
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 5: Write speed average …….. : 62.72 MB/s
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 6: Write speed min (MB/s)…… : 60.49 MB/s (Mega Bytes per Seconds, 1 MB = 1000*1000 Bytes, SI)
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 7: Write speed max (MB/s)…… : 64.96 MB/s (Mega Bytes per Seconds, 1 MB = 1000*1000 Bytes, SI)
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 8: Read speed average ……… : 1.64 MB/s
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 9: DATA OK ……………….. : 195.783599 GB
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 10: DATA Lost ……………… : 35.798432 GB
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 11: DATA Corrupted …………. : 35.798432 GB
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 12: DATA Changed …………… : 0.000000 Byte
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 13: DATA Overwritten ……….. : 0.000000 Byte
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – 14: sdspeed version ………… : 4.0.0-18 (2022-03mar-31) [sandboxed]
2022.08.01 05:02:03 – **: Report End —————————————–