Lexar Professional 2000x SDHC/SDXC UHS-II Review

New memory formats are coming up fast through the ranks, with CFast and CFExpress gathering pace and making an appearance on the latest cameras. However, the SD format is far from obsolete, with the new Blackmagic Pocket Cinema 6K Pro offering Dual Slot CFExpress and SD.

But while these new cameras offer ultra-high resolutions, that doesn’t always mean you need to fork out for the latest ultra-fast storage media.

While CFast and CFExpress offer incredible transfer speeds, these speeds often exceed what the cameras actually need. This means that you can opt for a slower card and save yourself a tonne of money.

The Lexar® Professional 2000x SDHC/SDXC UHS-II Cards SD is at the top end of the SD card format and is rated as UHS-II, Class 10, U3 and V90. This essentially means that it can, at present, cope with pretty much any camera data you throw at it.

The Lexar Professional 2000x SDHC/SDXC UHS-II Cards SD has been designing for professional use with transfer speeds of up to 300MB/s and recording speeds of up to 260MB/s.

These boosted transfer speeds are all made possible by the UHS-II technology, which is supported by the majority of manufactures. However, do check that your camera is capable of accessing these addition speed features.

As this card is rated UHS-II, Class 10, U3 and V90, it can cope with video up to 8K. This is quite unusual for an SD card, although it is not alone in its ability.

The card comes packed as a kit with the MobileLite Plus SD card reader; while this makes the most of the card’s transfer speeds, it is USB Type-A rather than the newer Type-C.

The card is available in either 32, 64, 128 or 256GB capacities. In this test, I’m looking at the 128GB version.

A robust build matches the card’s performance, and the card has been tested in conditions that mean it can be used in temperatures down to -25ºC and 85ºC. The Lexar® Professional 2000x SDHC/SDXC UHS-II Cards SD can also store it at temperatures between -40ºC and 85ºC.

Dimension wise the card measures in at 24 x 32 x 2.1mm and weighs in at 2g.

As SD cards go, it’s much the same as any other, just a switch of labels, and that’s about it.

Taking a look at the card’s contact side and everything seems in order with the two lines of contacts mark this out as UHS-II rather than UHS-I.

On the side is the lock switch, this write protects the card, but there’s nothing else to report other than it all looks solid enough and fits the SD card slot of the Sony A7 III without issue.

To discover how this card would perform, I started with a few standard tests in the A7 III. Firstly with the settings ramped up, recording 4K at 30fps the card performed as required.

No dropped frames, no warnings. It just did the job. Likewise, popping the card into the Blackmagic Design Pocket Cinema 6K Pro and switching to Blackmagic RAW, Constant Bitrate, 6K 6144 x 6456 and all was fine with no issue or warnings.

As ever, for a more accurate insight into the cards performance, I ran the Blackmagic Disk Speed Test with the following results.

Read = 260MB/s
Write = 200MB/s

Those scores put this card at the top of the table when it comes to a UHS-II SD card performance. These scores also show that the SD card format is far from dead.

The Lexar Professional 2000x SDHC/SDXC UHS-II Cards SD might be quarter the speed of the CFExpress cards, but then it’s also less than a quarter of the price.

In the next two tests, I wanted to see how durable the card was – so a quick temperature test to see if the card survived. An hour in the freezer and then another hour to defrost and it was time to test the card again. As before the Speed Test showed very similar results.

Finally, I dropped the card out of a first story window on to a brick pathway. At two grams, there was no actual damage to the card and both in the speed test and inside the camera, all worked as expected.

The Lexar Professional 2000x SDHC/SDXC UHS-II Cards performs exceptionally well. The read and write speeds are at the top end of this format. I was impressed that it was able to cope with use both in the Sony A7 III to record video and the Pocket Cinema 6K Pro.

After the main test, I checked out the price and was surprised to see that this model is far cheaper than many other UHS-II cards, which makes it a real bargin.

The Lexar® Professional 2000x SDHC/SDXC UHS-II Cards is a great choice for the price and performance if your shooting video or high resolution stills.