Samsung Pro Endurance 256GB Review

Sold in non-descript white packaging reminiscent of old-style supermarket home brand products, the Samsung Pro Endurance MicroSD card is marketed as the solution for surveillance, bodycam and dashcam cameras.

In reality, this Class 10 U3 V30 card offers every spec that meets the requirements of every action camera presently on the market, including GoPro 10 and Instat360 ONE RS.

This card might be UHS-I rather than the newer and even faster UHS-II technology, but still, Samsung state that the card is capable of transfer rates of 100MB/s. Breaking these transfer speeds down, you get impressive read speeds of 100MB/s and still good Write speeds of 40MB/s, more than enough for both action cameras and most Mirrorless and DSLRs, especially if you’re taking stills.

The card has also been designed with durability in mind, so it is waterproof, wear-out, X-Ray, Temperature, Magnet, and drop proof, although at the size and weight, it hardly hits the ground at speed or with force.

Through testing the Samsung Pro Endurance card was recognised in all action cameras I tried, including the Drift, Insta360 One RS, GoPro Hero10 and Garmin. In each, the card was inserted and formatted without issue and ready to record in the highest quality recording settings.

Used in each camera for around an hour and then left to record for the duration of the battery life; when there was some juice left, the card kept up with the video data, and there seemed to be no issue with the transfer or storage.

As the card is advertised as Endurance, or at least that’s in the name, and the packaging gives six points of protection, I tried each in turn. The drop test involved dropping it from a height of two meters to the ground; as you’d expect, it worked fine. I then placed a standard magnet on top with some footage stored on the card and checked the contents, and again, all was OK. Samsung suggested an MRI machine but seeing as the MRI operators are adamant that you have no metal objects on you when you enter one of these machines, I didn’t fancy asking if it was possible for this test.

I don’t have an X-Ray machine at home, so I haven’t tested this point of protection. As the card has been used for a month in and out of action cameras and card readers, it has had quite a bit of use, but not what I would call excessive. I’ll update you if I need to on the wear-out point of protection.

When it came to the temperature proof, it reached 45º in the direct sunlight, which seemed like a good time to leave it baking on a table; it worked fine after it had cooled down. Likewise, it still seemed to work fine when left in the freezer for a day, then defrosted and used. I didn’t quite get to the two temperature extremes of -25ºC and 80ºC, but it survived more than I could.

The final test was the waterproof test. I left this test until last, as this one doesn’t always go according to plan. Here I dropped the card into a glass of water and left it for 72 hours – Samsung state 72 hours under a meter of seawater – while the sea is close; I decided a glass of water was fine for various reasons.

Practical tests were out of the way, and the card was ready for the far simpler Blackmagic Disk Speed test:

Read Speed: 90MB/s
Write Speed: 75.5MB/s

Is the Samsung Pro Endurance card good? Yes, the transfer speeds are close to those that Samsung reported, and the all-important write speed was well above that stated by Samsung, so on that front, all good.

Regarding durability, there was also little to fault, I baked it, froze and submerged it in water with a sprinkling of sea salt for good measure, and it continued to work, so it does everything it is supposed to do.
However, while it is cheap at £44, there’s the Samsung EVO Plus; the same capacity card can be bought for almost £20 less, will do everything the Samsung Pro Endurance, and has a faster-stated write speed.

So, the Samsung Pro Endurance is good and cheap, but the Samsung EVO Plus is better and cheaper. I can only deduce those who own security cameras and body and dash cams have more cash than us photographers.