Lexar

Nowadays, professional photographers with high-end camera equipment are embracing CFexpress storage cards more and more. The problem? Those cards are quite expensive. Not to mention, many photographers can get by without top of the line. And so, for many photographers -- amateur and professional alike -- good ol' SD cards are still more than fine.

Thankfully, companies are still putting out new SD cards, and today, Lexar launches its latest. The SILVER Series Professional 1066x SDXC UHS-I card is both fast and durable. Best of all, pricing starts at just $17.99, making it affordable for all consumers.

M.2 NVMe solid state drives are much faster than 2.5-inch SATA versions -- the former is clearly the future. And yet, companies continue to manufacture new models of the latter. But why? It is quite simple -- many computers don't have M.2 ports, so those types of drives are of no use to people with older computers. Not to mention, SATA SSDs are still fast enough, making them great drop-in upgrades.

With all of that said, today, Lexar launches a new 2.5-inch SATA SSD. Called "NQ100," it is rather unremarkable, making it just another SATA drive on the market. However, its affordable $36.99 starting price should make it attractive for those on a budget -- especially consumers upgrading from a mechanical hard drive.

Having the ability to expand or add storage to a device is quite amazing, so it is sad that many phone manufacturers are removing that option. Sure, some Android smartphones still have microSD slots, but many do not -- including Google's own Pixel phones. Of course, Apple has never offered this option with its iconic iPhone.

If you do have a smartphone, tablet, camera, drone, or other device that utilizes microSD, I have some really exciting news. Today, Lexar launches some blazing fast new cards that won't break the bank. Called "SILVER Series," this line of 1066x microSD cards comes in capacities ranging from 32GB to 512GB.

If you want to store your data externally, you can always go with a mechanical hard disk drive. That makes sense, as HDDs are typically a more cost effective option when compared to solid state drives. With that said, SSDs have dropped in price a lot lately, and are getting larger storage capacities all the time. For instance, both Sabrent and Samsung recently showed off 8TB SSDs. Not to mention, solid state drives are faster and have no moving parts, making them worth the premium for some consumers.

Lexar recently announced a new portable SSD that uses USB-C for connectivity, and it is rather affordable. Called "SL200," it appears to use a SATA drive internally, so it isn't the fastest option on the market. With that said, it is still significantly faster than a USB hard disk drive. Your PC doesn't have USB-C? Don't worry. The attractive drive comes with both a USB-C to USB-C cable and a USB-C to USB-A cable in the box.

We recently told you that Synology is selling its own solid state drives -- a surprising move. Today, another company is getting into a new market, and it is also quite unexpected. You see, Lexar is now manufacturing its own-branded DRAM (computer RAM). Seriously? Yup!

The company is offering both laptop and desktop memory, but none of it seems very impressive. Don't get me wrong, I am sure the RAM is fine, but it is nothing an enthusiast would get excited about. All of the memory is DDR4 2666 with a CAS latency of 19, which is passable, but nowhere near the fastest. There are no fancy heat-spreaders or RGB lighting either. With all of that said, pricing starts below $20. Ultimately, Lexar seems to be making basic memory that is affordable. And yes, there is absolutely a place for that.

There is no shortage of news about solid state drives these days, with many new models being announced from popular manufacturers like ADATA, Samsung, and Kingston, to name a few. This includes both SATA and PCIe-based internal SSDs, plus external models that interface by USB and Thunderbolt 3.

Today, Lexar unveils an all-new solid state drive for professionals, although home consumers can obviously use it as well. Called “NM700,” it is an M.2 2280 PCIe Gen3x4 NVMe SSD with impressive performance.