10
votes
Where do you buy microSD cards from?
Amazon appears to have a severe problem with "co-mingled" stock for some items.
eBay is pretty scary for some things, but at least you know it's eBay.
Where do you buy microSD cards for a reasonable price and to ensure genuine product?
Honestly, at my local physical store.
Computer stores seem to be taking the competition from e-commerce very seriously on these types of items. I could imagine they might even be a loss leader to get folks in through the door regularly.
I can't be the only person who just archives SD cards as one of two backups, and buy new ones instead of deleting anything off them.
Yeah, I kinda get this paranoid sometimes, I regularly archive a dd copy of my SD cards to my storage, just because I had the worst experience with them, they used to die on my constantly. Even the one in my eReader died just from the old age it seems, even though it shouldn't be a thing technically, since no writes had been made to that SD card in ages, but I guess atime updates counts, since one day it would just die and leave me without any reading position for a fuckton of books. (even though that reader saved positions on internal memory, it is lost if the book is lost) I've dropped some of them as a result and it's been the most damage an SD card failure ever done to me.
Flash memory is an ATROCIOUS long term storage medium. Like... you should not even consider it for a backup.
Interesting idea. I used to do backups to DVDs a few years ago. I wish there was something cheap enough and sturdy enough to serve as a write-only backup medium that worked through USB. As @vakieh says tho, flash is not trustworthy enough. There are tapes, but last time I checked writers they costed a fortune and it's not worth it.
I've been getting mine from Aliexpress, genuine MIXZA SD cards (it's a Chinese brand, they have their storefront). They never failed me, they are cheap as dirt, and I had a 128Gb one from them in my Switch from the start, filled it to 3/4, works well. Same for the ones in my various embedded PCs and in my phone. Meanwhile a Sony 32Gb card dies just from having photos in my phone for two years.
Best Buy is still pretty reliable.
I go to JB Hi-Fi for stuff like this. I used to also go to Dick Smith Electrics, but they closed down a few years back.
I purchased a USB stick from a local big box store, used a Mac to try to make an install drive, and it failed somewhere around 25%. Acted a lot like these cards that report themselves as a larger size than they really are. Maybe even brick and mortar stores aren't safe anymore. Maybe I just got a bad one. Pretty hard to tell.