Finalized specs for Sony's Memory Stick XC Duo confirm that the format will eventually hold 2 TB of data.
Sony Insider spotted the specifications (and mocked up the photo below), and believes we'll see 64 GB sticks initially in 2010, with capacity slowly ramping up in the years that follow. Maximum theoretical transfer rates are 20 MB per second for the Memory Stick XC Duo, but there's also a faster XC-HG Duo model with transfer speeds of up to 60 MB per second in 8-bit parallel data transfer.
Memory nuts can check out the full specifications at Sony's OSS Formats site.
At least in terms of size, Sony will be running neck-and-neck with SD cards. A new SD standard, called SDXC, should also reach 2 TB of storage, with read/write speeds of 60 MB per second and 35 MB per second, respectively. Toshiba plans to ship SDXC cards to manufacturers at the end of the year and to retailers in 2010.
Sony, when it initially announced the new formats, expected to start licensing the format this year. Sony Insider says that's happening now, but it's not clear when the first Memory Stick XC Duo cards will reach market.
Competition between Sony and the SD Association is great for consumers, but Sony's not being as outward about where it wants the memory card format to go. In announcing SDXC, the SD Association was clear that it wanted to see the cards in more mobile phones, both for recording and storing high-definition video. Surely the memory stick format will continue to play a role in cameras and in Sony's PSP handheld game console, but it'd be interesting to know if Sony sees the format evolving into something greater.
