A Brief History of SmartMedia
Between SmartMedia and SD is where this card calls home
Originally launched in 1995 by Toshiba to compete with the MiniCard, SmartMedia was initially named Solid State Floppy Disc Card (SSFDC). The idea was to position the SmartMedia card to replace the floppy disc in the late 90s. Replacing the floppy turned out to be an unattainable dream of Toshiba's. SmartMedia failed its bid to replace the floppy disc, but it was probably a good idea at the time. Somehow, the floppy disc survives to this day.
To help SmartMedia take over the floppy a device called a FlashPath was employed. The FlashPath is a SmartMedia to floppy adapter, which was a clever way to give the humble floppy a storage boost. With it you could turn any floppy drive into a SmartMedia card reader, boosting the 1.44 Megs to the 128 Meg potential of your SmartMedia card.
As the smallest and thinnest of its generation of flash memory cards--only .76mm thick-- it's made from only a single EEPROM chip covered in thin plastic. Although it ultimately failed as the new floppy, it took over for a time as the storage medium of choice for portable electronics, especially digital cameras.
SmartMedia Fast Facts- Created by Toshiba in 1995 to compete with the MiniCard
- Originally named Solid State Floppy Disc Card pitched as a replacement for the floppy disc
- Comprised of a single NAND flash EEPROM in a thin plastic case
- Maximum available storage space from SmartMedia card is 128 Megs
- Never did replace the floppy, but Toshiba's FlashPath adaptor was a pretty cool gadget back in 1999
- Found a niche as the most sought after memory card for digital cameras back in 2001
- All but fully replaced by the xD and SD flash cards by 2005 when SD/MMC formats had announced a dominant 40% share of all flash memory
SmartMedia wasn't common in older media players, pagers or other devices. Its strength was clearly digital photography. The SmartMedia heyday was probably about 2001 when it was found in nearly half of all digital cameras. It had been vigorously backed by Olympus and Fuji as the storage of choice for digital photos. However, like all things, its reign was as finite as its storage limitation. The most roomy cards available in this format were 128M. Moreover, most devices only supported the cards in the 32Meg variety and required a firmware update to support the 128 Meg flash cards.
Eventually, newer, smaller and higher capacity replacements became the order of the day, but the basic idea of the flash card is still alive and well. Olympus switched to Secure Digital Cards before Fuji and Olympus co-created their own xD flash memory cards.
The reign of SmartMedia was on the decline by the mid 2000s, replaced by more robust formats that could facilitate greater demands. The biggest name in flash memory cards soon became SD Secure Digital, which has all but replaced SmartMedia. With its faster data rates and capacity of over twice its predecessor, SD would soon wipe our memory clean of older flash formats.
SmartMedia chips are still being made by Toshiba and Samsung, as well as re-branded products being sold under the Lexar and Sandisk names. But not for much longer, soon it'll be relegated to the Smithsonian institute.