This may very well be a dumb idea for a thread but I'm curious to know what brands/sizes of SD cards everyone uses for their 3DSs. I have no expertise in memory cards so I use [ this one ] for my XL and [ this one ] for my new XL. Both of them are listed on Nintendo's website as "tested to work". (I'm paranoid about things not working haha.)
Also if you have any stories of cards to avoid I would appreciate those too. Always looking to learn more.
Personally I've stuck with the 4GB SD card that came with my 3DS XL because I tend to prefer physical copies rather than downloads and apart from a few demos and 3 free games I got from promotions, it's still got enough space to keep me going. If you generally only have physical copies, and maybe 2-3 digital games, the basic 4GB card should be fine. If you intend on your game library to be mainly digitally based, or even 5+ games then you'd be best getting at least an 8GB card, or preferably a 16 or 32.
Page 30 of the instruction manual for the 3DS XL says "Nintendo 3DS XL supports SD Memory Cards up to 2GB, and SDHC Memory Cards between 4GB and 32GB." In other words, as long as you buy an SD card made by one of the big manufacturers that's either SD or SDHC(SD High Capacity) you should be alright.
As for brands, Sandisk is generally regarded as the most reliable, although Lexar and Transcend both also have very good reputations, and are usually slightly cheaper than Sandisk. Personally I prefer Sandisk cards, even though they do cost a bit more as I've always had a good experience with them with my camera and USB sticks. With all digital storage devices though, you will never have a 100% guarantee that they won't fail, even the "best" models can and do fail from time to time.
I have replaced my old 4GB Lexar I think is the brand name the 3DS XLs come with, with a 32GB SD card of the same brand. No formatting was needed to use the new card. I was going to get a 16GB card but the store had 32GB ones on for super cheap. I only upgraded my SD card because of last years Platnium reward of Donkey King Country Returns 3D took up nearly the whole 4GB SD card, and I've begun to buy virtual downloads of games more recently only a select few I actually buy in store anymore.
I recently made a purchase for a 32GB SDHC (SanDisk Extreme 32gb 60mbps transfer speed or something like that) and honestly it doesn't make much of a difference outside of amount of available blocks (and well, transfering files on and off the SDHC from the PC). I bought it off Amazon for like $40 after taxes. I made the purchase since I'm transitioning from physical copies of games to digital mainly so I can lug around all my games at the same time. So far its going pretty well, I enjoy the extra space.
@Solar: You can actually go past 32gb. If I remember correctly, you just need to have your SDHC formatted to FAT32 (what the 3DS uses) in order to use 64GB and even 128GB SDHCs on the 3DS. Though anything past I would say 32GB or 64GB seems like overkill to me since I have a huge amount of blocks available atm (with 5 3DS games installed, I still have about 180k+ blocks to use, estimating as I'm lazy to check right now).
I do agree however to go with brands that you have had a better experience with. I went with SanDisk and I don't regret the purchase at all. Above all else, I think the most important thing when it comes to buying an SDHC is the amount of storage, which is basically self explanatory. Don't worry about transfer speeds too much, amount of GB available+price>>>everything else.
@Holla: If you have a 3DS XL, it was most likely a Samsung 4GB SDHC (as that is what I got with my Pokemon Y edition 3DS XL)
I used to have this 16GB SD card to put all my music and digital games on there...but my brothers lost it over the weekend while doing something stupid with it....
*sigh* now i'm stuck with a 4GB again....uggggh....
Right now I have the 4gb micro sd in my WIIU, I ordered in the 32gb sandisk micro sd though, it should be here in a week. I don`t recall which one is in my 3DS and I`m to lazy to check.
My pika XL uses a 64GB Sony sdxc card (not anymore since I System transferred so now it's just a blank 64GB sdxc card lol)
My Og purple used a 64GB sdxc card- forgot the brand
My new XL uses a Sandisk 64GB class 10 micro sdxc card
Im not sure what brand, but I have a 16 GB microSD cause I bought quite a few digital games a while back and needed to transfer them. Given, I probably only have used 6-8 GB, but it is nice to have the extra storage
