The Raspberry Pi Foundation has released two new accessories for the Raspberry Pi 5, the Raspberry Pi SD Cards and the Raspberry Pi Bumper. The SD cards are a new way to set up your Pi board’s storage, while the Bumper is a case for the device.
The Raspberry Pi SD Cards are Class A2 SD cards, intended to be used as the main storage in any Pi board. The cards use the Command Queueing Host Controller Interface (CQHCI), a feature in SD v6.00 that adds faster read and write operations. CQHCI helps the card handle multiple requests simultaneously, improving performance for random I/O workloads. The Raspberry Pi Foundation collaborated with Longsys, a card OEM, to develop these SD cards. The cards had to meet specific performance requirements and went through detailed testing that included over 100,000 surprise power cycles under heavy load.
The Raspberry Pi Bumper is a silicone case to protect the base and edges of the Raspberry Pi 5. The Bumper adds a layer of protection against scratches and bumps and protects the surface where users put the device. The Bumper is compatible with the Raspberry Pi Active Cooler and is available at a few retailers for $3. That’s pretty cheap, but it doesn’t protect the top of the Pi or provide additional cooling, like some other Pi cases.
Raspberry Pi recommends installing the latest version of Raspberry Pi OS to get the most performance out of its new SD cards. Also, keep in mind that the performance of CQ mode across SD cards varies. While SanDisk’s Extreme and Extreme Pro lines performed well, many other manufacturers’ cards showed some problems. The Raspberry Pi kernel filters out cards that fail these tests, either during feature probing or through explicit quirks. The official announcement encourages everyone to report any cards that aren’t working well in the forum.
You can buy the Raspberry Pi SD cards or get the Raspberry Pi Bumper from authorized resellers.
Source: Raspberry Pi