Pretec revs up huge, super-speedy CF cards

Pretec announced on Tuesday its latest CompactFlash cards, which are substantially faster and higher capacity than other available CF cards.

The new cards come in two speeds: 233x (35MB per second) and 333x (50MBps), which is for now, as far as we know, the fastest for CF cards. The 233x model comes in 64GB and 100GB capacities while the 333x model comes in 32GB and 50GB capacities.

These cards can be used with digital cameras or mobile devices or reconfigured to work as solid-state hard drives. As I blogged recently, this is also good news for those who want to make their own SSDs.

There's a catch, though, and it's huge: the price. Pretec 233x 64GB and 333x 32GB CF cards are available this month with the hefty price tags of $399 and $630, respectively. The 233x 100GB and 333x 50GB, on the other hand, will be available by the end of the year. It's unclear for now how much they will cost but you probably don't want to know.