Samsung has unveiled an 8GB microSD memory card, claiming it to be the highest capacity currently available for the format.

The Korean electronics giant said that the card can store around 2,000 MP3 music files, 4,000 digital photos or approximately five DVD-quality movies.

Samsung hopes that the card will help expand the current trend towards turning mobile phones into all-in-one entertainment devices using expandable memory via microSD slots.

The card has a read speed of 16Mbps and a write speed of 6Mbps. This exceeds the Speed Class 4 Secure Digital High Capacity standard which requires a data write speed of 4Mbps.

Market research firm Dataquest predicts that the memory card market will average 10 per cent annual growth between 2006 and 2010, while demand for high density 8GB cards will grow an average of 2.6 times per year over the same period.

The 8GB memory card will be the market mainstream in terms of units sold by 2010, according to Dataquest.