Olympus announced the release of its new high-speed Type M+ Series xD-Picture Card, which offers approximately 1.5 times faster data-transfer speeds than its predecessor (Type M Series xD-Picture Card) when capturing images with an Olympus digital camera.

The new Type M+ Series will be available in April 2008. It will be compatible with all Olympus digital cameras that use Type M Series xD-Picture Cards, including the new digital compact cameras (Stylus, Stylus SW, FE-Series and Ultra Zoom) which were announced recently as well.

"The demand for faster media with higher speed performance is being driven by developments in advanced video-recording functions in digital still cameras," said John D. Blakeslee, business manager, digital memory products, Olympus Imaging America Inc.