Motivated mainly by future detector upgrades at HL-LHC and at future colliders, most
of the HEP R&D collaborations have been focusing on the design of new prototypes of
particle detectors for operation under very high particle flow. In the field of Micro-Pattern-
Gaseous-Detectors, the Small-pad resistive MICROMEGAS prototypes were designed to
overcome the actual limitations of more standard strip resistive MICROMEGAS. In these
new prototypes, small pads with a few mm$^{2}$ area replace the readout strips to reduce the
occupancy, and the spark protection resistive layer has been redesigned and optimized
with different techniques to permit a safe behaviour of the detector, without efficiency
loss, at rates of the order of MHz/cm$^{2}$ over large surfaces. The firstly-developed design
exploits a pad-patterned (PAD-P) embedded resistor layout by screen-printing while the
most recent technique involves uniform sputtered DLC (Diamond Like Carbon structure)
layers, where the current evacuates through vias to ground. Comparative studies have
been conducted on the performances of the prototypes with different resistive layouts or
different values of DLC resistivity and vias pitch. The preliminary results of the tests done
with high-rate X-rays and with high energy charged particle beams will be presented.