Wednesday, August 06, 2008

USB Flash Drives

I keep getting asked by people where to buy USB memory sticks to stick on your keyring or pop in your pocket to carry computer data such as excel or word docs or multimedia files. Over my lunchtime snack i thought i would create this post.

Also people keep strolling into PC world and buying sticks at massively inflated prices, they see the 4 gig one i use and are stunned that they paid £40 and i paid £8. Lesson = buy the sticks on the internet as they very cheap and all made in the same factories in the far east then differing plastic cases get stuck on the drives for branding......(apart from the ironkey below).

As a guide to how much DATA you can fit on a stick, see below which is guide for 8 gig or 4 gig ipods from apple, which use similar storage inside the case. If you have an old stick to compare with (Andy Hall copied here has a 512k) then 512k = 0.5 gig.

Capacity Guide

  • 4GB or 8GB flash drive
  • Holds up to 1,000 (4GB) or 2,000 songs in normal 128-Kbps AAC (IPOD) format
  • Holds up to 3,500 (4GB) or 7,000 (8GB) iPod-viewable photos
  • Holds up to 4 hours (4GB) or up to 8 hours (8GB) of video
  • Of course these devices will hold thousands of typical word / excel docs

Warning: these devices will not last forever, there are limits to the number of times a block of flash memory can be erased and rewritten before it loses the ability to reliably store data. That limit is generally around 100,000 cycles THUS backup the data on your computer or buy two drives and keep them identical each by copying the data each month

Dabs (add delivery or go for free delivery over 5 days)

4 gig at below £8
http://www.dabs.com/ProductView.aspx?Quicklinx=52JF

8 gig at £180 - Very secure IRONKEY usb flash drive - see www.ironkey.com for details - nobody can steal your sensitive data using this device
http://www.dabs.com/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=54TQ&CategorySelectedId=11152&NavigationKey=11152&ExposedRefinement=11003

EBuyer (add delivery or go for free delivery over 5 days)

4 Gig below £8
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/123365

8 Gig below £14
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/126211

16 gig at £30
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/140985

32 Gig at £60
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/140327

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