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
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
Posts
1 comment:
This is a great, practical guide that takes me back! Your advice about avoiding inflated retail prices and the warning about flash memory's finite write cycles are as relevant today as they were when this was written, even if the prices have fallen dramatically.
It's fascinating to contrast this with the evolution in processing power. The USB stick is designed for portable, personal data transfer—a single, simple task. This is the complete opposite of the computational philosophy behind a Xeon 64 Core processor.
While your 4GB stick was carrying thousands of documents, a single server with a Xeon 64 Core CPU wouldn't just store that data; it would be processing millions of those documents simultaneously. It could be running complex data analytics, rendering feature-length films, or simulating financial models for thousands of users at once. The data that might fill a stack of these USB drives is just the "appetizer" for a processor built to handle massive, parallel workloads.
It really shows how technology has branched into two paths: ultra-specialized, portable storage for the individual, and immense, centralized processing power for enterprise-scale data tasks. Thanks for the nostalgic look at the foundation of portable data!
Post a Comment