512MB USB 2.0 SAMSUNG Pen Drive ALUMINUM NEW (Ebay Stores) $128.90 Shipped!

[jhouston]

I thought I would post because I did not seem to find many on Flash Pen Drives USB 2.0.
I tried to base my purchase on reviews here but I did not seem to find many.

512MB USB 2.0 SAMSUNG Pen Drive ALUMINUM NEW (had to take link out because of Anandtech policy)

I do not know if this is a good deal or not?

I just ordered one of these.

I asked several people who bought one of these and they seem to be pleased.

I did a little price searching on 512MB Flash Drives and this seemed to be a good deal.

Anyway, I like the fact that it is not flimsy (aluminum, you know).

Quoted from a previous buyer

Quote

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
His price seemed reasonable, he shipped very quick and the flash drive works
great. It was new/unopened with the CD-ROM, usb cable and flash drive. I'm
very satisifed with it.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



512MB USB 2.0 HIGH SPEED Portable Flash Drive!

Read & Write ANY file type to the USB Port and take it with you!

Super Slim, Super Fast!

Features:

USB 1.1 AND 2.0 Support
Power saving mode support
LED disk-in-use indicator
Security Protection
Booting Mode Support
Hot Plug+Play, Hot Swappable
No External Power Required
Powered by USB Bus
Windows 98/SE/ME/2000/XP + MAC OS8.6+ + Linux
Up to 480Mbps data transfer <<<<not sure about this claim though?

Includes:

512MB USB 2.0 Flash Drive
USB 2.0 Extension Cable
CD with drivers & manual
Instructions on CD-ROM
Necklace chain to "wear" flash drive


---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lexar Media 512MB Jump Drive USB 2.0

Also found this 512 JumpDrive 2.0 Pro USB 2.0 ($30.00 Rebate) Whoops!

The only thing I do not like about the Lexar is that I have heard it is not as rugged and pocket clip that's part of the cap can be easily snapped off.

Here is the Page Computer Rebate Link!

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Pen Drive at newegg.com seems to be around the same price.

Pen Drive 2.0 Light 512MB USB Flash Drive - RETAIL

I still prefer the aluminum casing better.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I do like the look of this generic Pen Drive. I almost purchased this one. Looks pretty tough.


SuperMedia Pro 512MB USB 2.0 Flash Drive Pen Drive

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Anyway, here are some to keep in mind while your shopping.

Thanks!

 

[beamrider]

Don't think you can post a link to an eBay auction here..........Good price tho, I think!

 

[jhouston]

Thanks! I did not think about Ebay links.

Anyway, it is not hard to find via search.

 

[weepul]

kewl toy! but a bit pricey as of the moment.

//krunk (^_^x)

 

[Souka]

and you all know usb 2.0 doesn't necessarly mean 480mb/s


These USB 2.0 pens seem to have pretty low read/rate ratings for a "usb 2.0" device....


USB Naming and confusion link
http://www.techworld.com/news/index.cfm?fuseaction=displaynews&newsid=197

Just a FYI

 

[MorganNY]

looks like the 512 jumpdrive only has a $30 rebate, $40 is for the 1gb

 

[aldamon]

I wish someone would decide on a name for these gadgets. It's almost impossible to search AT for a deal on them because they are referred to as "pen drives", "flash drives", "flash memory drives", "USB drives", "thumb drives", "jump drives" and all sorts of combined iterrations. Very annoying.

 

[Jaxidian]

Originally posted by: Souka
and you all know usb 2.0 doesn't necessarly mean 480mb/s


These USB 2.0 pens seem to have pretty low read/rate ratings for a "usb 2.0" device....


USB Naming and confusion link
http://www.techworld.com/news/index.cfm?fuseaction=displaynews&newsid=197

Just a FYI

http://www.usb.org/info/usb_nomenclature
http://www.usb.org/developers/packaging/

If they don't follow these rules, then they are committing fraud. Basically, look at the USB logo. If it has the red thing, then it really is what you expect with USB2.0. If it's just the blue logo, then expect it to be essentially the same as USB1.1.

 

[DesiRich]

You can be a USB 2.0 device and not have a throughput of 480 mbps.

There are different classes of devices - Low speed, High speed, and Full speed. They indicate what speed the device talks on the USB bus. You can have the ability to talk on the bus faster than the device can read and write to /from the flash chips and still be a USB high speed device. It has to do with how the packets are framed up and sent over the bus.

Most flash chips are much slower than 480 mb/s. If you take this relatively low speed media (Flash chips) and combine it with a high speed device controller (480 Mb/s) then you have a USB 2.0 "High Speed" device, even though your total throughput is limited by the speed of the flash, not the communications link.

Think of it like hooking up a USB floppy drive. The drive is much slower than the bus is. Another analogy is hooking up a modem to an Ethernet network. The modem can only deliver the data at 56K, but the network could be 1GB...

 

[EmMayEx]

Here is a 512K USB 2.0 Pen Drive at Knowledge Micro (LINK) for $99 plus about $4 shipping.

They claim > 5MB/s read and > 4.7 MB/s write so figure a bit less than 2 minutes to read or write the entire drive. I think these rates are roughly equivalent to the average transfer speed of a 40X CDRW drive and nowhere near the theoretical throughput of even USB 1.1. Flash memory just isn't that fast . . . yet.

Max L.

 

[PHL1365]

Originally posted by: EmMayEx
Here is a 512K USB 2.0 Pen Drive at Knowledge Micro (LINK) for $99 plus about $4 shipping.

They claim > 5MB/s read and > 4.7 MB/s write so figure a bit less than 2 minutes to read or write the entire drive. I think these rates are roughly equivalent to the average transfer speed of a 40X CDRW drive and nowhere near the theoretical throughput of even USB 1.1. Flash memory just isn't that fast . . . yet.

Max L.

Actually, I believe USB 1.1 is limited to about 1.2 MB/sec. The USB 2.0 flash drives are definitely faster than their USB 1.1 predecessors. Most of the USB 1.1 drives had transfer rates under 1 MB/sec. Some of the slower ones were closer to 500 KB/sec. If you're in the market for a flash drive, definitely pay the extra money for a USB 2.0 device. You'll be glad you did.

 

[TooChill]

I picked up a PQI Traveling Disk (256mb, USB 2.0) from
digi4me.com last month. They have since sold out.
I really like the form factor of this particular model. No
bulbous center section, just nice and slim all the way down.
Throughput has been great, and it comes with partitioning,
security software. Here's a pic.
I would highly recommend it to anyone.

 

[DesiRich]

USB 1.1 low speed devices are 1 Mbps, but Full Speed devices communicate at 10.0 Mbps.

With overhaed on the framing and messages, plus allowing for other devices on the bus, you will get a pratical throughput of around 6-7 Mbps best case.

I can't speak to the speed of flash devices, but I would imagine them to be higher than 1 Mbps and lower than 6-7, so 5Mbps read and 4 Mbps write seems about right.