16 gig memory stick recommendations?

[delport]

Why might a stick die you ask.

Ignoring "safely remove hardware" and simply yanking the thing out of the pc would be one way to damage it.

No reason why you shouldn't be able to get many years of use out of a usb stick, 5 to 10 years should be achievable in my view.
After all these are devices we don't always use every day, and they have no working parts like platters in a hard drive.So you can drop them from a height and they should still be fine.

I'd expect at least 5 years use out of a hard drive.

I still have a usb stick i bought about 7 years ago, works fine.
Back then 256mb capacity cost £60-.

 

[Fnaar]

Yeah, I've had other sticks which I've had for a bit longer, but which have been 'retired' as I started to need more space for work-related stuff (e.g. one I bought 6 yrs ago now holds music for the kitchen mini hi-fi).
The one that's just gone wrong after 2.5 yrs has repeated/heavy use 5 days out of 7, and is always in my pocket or in the PC when I'm at work. Absolutely no probs with it till last week, when 3 files were noted as corrupted, and now the thing isn't recognised. I'm very very guilty of the 'just pull it out' approach*, so perhaps that's it

(*I was brought up a catholic

)

 

[2Loose]

On the wearing out front, I quote from wikipedia;


Like all flash memory devices, flash drives can sustain only a limited number of write and erase cycles before the drive fails.[sup][35][/sup][sup][36][/sup] This should be a consideration when using a flash drive to run application software or an operating system. To address this, as well as space limitations, some developers have produced special versions of operating systems (such as Linux inLive USB)[sup][37][/sup] or commonplace applications (such as Mozilla Firefox) designed to run from flash drives. These are typically optimized for size and configured to place temporary or intermediate files in the computer's main RAM rather than store them temporarily on the flash drive.


Which is part of the reason that exFAT was created - during a file write or copy situation, it places less wear on the device. Especially compared to NTFS, which performs all kinds of checks every time in order to make your data as safe as possible.

 

[ian turner]

Even with a cheap flash drive you'd expect it to last more than 2.5 years before failure due to cell death.

Unless you're nuts enough to use it as an external drive and open files directly from it into applications that then write back to it at regular intervals. Flash drives are for transfer and backup purposes not as harddrive subsitutes.

If you're not using it as a harddrive substitute then the usb connector is an obvious weakpoint as regular use will probably cause a certain amount of flexing leading to eventual breakage.

Just picked up a samsung s1 drive which is about the size of a credit card (obviously thicker) with 160gb capacity for about £40. Slower than a normal external drive but a damn sight more portable.

 

[Cardiac]

Other reasons sticks can go bad...
...static damage
...b-grade silicon (plenty on the grey market, in clones of named branded products and others)
...aging of other elements in the stick - some high capacity sticks use multi-level-cell technology (storing more than one bit per memory cell) and this was much less robust a few years ago than it is now

There are others I am sure, but these spring to mind

 

[Fnaar]

Even with a cheap flash drive you'd expect it to last more than 2.5 years before failure due to cell death.

Unless you're nuts enough to use it as an external drive and open files directly from it into applications that then write back to it at regular intervals. Flash drives are for transfer and backup purposes not as harddrive subsitutes.

Tbh, that's exactly how I do use it, and floppies before them. A bit of laziness on my part I guess, but I regularly use dozens of files between 7 or 8 different computrs, and open them straight from the flash drive...

 

[ian turner]

what sort of files are we talking about ?

 

[Fnaar]

what sort of files are we talking about ?

Hi there... mostly MS Word and Powerpoint, also small mp3s (voice recordings for work) and the occasional jpeg and excel spreadsheet. Majority Word and Powerpoint, though

 

[ian turner]

Hmm think word creates temporary files and not sure about backup as well. The section of the flash drive most likely to
go first is the FAT tables at the start as they change every time you create, delete or save files. Not suitable for the purpose you're using them for.

 

[Fnaar]

Cheers, thanks Ian... I think I'll have to change my habits

Just got the new one through the post... putting my backed up files on it as I type

 

[delport]

Cheers, thanks Ian... I think I'll have to change my habits

Just got the new one through the post... putting my backed up files on it as I type

I think you have now seen how the drive didn't last so long.
Heavy duty use.