Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?

Ant wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Ant wrote

Either I'm having bad luck

Or are mistreating them in some way.

Maybe. I am trying to figure out why so
many failed USB flash drives on my side.

Yeah, very suspicious given that we don’t get so many failures.

Don’t you get quite a few hard drive failures
too or am I remembering that wrong ?

Some just stopped working and not detected at all
by any computers (desktops and (laptop/notebook)s
and OSes (Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows).

That is the result I got with the only one that has failed.
I haven't even bothered to open it up to check how its
failed, whether it is a simple mechanical failure, dry
joint/cracked trace etc or what.

Their cases are hard to open up!

Some of them arent, have a look at the youtube teardowns.

Looking at their USB connectors, they look clean and fine to me.

Yeah, it’s a pretty robust connector. I have
seen some cables develop weak springs tho.

I use a cable from the USB port on the desktop to plug
the USB stick into, just so the cable socket is to the left
of the big armchair that I always compute from.

No bad odors like burning smell.

Yeah, they don’t die like that.

The only thing noticeable is their
temperatures are hot after long usages.

I don’t use them that long, just copy the movies on to them.

Some are detected but no disk volumes seen and
can't even partition and format. Some seen and
connected, but can't been fully formatted.

What's up?

Either bad luck or the way you are treating them static wise.

The kids don't do anything special with them static wise
and the houses are all carpeted, 3 different houses. And
at least one of them has full aircon used in the winter for
heating which can be a static problem. One other has gas
heating and I forget what the third one has heating wise.
I've only been in there in other than the winter, moving
some heavy furniture in there.

No carpets here, but a few rugs. Mostly hard floors (never dropped
them). Temperatures can be hot (up to 90F degrees in the room during
heat waves). The two drives that went bust was during the cold and wet
temperatures (60F degrees and light rain outside; 70F degres indoor).

Should be fine.

lots of physically moving around, etc.?

These get plenty of that, usually in cars but not always.

Most of the times, the tiny drives are in my wallets to be carried
where-ever I go. They don't move around much in the crowded
tight wallet in my front pockets. That should be OK, right?

Yep. Shouldn’t even be a static problem with a plastic wallet either.

I have seen people put them on their keychains and appear to be
more abusive since they hit desks. tables, etc. but they still work.

Yeah, and they are pretty mechanically robust.

Is Lexar brand any good as shown in
http://www.salescircular.com/ca/computer/usbstp.shtml web page
from the local So(uthern) CA(lifornia) stores (Fry's Electronics, Best
Buy, Costco, Walmart, Target, Office Depot, Staples, etc.).

Yes, some of the ones I use are Lexars.

Hmm, I might try Lexars next. Or maybe well known brands
won't metter to me since Sandisk failed for me in the past. :/

I do have some sandisks, but the problem with sandisks is that
there are some fakes around too. Not that likely to be your
problem tho given that you don’t buy off ebay or aliexpress.

Of course they must be returnable if the drives
die quickly again within return times. :P

Thank you in advance.

Still smirking.

I will always smirk.

Yep, you've always been a smirky little bugger.

"Ant" wrote in message
...
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Computer Nerd Kev
wrote:
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Your Name
wrote:
In article , Doc O'Leary
wrote:

For your reference, records indicate that
(Ant) wrote:

Either I'm having bad luck or USB flash drives suck even with
various
sizes (e.g., 512 MB to 32 GB), well known brand names (e.g.,
SanDisk),
and cheap/free ones (SP [a few years] and Patriot [had it since
10/3/2015]). They don't seems like they don't last longer than a
year. I
keep them in my drawers, wallets, etc.

Of course, anyone who remembers how unreliable floppy disks used to
be would treasure a one year life span.

I can't say I've ever had any real problems with floppy disks. I've
still got a huge pile of them (some magazine cover disks, some my own
disks). In fact, the biggest issue I've ever had with floppy disks is
the drive in my beige G3 dying and I didn't have the time nor equipment
to fix it, so I got an external USB one instead.

A large part of the issue many people had with floppy disks is due to
the way they treated them. Mine were and are always stored in boxes,
never simply thrown into bags or pockets alone.

I found that frequent erasures and writes of large files killed them
fairly fast, with just small writes to text files or the like they
served a good life, and for Read-Only use I've found they last very
well indeed.

Is this still true for USB flash drives?

No its not. I mostly copy movie files. I do torrent quite a
few small music files too but mostly put them directly on
the iphone the one kid who gets them wants them on.

I was copying HUGE files

Should be fine, I mostly do that.

and even installing mac OS Sierra onto
these two recent 32 GB USB flash drives.

Havent done any of that.

Jolly Roger wrote
Ant wrote
Rod Speed wrote
Ant wrote

Either I'm having bad luck

Or are mistreating them in some way.

Maybe. I am trying to figure out why so many failed USB flash drives on
my side.

Maybe stop sitting on them.

He isnt sitting on them, they are in his front pocket.

They should be fine to sit on too, most of them are pretty
mechanically robust and survive being on key rings fine.

On 10-18-2016 16:28, Ant wrote:
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Happy.Hobo wrote:
Every time I think I need another (sometimes failure, but more often
size), I pay about the same as before and get twice the size.

How often do you have to do that? I find it annoying this is happening
so often!

Every one or two years. But remember, it's usually NOT due to failure.

For your reference, records indicate that
nospam wrote:

In article , Ant
wrote:

I found that frequent erasures and writes of large files killed them
fairly fast, with just small writes to text files or the like they
served a good life, and for Read-Only use I've found they last very
well indeed.

Is this still true for USB flash drives? I was copying HUGE files and
even installing mac OS Sierra onto these two recent 32 GB USB flash
drives.

it was never true.

It is true that flash memory has limited read/write cycles. Of
course, under normal usage it would be unlikely to hit even a 10K
cycle limit.

--
"Also . . . I can kill you with my brain."
River Tam, Trash, Firefly

In article , Doc O'Leary
wrote:

I found that frequent erasures and writes of large files killed them
fairly fast, with just small writes to text files or the like they
served a good life, and for Read-Only use I've found they last very
well indeed.

Is this still true for USB flash drives? I was copying HUGE files and
even installing mac OS Sierra onto these two recent 32 GB USB flash
drives.

it was never true.

It is true that flash memory has limited read/write cycles.

all types of storage has limited read/write cycles or some other
limiting factor (moving parts wearing out, etc.).

the point is that the size of the files being written does not matter.

there is no additional wear by writing a single larger file versus many
smaller files. in fact, it's probably *less* overall wear because of
the additional directory writes for the many smaller files.

Of
course, under normal usage it would be unlikely to hit even a 10K
cycle limit.

true.

On 2016-10-19, Ant wrote:
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Jolly Roger wrote:
On 2016-10-18, Ant wrote:
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Rod Speed wrote:
Ant wrote

Either I'm having bad luck

Or are mistreating them in some way.

Maybe. I am trying to figure out why so many failed USB flash drives on
my side.

Maybe stop sitting on them.

I don't put them in my rear pockets. They go in my front pockets.

So? It's quite possible to place objects in your front pocket under
significant stress.

--
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my ravenous SPAM filter.
I often ignore posts from Google. Use a real news client instead.

JR

"Jolly Roger" wrote in message
...
On 2016-10-19, Ant wrote:
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Jolly Roger
wrote:
On 2016-10-18, Ant wrote:
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Rod Speed
wrote:
Ant wrote

Either I'm having bad luck

Or are mistreating them in some way.

Maybe. I am trying to figure out why so many failed USB flash drives
on
my side.

Maybe stop sitting on them.

I don't put them in my rear pockets. They go in my front pockets.

So?

So he isnt SITTING on them.

It's quite possible to place objects in your
front pocket under significant stress.

But he isnt SITTING on them.

In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Happy.Hobo wrote:
On 10-18-2016 16:28, Ant wrote:
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Happy.Hobo wrote:
Every time I think I need another (sometimes failure, but more often
size), I pay about the same as before and get twice the size.

How often do you have to do that? I find it annoying this is happening
so often!

Every one or two years. But remember, it's usually NOT due to failure.

Not failures? You have a collection of them from upgrading to bigger and
faster USB flash drives? :P
--
Quote of the Week: "I really believe I've been a good person. Not
perfect - forget about perfect - but just learning by what I was taught
and living by my own values. I might have stepped on a few ants - and a
few other things as well - but I've never hurt anybody." --Kiri Te
Kanawa
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In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage nospam wrote:
In article , Doc O'Leary
wrote:

I found that frequent erasures and writes of large files killed them
fairly fast, with just small writes to text files or the like they
served a good life, and for Read-Only use I've found they last very
well indeed.

Is this still true for USB flash drives? I was copying HUGE files and
even installing mac OS Sierra onto these two recent 32 GB USB flash
drives.

it was never true.

It is true that flash memory has limited read/write cycles.

all types of storage has limited read/write cycles or some other
limiting factor (moving parts wearing out, etc.).

the point is that the size of the files being written does not matter.

there is no additional wear by writing a single larger file versus many
smaller files. in fact, it's probably *less* overall wear because of
the additional directory writes for the many smaller files.

Of
course, under normal usage it would be unlikely to hit even a 10K
cycle limit.

true.

Hmm, I don't think my various copies, reformatting (various file
systems), physical movements between computers, etc. are causing my
failures? I wished there was a way to see counters and stuff.

--
Quote of the Week: "I really believe I've been a good person. Not
perfect - forget about perfect - but just learning by what I was taught
and living by my own values. I might have stepped on a few ants - and a
few other things as well - but I've never hurt anybody." --Kiri Te
Kanawa
Note: A fixed width font (Courier, Monospace, etc.) is required to see this signature correctly.
/\___/\ Ant(Dude) @ http://antfarm.home.dhs.org (Personal Web Site)
/ /\ /\ \ Ant's Quality Foraged Links: http://aqfl.net
| |o o| |
\ _ / Please nuke ANT if replying by e-mail privately. If credit-
( ) ing, then please kindly use Ant nickname and AQFL URL/link.