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#1
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
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. 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). 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? I think I need to go buy new ones soon. What are GOOD reliable brands 32+ GB that can handle hot temperatures (feeling them is hot due to heavy usages like copying huge files, installing and running OSes, etc. for hours), lots of physically moving around, etc.? 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.). Of course they must be returnable if the drives die quickly again within return times. :P Thank you in advance. -- 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. |
#2
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
On Mon, 17 Oct 2016 16:03:03 -0500, (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. SNIP Awhile back, someone recommended a program called USB Flash Drive Tester, from https://www.vconsole.com/download. I downloaded and installed it, but I haven't had a reason to use it yet. I'd be curious to see what it says about some of your devices. Of course, if they can't be seen, there won't be much to report. |
#3
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
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#4
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
On 10-18-2016 10:23, Doc O'Leary wrote:
every year. Personally, I just buy the MicroCenter store brand in whatever size $10 will get me, and it generally lasts until at least the warranty runs out. It’s not a huge expense, so I don’t worry too much about it. 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. |
#5
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
Ant wrote
Either I'm having bad luck Or are mistreating them in some way. 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. I use them a lot, for the torrented movies the neighbours kids get me to get for them that they pay on their PS3/4 and a set top box and have only ever had the one failure with one unbranded one what appears to have failed at the work place of the kids, a nursing home. 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. 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. I think I need to go buy new ones soon. What are GOOD reliable brands 32+ GB that can handle hot temperatures I can't say given that I have had few failures and don’t even know the brand of the one that did fail given that its unbranded and marked with the nursing home label. (feeling them is hot due to heavy usages like copying huge files, installing and running OSes, etc. for hours), I don’t do that with these, just put movies on them tho its clear that the kids do use them for data like photos and assignments etc. lots of physically moving around, etc.? These get plenty of that, usually in cars but not always. 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. Of course they must be returnable if the drives die quickly again within return times. :P Thank you in advance. Still smirking. |
#6
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
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. The same goes for USB flash drives. I've seen people treating them extremely badly. I think, for the industry, flash drives are seen as the new floppy. It doesn¹t much matter who you go with, they¹re all built to be essentially disposable. That said, though, they all seem to come with a 2+ year warranty, so you¹d be getting some nifty free refreshes if you¹re seeing failures every year. Personally, I just buy the MicroCenter store brand in whatever size $10 will get me, and it generally lasts until at least the warranty runs out. It¹s not a huge expense, so I don¹t worry too much about it. USB flash drives (thumb drive, keyring drives, pen drives, memory sticks, whatever else you want to call them) and SSDs do have a limited lifespan measured in the number of write cycles ... so using them continuously (e.g. as an OS boot drive with things like virtual memory going) as Ant said can be a bit silly and cause them to "wear out" much sooner than simply using them to store files on for backup or transport. https://www.techwalla.com/articles/l...sb-flash-drive http://www.storagecraft.com/blog/data-storage-lifespan/ http://www.flashbay.co.nz/blog/usb-life-expectancy |
#7
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
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. The same goes for USB flash drives. I've seen people treating them extremely badly. I read online once a theory that it's usually the crystal (the component in the metal can that has wire leads going to it) that fails. Crystals are used in all sorts of things these days, so it must be either poor quality, or some aspect of use, that would make them more susceptable to failure in memory sticks specifically. Modern thin, card-width, memory sticks seem to show that the need for the traditionally large crystal package has been overcome. Perhaps this has improved reliability? In any case, unlike the old crystals, these modern integrated ones can't be easily replaced by someone with a soldering iron. The consequence of the crystal failing would usually be the memory stick failing to be recognised by any computer. The data could well be recovered if it were replaced afterwards. -- __ __ #_ |\| | _# |
#8
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Mark Perkins wrote:
On Mon, 17 Oct 2016 16:03:03 -0500, (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. SNIP Awhile back, someone recommended a program called USB Flash Drive Tester, from https://www.vconsole.com/download. I downloaded and installed it, but I haven't had a reason to use it yet. I'd be curious to see what it says about some of your devices. Of course, if they can't be seen, there won't be much to report. Here are Flash Drive/Card v1.14 test results on the two recent USB flash drives: One (SP brand) of the 32 GB drives failed in write (reading seems OK): 00:00:06.83 - -------------------------------- New test process started 00:00:06.84 - Started "Writing test data" for drive D: 30959MB, "SRT, USB, 1100, ", 512b 00:00:53.61 - ! Write fatal (3/3) error at LBN = 0 -- The semaphore timeout period has expired. (121.) 00:01:39.70 - ! Write fatal (3/3) error at LBN = 128 -- The semaphore timeout period has expired. (121.) 00:02:26.29 - ! Write fatal (3/3) error at LBN = 256 -- The semaphore timeout period has expired. (121.) 00:03:11.79 - ! Write fatal (3/3) error at LBN = 384 -- The semaphore timeout period has expired. (121.) 00:03:57.73 - ! Write fatal (3/3) error at LBN = 512 -- The semaphore timeout period has expired. (121.) .... I guess it ran out of write cycles for being a few years old? It makes sense since reformats (quick and full) failed to finish every time now. The other drive (Patriot brand) failed to do anything since it could not be seen even though all OSes can see an USB device. They all can't access its datas like partitions. I cannot even repartition and reformat it. Both broke when I was trying to install mac OS X v10.12/Sierra onto them. I know the new 15" MacBook Pro (Retina; mid-2015) rebooted already into them to install. -- 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. |
#9
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
In comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage Happy.Hobo wrote:
On 10-18-2016 10:23, Doc O'Leary wrote: every year. Personally, I just buy the MicroCenter store brand in whatever size $10 will get me, and it generally lasts until at least the warranty runs out. It???s not a huge expense, so I don???t worry too much about it. 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! -- 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. |
#10
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Is it me or are there many unreliable USB flash drives?
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. The same goes for USB flash drives. I've seen people treating them extremely badly. Someone told me putting these tiny USB flash drives in my wallets that go into my pants' front pockets are breaking them due to stresses. What do you thnk of that? I see people having them on keychains and they hit tables, desks, etc. hard and loudly a lot! I think, for the industry, flash drives are seen as the new floppy. It doesn¹t much matter who you go with, they¹re all built to be essentially disposable. That said, though, they all seem to come with a 2+ year warranty, so you¹d be getting some nifty free refreshes if you¹re seeing failures every year. Personally, I just buy the MicroCenter store brand in whatever size $10 will get me, and it generally lasts until at least the warranty runs out. It¹s not a huge expense, so I don¹t worry too much about it. USB flash drives (thumb drive, keyring drives, pen drives, memory sticks, whatever else you want to call them) and SSDs do have a limited lifespan measured in the number of write cycles ... so using them continuously (e.g. as an OS boot drive with things like virtual memory going) as Ant said can be a bit silly and cause them to "wear out" much sooner than simply using them to store files on for backup or transport. https://www.techwalla.com/articles/l...sb-flash-drive http://www.storagecraft.com/blog/data-storage-lifespan/ http://www.flashbay.co.nz/blog/usb-life-expectancy The weird part is that I was still installing mac OS Sierra v10.12 on these two old USB flash drives. Is that too much already? I only wanted to install and use the OS for quick tests like those bootable read only live discs for OSes. In the past, I used these USB flsah drives to copy all kinds of files (giant sizes too) to use between various computers. I love flash drives for being super tiny and light to stick into my wallet to carry easily! Argh. -- 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. |
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