This USB 3.0 based thumb drive is their fastest model to date. It features blazing read/write speeds of 225 MB/S and 135 MB/S. Kingston designed the DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 with 8-channel architecture allowing for storage capacities of up to 256 GB.

Besides the functional aspects of the drive, Kingston’s HyperX design is just plain cool looking.

The DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 comes packaged on a plastic blister card with the drive visualized on the front along with the Kingston HyperX logo. On the back of the package is a list of features in several languages.

Inside the package we find the DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 USB drive, a lanyard and installation/warranty card.

The HyperX 3.0 comes in three size capacities of 64 GB, 128 GB and 256 GB. For today’s review we will look at the 64 GB version.

The drive is composed of an electric blue metal surrounded by a rubberized black material with the HyperX logo imprinted on the top of the casing along with the drives capacity and the Kingston head logo. When the drive is plugged into a PC a blue LED under this head logo illuminates during drive activity.

On the underside of the drive is an embossed Kingston name. A detachable cap that is removed by pinching the sides and can be stored on the backside of the drive covers the USB component of the drive. This backside also has an open area for attaching the included lanyard.

In terms of size the HyperX USB 3.0 is comparable in length and thickness to the Kingston DataTraveler Ultimate USB 3.0 drives.

Specifications:

DataTraveler HyperX30

HyperX performance, capacity and style in a USB drive
Power users have long known HyperX as the innovative brand from Kingston Technology and the new DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 Flash drive continues this tradition by featuring the fastest speeds and largest capacity Kingston offers for portable storage.

•  Supports Windows 7, Vista & XP
•  USB 3.0
•  8-Channel Architecture
•  Fast – 225MB/s read and 135MB/s write
•  Durable metal and rubber casing
•  Capacities up to 256GB

Featuring a high-speed 8-channel architecture that provides USB 3.0 data transfer speeds with capacities up to 256GB, DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 is the perfect solution for expanding a notebook’s storage and for quickly storing, transferring and backing up any digital lifestyle. Users will save time associated with opening and transferring large files and applications between devices.

DataTraveler HyperX is covered by a five-year warranty, 24/7 technical support and legendary Kingston reliability.

Kingston DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 Part Numbers:  DTHX30/64GB, DTHX30/128GB, DTHX30/256GB

Features/Specifications:
•Practical — Durable metal and rubber casing with a solid lanyard loop
•8-Channel Architecture
•Backwards Compatible — with USB 2.0
•ReadyBoost Support
•Guaranteed — five-year warranty
•Capacities1 64GB, 128GB and 256GB
•Speed USB 3.0: 225MB/s read and 135MB/s write

USB 2.0: 30MB/s read/write
•Dimensions 2.952″ x 0.916″ x 0.626″ (74.99mm x 23.29mm x 15.9mm)
•Operating Temperature 0° to 60°C/ 32° to 140°F
•Storage Temperature -20° to 85°C/ -4° to 185°F

Price: $149.99

The Kingston HyperX USB 3.0 drive comes preformatted in FAT32 allowing it to work with Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7 or OS X once plugged into a USB port. The drive is backwards compatible with USB 2.0; however to take advantage of its speeds you’ll need a USB 3.0 connector on your machine.

For testing a Core i7 2600K with ASUS P8P67 Pro motherboard, which has built in USB 3.0 ports was used. ATTO Disk Benchmark 2.46, Crystal Disk Mark 3.0.1 x64, HD Tach RW 3.0.1.0 were used for benchmarking the drives. For comparison the original DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 64 GB, the DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 G2 32 GB were included.

Starting with the ATTO DiskBenchmark we see the DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 has write speeds in the 125 MB/S and reads in the 220 MB/s range versus the DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 Gen 2 with 65 MB/s write and 125 MB/s read while the first gen DataTraveler Ultimate has 75 MB/s write and 95 MB/s read.

Next the Crystal Disk Mark 3.0 revealed the DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 with sequential read speeds of 200.3 MB/s and write speeds of 70.87 MB/s versus 126.9/75.39 for the DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 G2 and 96.78/67.87 for the DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 G1. The read speeds on the HyperX were clearly ahead of the other DataTraveler’s yet the write speeds were pretty comparable on this benchmark.

12/31/2011

Addendum – I just finished rebuilding my Asus P8P67 Pro Machine using the latest BIOS and drivers.  One thing that bothered me during this review was the abnormally low write speeds reported in the Crystal Disk Mark results.

I decided to re-run the Sequential test on the rebuilt platform and discovered a write speed of 110.4 MB/s which was more in line with the Kingston specs.  The take home is making sure your hardware is up to date when benchmarking these things.

HDTach RW average read speeds of 220.2 MB/s and burst speeds of 216.5 MB/s with the DataTraveler HyperX 3.0. The DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 G1 had average reads of 87.3 MB/s and burst of 98.2 MB/s while the DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 G2 came in with average read of 124.0 MB/s and burst of 90.0 MB/s.

On a USB 2.0 connection the HyperX 3.0 USB had expected speeds in the 30’s MB/s for both read and writes.

Conclusion:

If you already take advantage of USB 3.0 technology than the HyperX 3.0 USB drive is the one to get. It is the fastest USB 3.0 drive that I’ve come across and its read/write speeds are terrific. In addition the blue and black HyperX style makes it a slick looking thumb drive.

Obviously for this performance you will currently pay a premium as this drive is currently priced at $149 at Newegg. Like most USB drive technology, expect the price of this drive to trend lower in the coming year. If you are looking for a svelte USB drive then you may want to look elsewhere; however if speed is what you desire then you’ll want to get the HyperX USB 3.0.

Pros:
+Fast
+Solid build
+HyperX branding and style

Cons:
-Price

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

To learn more about our review policy please visit this page HERE.

Review of Kingston DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 64GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

The OCZ Enyo is packaged nicely in a thick, nice looking box and it’s padded well.

Inside you’ll find a brief instruction manual, USB 3.0 cable, the Enyo itself and a nice little sticker. The USB 3.0 cable is thick, and it’s long enough for most uses.

The Enyo itself is sleek looking with the anodized aluminum housing. It’s sort of wedge shaped really and it’s surprisingly lightweight. On the front is the Enyo logo and two LEDS, one for power and one that will blink with activity.

On the bottom you’ll just find an identifications sticker.

On the back edge is the USB 3.0 connector.

To give you an idea of size, here’s the Enyo with a few USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 flash drives. The Enyo isn’t a flash drive, but it’s not a hard drive in the usual sense either.

The next part will void your warranty so don’t this. I took it apart to get a better look inside.

The Symwave chip is the USB 3.0  to SATA controller. It offers transfer speeds in excess of 270MB/s.

The chips marked with the ‘i’ and 29F32G08AAMDB identification label are the Intel memory chips.

The Indilinix chip is the flash controller, the Barefoot chip as it’s called.

Specifications:

OCZ Enyo 64gb USB 3.0 Portable Solid State Drive

Part Numbers: 64GB – OCZSSDU3-1ENY64G

Portable SSD / SuperSpeed USB 3.0 interface / 64GB – 256GB

The OCZ Enyo USB 3.0 Portable Solid State Drive features all the performance and durability advantages of an internal SSD, but delivers portability with an external storage solution for on-the-go users sharing files between various PC systems.

Enyo SSDs offer an array of state-of-the-art features for prosumers looking to take advantage of the SuperSpeed 5Gbps port. In addition to cutting-edge performance, this portable SSD offers superior power management and lower CPU utilization far surpassing the capabilities of external hard drives. With up to 260MB/s read and 200MB/s write capabilities, OCZ makes storage ten times faster than USB 2.0 speeds, while also being backwards-compatible with legacy ports.

Enyo USB 3.0 SSDs cut the time it takes for fast transferring of HD video, graphics, and music and are plug-and-play without additional external power requirements. Furthermore, the Enyo features background garbage collection to help maintain “like-new” performance throughout its lifespan. Designed with ultimate portability in mind, the Enyo features a sleek, anodized aluminum housing and will be available in 64GB, 128GB, and 256GB capacities.

64GB Max Performance
* Read: Up to 225 MB/s
* Write: Up to 135 MB/s
* Sustained Write: Up to 40 MB/s

Specs:
- USB 3.0 Interface
- Backwards compatible with legacy USB ports (2.0)
- MLC Flash
- 64MB Onboard Cache
- Background Garbage Collection
- Blue LED indicators
- Anodized Aluminum Housing
- Seek Time: < .1ms
- Slim, lightweight Design
- Included: 3′ White USB 3.0 (A to Micro B) Cable
- Weight: 75g
- 56mm x 120mm x 10mm H
- Operating Temp: 0°C ~ 70°C
- Storage Temp: -45°C ~ +85°C
- Low Power Consumption: 2.4W in operation, 1.1W idle
- Shock Resistant up to 1500G
- Compatible with Mac OS X (USB 2.0 operation only)
- MTBF: 1.5 million hours
- 3-Year Warranty

Price: $193.99 (from Amazon a time of review)

So let me just say here that with USB 3.0 product I’m not testing USB 2.0 speeds, I’ve already proved time and time again that USB 3.0 is faster so there’s no need to show you similar results again and again.

My system is a Corei5 750 CPU on an EVGA P55 132-LF-E655-KR motherboard. The motherboard does not have USB 3.0 natively on it so I use the ASUS U3S6 PCIE X4 add-in card that adds both USB 3.0 ports and SATA6 ports to my system. it works very well and I can recommend it to anyone looking for an inexpensive way to add USB 3.0 to their system and even SATA6.

Here’s the drive connected with the LEDs active:

For testing I’m comparing the OCZ Enyo to two USB 3.0 enabled portable hard drive, the Seagate 500gb Black Armor PS110 and the Cirago CST6000 250gb hard drive. I’m also comparing it to the Kingston DT Ultimate 64gb USB 3.0 flash drive. I should note that the Seagate actually has a 7200RPM drive in it while the Cirago only has a 5400RPM drive inside.

I’ve got several tests here for you to show you what this drive is capable of. All of the tests were run several times each to make sure the results were similar each time.

First up I’m using ATTO Disk Benchmark:

According to the specs above the Enyo 64gb should hit up to 225MB/s for read speeds and up to 135 mb/s for write speeds. Looking at the ATTO results we see it hit 255mb/s for read and 144 mb/s for write speeds. The read speeds are well above specs as you can see, and the write speeds are decently above what OCZ says they should be.

Next up is Crystal Diskmark:

Here the test results or speeds are a bit different, but that happens with different tests. The read speeds of the Enyo are above specs but the write is lower than expected.

HDTune Pro allows the user to run several types of tests, and I figured why not. I ran four tests on each drive, but they’re three different ones. The main test of course everyone knows is the Read test, so we’ll start with that one:

Here with this test we see the Enyo only hit 146.1 MB/s for some reason, but it still easily bested the competitors.

HDTune Pro File Benchmark only goes up to 512mb in size, so I ran both the 64mb test and the 512mb to see how the products performed with small and large files.

First up is the 64mb test:

There’s no comparison really here with the other other drives and the Enyo. If we look at the test results though you can see we’re over 200MB/s for the read speeds and almost to 150mb/s for the write speeds. Good performance I’d say.

Next is the 512mb test, and the results pretty much the same for the Enyo but the read speeds is just little slower here.

The next test I ran using HD Tune was the Random Access test:

Access times, Speeds, and Operations per Second are amazing for the Enyo when compared to regular hard drives and flash drives.

Then I ran more tests using SiSoft Sandra 2010.

Since there are all considered removable storage, the first I ran was the Removable Storage test:

Removable Storage

Benchmark removable and flash devices.

Combined Device Index: is a composite figure representing an overall performance rating based on the average of the Combined Index figures over the four file sizes. (Higher is better, i.e. better performance)

Endurance Factor: is a figure representing the Wear and Life Expectancy of flash devices; this is obtained by dividing the average performance (normal condition, i.e. sequential write) to the lowest performance (high-stress condition, i.e. same block re-write).

It measures the relative improvement of endurance caused by the wear leveling or flash management algorithm; the absolute endurance of a device (i.e. its expected life-time) is directly dependent, in addition to this Endurance Factor, on the nominal manufacturer rating of maximum erase/reprogram cycles, which is typically 100,000+ for SLC and 10,000+ for MLC devices. (Higher is better, i.e. longer life-time for the device)

The Device index for the Enyo is amazing, more than double that of the Kingston flash drive.

The next two tests are drive specific, first up is the Physical Disks test:

Physical Disks Test:
Drive Index :
Results Interpretation : Higher index values are better.
Random Access Time :
Results Interpretation : Lower index values are better.
As the test measures raw performance it is independent on the file system the disk uses and any volumes mounted off the disk.
Drive Index: is a composite figure representing an overall performance rating based on the highest read or write speed across the whole disk. Thus the higher the better.
Access Time: is the average time to read a random sector on the disk, analogous to latency response time. Thus the lower the better.

218.2 MB/s isn’t bad at all, well above the closest competitor.

Next up is the File Systems Test:
File Systems Test:
Drive Index :
Results Interpretation : Higher index values are better.
Random Access Time :
Results Interpretation : Lower index values are better.
This is not the raw disk performance that other benchmarks test – but the speed of the volume itself that depends on many more factors like file system, operating system cache, position on disk, etc. Thus this is the performance you get at the file system level.
Drive Index: is a composite figure representing an overall performance rating based on the average of the read, write, and seek tests, and file and cache size. The Drive Index is intended to represent drive performance under typical use in a PC. A larger number means better performance. The weighting of the results is not equal it represents the distribution of different files sizes as used on these devices (obtained through field research).

The scores here are the drive index or basically an average, and the Enyo scores well.

Let’s take a look at the actual test results in text format.

First is the OCZ Enyo:

Detailed Benchmark Results
Buffered Read : 256.26MB/s
Sequential Read : 231.55MB/s
Random Read : 60.28MB/s
Buffered Write : 179.88MB/s
Sequential Write : 61MB/s
Random Write : 104.44MB/s
Random Access Time : 12.27ms

Next is the Cirago drive:

Detailed Benchmark Results
Buffered Read : 35.8MB/s
Sequential Read : 36.31MB/s
Random Read : 24.46MB/s
Buffered Write : 74.4MB/s
Sequential Write : 52.54MB/s
Random Write : 35.3MB/s
Random Access Time : 13.34ms

Then next is the Kingston Flash Drive:

Detailed Benchmark Results
Buffered Read : 48MB/s
Sequential Read : 87.8MB/s
Random Read : 77.9MB/s
Buffered Write : 93.83MB/s
Sequential Write : 56MB/s
Random Write : 16MB/s
Random Access Time : 1.45ms

and lastly is the Seagate Black Armor:

Detailed Benchmark Results
Buffered Read : 53.6MB/s
Sequential Read : 93.65MB/s
Random Read : 49.44MB/s
Buffered Write : 44.88MB/s
Sequential Write : 93MB/s
Random Write : 36.7MB/s
Random Access Time : 9.55ms

So the Enyo performs well and it’s well made, what more could you ask for?!

Conclusion:
The OCZ Enyo is faster than the fastest portable hard drive I’ve got on hand, and even faster than the latest USB 3.0 flash drive as well. That’s saying a lot there surely.

The OCZ Enyo, in my testing, performed very well, even significantly beating out the specs that OCZ has listed for it in some tests.

I do however have to small issues, maybe not issues but possible improvements to keep in mind for a version 2. I personally don’t like the type of USB 3.0 connector used on the Enyo, I’ve had them break myself. It’s not the fault of OCZ, it’s whoever designed it, it’s just too thin and fragile I think. I would have went with a sturdier style connection myself, but space may have been an issue. It’s a mini-connector and obviously another type of connector would have made the Enyo more bulky, so I can understand why they chose what they did.

The Enyo is an excellent product truly but I would improve upon by having a built-in USB connection. It’s not a portable hard drive, it’s smaller and having to carry the cable can be cumbersome, so I would much like to see a connector built right in with a small cable. Again that might be an issue with bulk, but I’m sure they could find  away to get it to work with a little design finesse.

As is though the OCZ Enyo is a great product, it’s fast and lightweight making it very portable and useful. If you get it I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.

Pros:
+Excellent performance
+Well made and good looking
+Simple, easy to use and portable

Cons:
-A bit expensive

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

To learn more about our review policy please visit this page HERE.

Review of OCZ Enyo 64gb USB 3.0 Portable Solid State Drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

The Data Traveler Ultimate 3.0 comes packaged in the familiar sealed plastic clamshell style package. On the front you can see the drive itself, and on the back you can see a USB cable along with some basic information.

When you open it up you’ll find the drive, a ‘Y’ style USB cable and a small lanyard.

The ‘Y’ USB cable can be used with USB 2.0, actually it says to use it with USB 2.0 and not to plug it into a USB 2.0 port. The cable has one thick wire and one thin one, one is data and one is extra power. This isn’t true all of the time though, you may be able to use the DT Ultimate 3.0 without the cable on USB 2.0. I found I could use it without the cable on USB 2.0 ports in my system.

The drive itself is plastic and aluminum, and it feels very well made. It’s solid and sturdy. On the front you’ll see a the DT Ultimate 3.0 logo plate and on the back is the Kingston logo. On the end of the drive is a large hole for the lanyard, keychain or whatever. The cap can attach to the back end for storage while in use.

The top pops off to reveal the blue USB 3.0 connector.

Specifications:

DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0

DTU30/64GB
-64GB USB 3.0 Flash drive

Ultimate Performance expands new worlds.

Kingston’s DataTraveler Ultimate 3.0 (DTU30) features the latest technology for USB Flash drives, making it ideal for early adopters who want to take advantage of all the performance improvements offered by USB 3.0 right away.

The DTU30 is the perfect solution for easily storing and quickly transferring all your documents, high resolution photos, HD video, and more. It’s exceptionally fast and easy to let you keep data with you wherever you go.

USB 3.0 offers the same ease-of-use and plug and play capabilities as previous generations of USB technologies but with a performance increase and better power management. This USB 3.0 drive is backwards compatible with USB 2.0.

DTU30 is backed by 24.7 tech support, a five-year warranty and legendary Kingston reliability.

Features/Specifications:

* Capacities – 16GB, 32GB, 64GB
* Requirements – system with USB 3.0 port
* Fast – data transfer rates for USB 3.0 to 80MB/sec. read and 60MB/sec. write; USB 2.0 = 30MB/sec. read and 30MB/sec. write
* Backwards compatible – with USB 2.0.
* Dimensions – 2.90″ x 0.87″ x 0.63″ (73.70mm x 22.20mm x 16.10mm)
* Operating Temperature – 32° to 140°F (0° to 60°C)
* Storage Temperature – -4° to 185°F (-20° to 85°C)
* Simple – just plug into a USB port
* Practical – durable casing with a solid lanyard loop
* Guaranteed – five-year warranty

Price: $208.86   (From Amazon at time of review)

In use there is a rather bright blue LED in the end of the drive. It lights up solid when connected and then blinks for activity.

USB 3.0 is rather new, and I’ve got no other USB 3.0 drive to compare the DT Ultimate 3.0 to, so I’m just testing the speeds here and trying to see if it meets the specs that Kingston has set forth for it.

First up I used ATTO Disk Benchmark.  I ran three tests actually here, one on USB 3.0, one on USB 2.0 with the ‘Y’ cable and one on USB 2.0 without the ‘Y’ cable to see if there were any differences or if the cable was needed in my system, and it wasn’t needed. The drive worked fine on my USB 2.0 ports without the cable.

On the package Kingston lists speeds of 80mb/s read and 60mb/s write for USB 3.0 and 30mb/s read and 30mb/s write for USB 2.0. On USB 3.0 I managed to hit 91mb/s read and 70mb/s write speeds which is well above the specs Kingston states for this drive. On USB 2.0 I hit 33 MB/s read speeds and only 25MB/s for the write speed. I didn’t hit the 30Mb/s write as Kingston says it should but still 25MB/s isn’t bad for a USB drive. I did though exceed the 30Mb/s read speed which is good.

Next up I ran CrystalDiskMark to see what it tells me. I didn’t run the tests again with the adapter as it wasn’t needed.

I got similar results here with this test, above specs for USB 3.0 and almost the same for USB 2.0 for the Sequential read/write test.

Finally I ran the Read Test on HD Tune to see what kind of performance I could get.

HD Tune gives you the average speed as well as minimum and maximum speeds. We hit 32mb/s and averaged 30.1mb/s on the UBS 2.0 interface. On the USB 3.0 connection I hit a maximum of 84 MB/s with an average of 71.3mb/s.

So not bad overall I would say, I’m happy with it anyway.

One thing I did notice is that while in use the drive gets very warm. Room temperature was 24C/75.2F, I used as non-contact infrared thermometer (ThermoHawk 200) to check the temps on the DT Ultimate 3.0 and it averaged 37C/98.6F during testing or usage. 98.6F might seem hot but that’s your average body temperature anyway, still though going from 75F up to 98F is rather large jump. We know heat isn’t exactly something that electronics like very much, but I think it’ll be fine. The Kingston specs state operating temperature maximum of 140F/60C, so hitting 37C we’re way below that and safe.

The price of this drive might be a concern to some. Kingston lists it on their site as $270, but Amazon has it for $208, still that’s a bit high for a USB drive, but as with any new tech prices are high when it first comes out. The 32gb and the 16gb versions are much cheaper of course though.

Conclusion:

The Kingston Data Traveler 3.0 USB 3.0 flash drive exceeds specifications, what more could you ask for really? The speeds are excellent, coming in well above the rated specs. The drive itself is nicely made, it’s solid and feels very sturdy while being aesthetically pleasing as well.

This is the first USB 3.0 drive for Kingston and it’s decent for a first attempt truly. I’m happy with it, it’s work fine.

Some might have to use the ‘Y’ USB 2.0 cable, but most likely that will only be a concern with laptops as most desktop PCs will provide enough power on the USB 2.0 ports for use of this drive.

I would however work on the heat issue, it does feel very warm to the touch, and to some that might be a bit disconcerting.

The price is high, but that’s to be expected for a new technology/new product, give it a month or so and the price will drop as does all technology.

Pros:
+Very nicely made
+Exceeds specifications
+Fast transfers

Cons:
-Drive gets very warm when in use
-May have to use adapter cable
-Expensive

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

To learn more about our review policy please visit this page HERE.

Review of Kingston Data Traveler Ultimate 3.0 64GB USB 3.0 Flash drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

USB Flash drives are a great way of carrying around portable data. However, keeping this data safe from prying eyes usually requires some form of security; whether it is password or encryption protection. In most cases, hardware encrypted USB Flash drives are the most secure way of locking up ones data. Of course these drives can be rather expensive. Thankfully, Kingston has released the relatively affordable DataTraveler Locker+ USB Flash drive, which features hardware-based encryption.

With the DataTraveler Locker+, Kingston implements a 256-bit AES hardware-based encryption to protect its contents. To keep this data safe, the DataTraveler Locker+ will lock down and reformat after 10 intrusion attempts. Now if you lose or have your USB Flash drive stolen, the encrypted data is protected from ever being accessed. The DataTraveler Locker+ is totally encrypted requiring a password to be entered each time the drive is plugged into a computer. Kingston makes a similar model called the DataTraveler Locker which allows the user to create both a secure and unsecure partition. On the DataTraveler Locker+ there is not unsecure partition.

The DataTraveler Locker+ is available in 4, 8, 16 and 32 GB sizes and does not require administrator access or any installation of software to run on Windows machines. It also works on Macs running OS X (10.4 or higher).

The Kingston DataTraveler Locker+ comes on a blister card with the standard Kingston packaging. On the back of this card is a list of features and an OS compatibility table. What separates the DataTraveler Locker+ from other hardware-encrypted drives is the Mac OS X 10.4-10.6 capability. As a dual OS user this is a terrific feature; thank you Kingston for the Mac love.

Inside the packaging we find the drive, a lanyard and the white backing card.

The DataTraveler Locker+ should look very familiar to the owners of the DataTraveler 400 as the USB housing is identical. The device measures 65.76mm x 17.98mm x 10.7mm is a swivel design which eschews the cap solution. Another nice touch by Kingston as I tend to lose USB Flash drive caps rather quickly.

DataTraveler Locker+ is composed of a gunmetal grey aluminum exterior, which swivels off the actual drive that is covered by a black rubber material. The aluminum housing has an opening at one end for attaching the included lanyard.

Markings on the drive include the DataTraveler Locker+ name and drive size on one side and the Kingston logo on the other. Next to this Kingston logo is an opening for the operating LED found on the black portion to shine through.

Specifications:

DataTraveler Locker+ 16GB USB Flash drive

Kingston’s DataTraveler Locker+ USB Flash drive is ideal for people and organizations that require the most secure way to store and transfer portable data. It uses hardware encryption to safeguard 100 percent of stored data in case the drive is lost or stolen. No need to worry about sensitive and personal documents ending up in the wrong hands. DataTraveler Locker+ also provides a fully customizable security policy.

Kingston’s DataTraveler® Locker+ USB Flash drive is designed for organizations that require a secure way to store and transfer portable data. One hundred percent of the stored data is secured by hardware-based encryption to guard even the most sensitive data in case the drive is lost or stolen.

Features/Benefits:
-Full Encryption — 100 percent of stored data is protected by hardware-based encryption
-Secure — drive locks down and reformats after 10 intrusion attempts.
-Enforced password protection — complex password issuer set with minimum characteristics to prevent unauthorized access
-Easy to use — no admin rights or application installation required
-Guaranteed — five-year warranty and 24/7 tech support

Specifications:
-Capacities — 4GB, 8GB, 16GB, 32GB
-Dimensions — 2.58″ x 0.71″ x 0.41″ (65.76mm x 17.98mm x 10.7mm)
-Simple — just plug into a USB port
-Guaranteed — five-year warranty
-Minimum System Requirements —
–USB 2.0 compliant and 1.1 compatible
–Two (2) free consecutive drive letters required for use+

For testing the DataTraveler Locker+ I used my MacBook Pro running Snow Leopard (OS X 10.6) and my Desktop PC with Windows 7 64 Bit Professional installed. Upon insertion of the Kingston USB Flash Drive we see a 9MB file named DTplus appear on the desktop. This is a read only file and is recognized as a CD/DVD file type to prevent erasure. On Windows machines the file should autorun and start the setup process, while on the Mac side the user needs to manually open the folder and start the installation from the Mac subfolder.

Setup takes less than a minute and involves selecting the default language, accepting the License Agreement and finally choosing a password. Kingston requires the password to be 6 to 16 characters long and contain three of the following: upper case letters, lower case letters, digits and special characters. Before the initial format Kingston allows Contact Information to be entered. Once the format is completed we see the 16GB drive on either the Windows or Apple machine.

Initially when I first plugged in the DataTraveler Locker+ into my MacBook Pro, I was unable to execute the DTLocker+ application and received the following error:

After some investigation I found the System Preference program USB OverDrive caused a USB conflict and once I uninstalled this program and rebooted I was able to use the DataTraveler Locker+. So if you are running any third party programs and have issues with installation or reading the USB drive, check to see if anything is tied to the USB control.

Every time the DataTraveler Locker+ is plugged into a Windows or OS X machine, the password needs to be entered to access the contents on the drive. From the Dock in OS X and the System Tray on Windows we find the DTLocker icon from which settings can be changed, the drive can be formatted or unmounted.

To compare the speed of the DataTraveler Locker+, I pitted it against some recent large capacity USB Flash drives including the DataTraveler 400 (16GB) (a password protected but not encrypted drive), Corsair Voyager 16GB and the OCZ Rally2 64 GB drives.

For testing I used DiskBench running the copy and read bench marks. As you can see the DataTraveler Locker+ was actually faster than the others on both benchmarks with the hardware encryption running. This was quite surprising, so I ran another set of benchmarks with the same four drives.

For the second test I used HD Tune Pro 4.0 running the Read benchmark. The two Kingston Drives ran at similar speeds while the Corsair and OCZ drives were slightly slower. None of these drives are designed for speed performance but for everyday use. The DataTraveler Locker+ seems to hold its own and actually stands out against these drives even with the hardware encryption running.

Since the ENTIRE USB drive is encrypted, a password must be entered each time the drive is plugged into a computer. This may be a hassle to some, but for true security there is no way around this.

Of course for security and protection that is found in the Kingston DataTraveler Locker+ there is a premium to be paid and that is the price of the actual device. It is generally more expensive than similar capacity flash drives. But for this price you are getting security, cross platform capability and Kingston’s five year warranty.

The main drawback to the DataTraveler Locker+ is that it will not work with Linux. Hopefully Kingston will remedy this issue in the future for Linux users making this the optimal cross platform USB Thumb drive security solution.

Conclusion:

When grading the Kingston DataTraveler Locker+ against non-encrypted competitors it is a very good USB Flash Thumb drive. But once the security feature is taken into account the DataTraveler Locker+ becomes a phenomenal USB drive. The hardware encryption allows the Kingston drive to work in numerous computing environments including OS X and Windows machines without administrative access.

It is a 100% secure drive and all the contents within are protected by 256-bit AES hardware-based encryption. If you prefer to have a public and private partition then the Kingston DataTraveler Locker would be advised. However for the the truly security obsessive such as myself and business environments then the Kingston DataTraveler Locker+ is an ideal solution.

Pros:
+Hardware Encryption (AES 256-bit)
+Works with both Windows and Mac
+Excellent performance
+Rugged and well designed
+Capless design
+Simple setup

Cons:
-Linux users need not apply
-Pricey

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

This product was given to TestFreaks for review by the company for review purposes only, and is not considered by us as payment for the review, we do not, and never will, accept payment from companies to review their products. To learn more about our review policy please visit this page HERE.

DataTraveler Locker+ 16GB USB Flash drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

We love USB drives here at TestFreaks, we love to test them and we really love the unusual ones. Today for review I’ve got four USB drives that are very cool, these are from a company called Tyme Machines and they’re special because they’re Star Wars themed. I’ve got 4gig versions of Yoda, Darth Vader, Boba Fett and a Storm Trooper. They’re very nicely made, they look great, but looks aren’t everything, so I had to test them out and compare them to some ‘regular’ USB drives I’ve got on hand, so read on to see a whole bunch of pictures of these drives and the testing of course…

We’ll start off with the packaging, the fronts are a little bit different on each one, but the backs are the same.

We’ first take a look at our little friend Yoda. he’s very detailed, and well made. They’re all made of plastic, and they’re all rather large. You can’t put two of these in UBS ports if the ports are close to each other. I’ve included a comparison picture as well for each of them with a standard USB drive and my Jawbone2 headset so you can get an idea of the size.

Next up we have the dark lord himself, Darth Vader:

Next we’ve got the most famous bounty hunter in the galaxy, Boba Fett:

and finally we’ve got the ever present grunt, the Storm Trooper:<

And here’s a family photo:

Specifications:

Tyme Machines Star Wars Sculpted 4gb USB Drives

This 3” commemorative designer drive is perfect for any Star Wars fan to backup and share files in style.  Weather your looking for a place to store your work, photos, your favorite MP3s, this is the perfect addition to any collection.

Price: $29.99 (Each)

You can mix and match their heads, but they really don’t securely attach to the base, but it’s fun…

There is an LED inside of the drives, but it only really shows up on the lighter colored figures:

For testing and comparison I put the Star Wars drives up against three other 4gb USB drives I’ve got on hand, the Corsair Flash Voyager mini, the Verbatim Touch ‘n Tiny and the OCZ ATV Turbo:

Pulling some info from the drives I found that they are PNY drives inside of the characters. SiSoft Sandra and HDTach just says it’s a PNY Drive Model USB 2.0 FD and that’s it… Other than that I don’t know any specs or speeds of the drives as they aren’t really listed anywhere.

The first test was ATTO DiskBenchmark. I was curious so I ran it on all of the drives.

You can see the results are virtually the same, very slow write speeds.

here’s the tests with the other drives:

Even the slow Corsair drive outperforms the Star Wars drives…

I ran HDTach as well, not on all of the Star Wars drives though since they are the same:

as you can see, in terms of performance the Tyme Machine Star Wars drives are pretty bad really, but that’s not why we’re buying them is it?

Conclusion:

The Tyme Machines Star Wars Sculpted USB drives are very well made, the attention to detail is amazing, for any Star Wars fan these are a must have item. Add these to your holiday wish list definitely.<

You’re not buying them for their performance though are you?

it would be nice if we could get the best of both worlds though, good looks and speed, but alas you’re going to have to sacrifice some performance for the good looks of these drives.

These are the USB Drives you’re looking for…

Pros:
+Well made
+They’re Star Wars Themed USB Drives!
+They’re cool!

Cons:
-Slow write and read speeds compared to others

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

Tyme Machines Star Wars Sculpted 4gb USB Drives is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

Sushi, Strawberry, BBQ Chicken, Cookie, Hamburger, Pizza, Watermelon and Shrimp, sounds like something you might find at a buffet right? Well throw in a ninja, a teddy bear, a fox, a shoe, a sandal and skull, then what do you have? One heck of a party that’s what!  Seriously though, we could even add a lot more odd things to that list as well. What all these things have in common is that they are USB flash drives. Yes, we love our flash drives, we love testing them and comparing them.

I’ve done something that no one else has done, I’ve taken 36 novelty USB drives, tested and compared them to each other. You might ask why, well I ask why not? USB novelty drives are a large market, and people buy them obviously, but I’ve never seen anyone really compare them to see how they perform. So I took quite a bit of time and ran lots of tests, on 1gig, 2gig and 8gig novelty style USB drives to see how they stand up to each other.

So here are some pictures of the drives themselves, in packages and opened:

I’ve got 1gig, 2gig, 4gig and 8gig sized drives, the majority of these drives are from USBGeek.com. They’ve got tons of interesting USB gadgets that you might not see elsewhere.

So here’s the 1gig drives:

Here’s the 2gig drives:

There’s one 4gig drive:

and here’s the 8gig drives:

That’s enough drives I think for testing. Quality wise, most of these drives are decently made, and the food ones actually look like food, for the most part… The jewelry ones are a bit questionable, I’m not sure who would wear these things, but they’re about the quality of costume jewelry.

So, for testing I used SiSoft Sandra 2009 SP3 and Diskbench.

We’ll start with SiSoft Sandra 2009 SP3 Removable Storage Benchmark first.

Here’s all of the drives compared to each other, ordering is worst to best. Sorry is the font is a bit small, but that’s a lot to cram in there, you can click it to get a bigger view. I named the drives what they are, i.e. Monkey USB Drive is a ‘Monkey 2gb’.

Next up I compared only the 2gb drives, and I threw in the Sandisk Cruzer Enterprise 2gb as well for comparison. Same ordering worst to best.

As expected the Cruzer just blows them all away easily…

Next up is the 8gig drives only being tested, I threw in the Super Talent Pico-D 8gb drive as well for comparison.

Surprisingly the Super Talent isn’t the fastest… the Strawberry is?!?

Ok, now I’ve got a bunch more charts for you for the testing with DiskBench. I had to do individual charts for the Copy To and Copy From as it was already a bit crowded. I used a 350MB .AVI Video file for testing on all of the drives.

First up is Copy to or the write speeds of the drives. First we’ll take a look at the times, in seconds, it takes to transfer the file to the USB drive. Chart is ordered best to worst, lower time is better of course.

Stay away from the wood, almost three minutes to transfer the file. The bracelet though is surprisingly fast.

Now we have the Copy To or Write times for the 2gig drives, again I threw in the Sandisk Cruzer 2gb for comparison.

Sandisk wins of course.

And here are the times for the 8gb drives, with the Super Talent Pico-D 8gb included as well:

Here we see the Pico-D has the fastest time.

Here are three more graphs showing the transfer rates in MB/s for the above tests, ordered best to worst, or fastest to slowest.

Now we have the Copy From or read speeds/times of the drives. Times are in seconds, ordered best to worst, or fastest to slowest.

Here we see some of the positions have changed, though the bracelet is still the fastest.

Next up is the 2gig drives, with the Sandisk in there as well:

Sandisk wins, but just barely….

next up is the 8gig drives:

The Super Talent Pico-D wins by a nice margin.

and finally here’s the transfer rates for those Copy From/Read tests:

What have we learned from all of this? Besides the fact that I’ve got way too many USB drives floating around here now…

Well we learned that USB Novelty drives just aren’t that good for doing anything but looking cute. Though the USB bracelet actually performed fairly well compared to the others. Though I’m not sure who would want to wear it…but it is well made.

One thing about these novelty style drives is that, most of the time, they are a lot more expensive than their ‘regular’ counterparts. Looking at the USBgeek site we can see the 8gb BBQ Chicken costs $42.00, while the Super Talent Pico-D 8gb drive can be had for as little as $17. That is ridiculous to pay more than twice the amount for the same size and get a lot less performance.

I guess they have their place out there, or they wouldn’t be on the market right?

Who buys them? I guess people who prefer cute over performance.

Well I hope you learned something from all of this, I think I did.

..but be sure to check back as we’re going to be giving these drives away here, and be sure to follow us on Twitter as we’ll be tossing a few up there just for our followers to get! As you can see, we’ve got a lot of them, so chances are good you can snag one.

If you’re looking for a ‘real’ USB drive then check out my other articles about them:

USB Flash Drive Comparison – 21 Tested and Compared

USB Flash Drive Comparison prt2 – FAT32 vs NTFS vs ExFat

16gb USB Flash Drive Comparison – 17 Compared

and stop by the main site where we’ve got hundreds, if not thousands of them reviewed and indexed. The category is USB Flash Memory.

USB Novelty Flash Drive Roundup – 36 Tested and Compared is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

A few weeks ago I reviewed the OCZ Rally2 64gb Flash Drive, and the results weren’t that good really, especially for the write speeds. So I got together with Lisa and Eric from over at OCZ and we found out that it seems I got one of the first batches of Rally2 64gb USB Drives with the older firmware on it. There is a quick and easy fix for the slow write speed problem though, just a firmware update that you can do yourself if you happen to have one of the first Rally2′s that were released. So read on to learn more on how to get the firmware and see what the differences are before and after the firmware upgrade.

The firmware upgrade itself is very easy to do, just download the Zip file HERE, and read the included text file for instructions. The instructions are easy, just run the program, it’s automatically done for you. Two little details are that the firmware update program only works on Windows Xp and with USB2.0 ports only. For most people the USB2.0 should not be a problem, but for those of us using Vista we’ve got to find an XP machine to use. Supposedly there is going to be a Vista version released though. The entire process takes about 2 minutes total, simple and worth it.

So let’s take a look at the before and after flash or firmware upgrade results.

First up is SiSoft Sandra 2009 Sp3 Removable Storage Benchmark.

As you can see there is a nice increase in the overall performance of the Rally2 after the flash

Here’s the 256MB files test results:

As you can see the write performance doubled.

Next up is DiskBench, I used a 350MB .AVI video file for testing Copy To, Copy From and Read From.

First we have the time it took to do the tasks, lower is better of course:

The Read and Copy From performance got a little better but not much, the Copy To or Write Performance shows a dramatic increase is speeds, we see the time dropped by 12.21 seconds.

Here’s the transfer rates in MB/s for those tests:

For my testing we gained 5.96MB/s speed for writing to the Rally2, which pushed it into the specs listed for the Rally2 of 15-20MB/s transfer rates.

Finally here’s testing using ATTO Dick Benchmark, personally I don’t use ATTO often as I don’t feel it represents real world results, but it is used by many companies to test their products.

ATTO runs several tests, read and write and the following graph shows the highest speeds achieved before and after the firmware upgrade.

You can see I hit 26.5 MB/s for the write speeds, which is excellent.

So basically the first batch of Rally2 drives that went out had the original firmware on it, the ones out there now available for purchase should have the upgraded firmware. If you happen to have one of the older drives though you can easily make it faster…

Going back though with this new information I can revise the review scoring to give the Rally2 a 9 out of 10 score. The reasoning is that it still isn’t quite the fastest out there, but it’s very close.

In conclusion the Rally2 is a nice, fast drive with a large capacity that most anyone should be happy with.

OCZ USB 2.0 Rally2 64GB Flash Drive Revisited is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

It’s been a while since I looked at any USB Flash Drives, so I figured it was about time. This isn’t just any flash drive either, it’s one of only a few 64gb drives on the market today. The OCZ Rally2 64gb flash drive is obviously large capacity, but it’s got a metal housing as well that makes it tough and durable. I’ve got two other 64gb drives on hand for comparison, so continue on for the comparison and review of the Rally2 64gb flash drive.

The 64gb Rally2 comes in the familiar sealed plastic clamshell style package, we can see the drive through the front and there’s some information listed as well. Included with the drive is a lanyard for carrying the Rally2.

The Rally2 is a black metal drive with the Rally2 logo on one side and the OCZ Logo on the other.

Specifications:

OCZ USB 2.0 Rally2 64GB Flash Drive

The enthusiast’s favorite flash drive! The OCZ USB 2.0 Rally2 Flash Drive features a sleek and ergonomic design housing and is one of the fastest flash drives available. Thanks to the implementation of leading edge Dual Channel technology, the Rally2 puts data transferring in the fast lane and leaves the competitors in the dust.

Pick up the pace and transfer your music, pictures, videos, and data to your laptop or desktop in record time or simply "Plug and Play" them instantaneously from the convenience of any USB port. The Rally2 Drive excels when managing a wide range of media, and is optimized to more rapidly transfer today’s larger (5MB and up) files.

The ultra durable OCZ Rally2 stores vital documents, presentations, images, music and more in an ultra sleek pocket-size drive, so you can access your files without having to disconnect other USB ports to make room, a common problem with many oversized competitor drives. Available in a modest 1GB all the way up to an ample 64GB capacity, choose the capacity that’s right for your storage needs.

The incredible OCZ Rally2 Flash drive is designed to be the fastest most reliable USB flash memory drive on the market, and makes use of cutting edge technology and comes backed with a limited lifetime warranty for the ultimate peace of mind.

Features:
High Speed USB 2.0 Certified      
Up to 30-35MB/s (read), 15-20MB/s (write)      
True Plug and Play (Compatible with MAC OS X)      
Dual Channel Technology      
64GB Dimensions: 87.0mm (L) x 16.0mm (W) x 8.0mm (H)      
Aluminum Chassis      
Orange LED Status Light      
Lifetime Warranty

Accessories: Lanyard

System Requirement:      
USB port      
Operating System: Windows 98SE, Windows Me, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Mac OS 9.0 or later, Linux Kernel 2.4.2 or later

Part Numbers: OCZUSBR2DC-64GB

So I’ve got two other 64gb drives on hand, a Kingston and a Patriot, the OCZ is the longest of them, but the thinnest. The Rally2 64gb is also a bit larger than the OCZ Rally2 32gb  version as well.

Actually I’ve got three Rally2 drives now, a 4gb, a 32gb and the 64gb and I noticed that the lanyard for the 64gb is thicker, or heavier than that of the other two, nothing really ground breaking but just an observation really.

The Rally2 does have an orange LED in the end that lights up and blinks for activity.

So now we know what it looks like, let’s check out the performance.

First up I’ve got SiSoft Sandra 2009 SP2 Removable Storage Benchmark, higher scores are better.

As you can see, according to SiSoft Sandra the Rally2 performs very well.

Here’s a look at the 256MB files test:

as we can see here the Rally2 is a bit slower than the others.

Next up for testing I’ve got DiskBench and the time it takes to Copy To, Copy From and Read From the USB drives. For all testing I used a 350MB .AVI Video file. Results are in seconds so lower is better.

As you can see the write times of the Rally2 is a bit slow compared to the Kingston and the Patriot drives, but the Read specs is close.

Here’s the actual transfer rates for the above tests, higher scores are better.

Here again you can see the Rally2 is slower at writing than the other two drives, and even the read speeds are as well.

One observation here is that the specs list the write speed for the Rally2 at 10-15MB/s, but as you can see I didn’t quite hit the 10MB/s mark.

While it’s not the fastest out there, the Rally2 is the least expensive of all three drives, coming in around $5 cheaper than both of the others.

Honestly I’m a bit disappointed by the Rally2 and its performance, I was expecting it to be a the fastest of the bunch, but you can’t win them all I guess.

Conclusion:
The OCZ Rally2 is a well made and inexpensive 64gb USB flash drive. It might not be the fastest out there, but it looks good, and it’s the least expensive of those I’ve tested to date.

Pros:
Least expensive of those tested
Well made
Includes lanyard

Cons:
Not the fastest of those tested
Didn’t hit the rated specs for write speeds

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

OCZ USB 2.0 Rally2 64GB Flash Drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

Yes, it’s yet another USB drive, it’s from our friends at OCZ, but this one is a bit different than your usual USB drive. It’s called the CrossOver, and the reason for the name is that it crosses two storage mediums together basically. The CrossOver I got for review is the 8gb version, but what makes it so special is the integrated card reader for microSD cards, this allows you to take 8gigs of storage with you and be able to read the microSD cards from your phone, media player etc. It truly is a useful little USB drive, though from my tests I’ve found that it’s not quite that fast…

So read on to find out what I did about the CrossOver…

The OCZ CrossOver comes in every ones favorite packaging, the sealed plastic clamshell, we can see the CrossOVer through the front and the back has a product description.

Opening up the package we only find the Crossover itself and nothing else, normally you’d find a strap or lanyard, but not this time, though there is a hole in the end for one to be attached.

The back end is where you’ll find the card reader, just slip a microSD card in there and you’re in business.

Specifications:

OCZ 8gb CrossOver USB 2.0 Flash Drive

8GB – OCZUSBCVR8G

The CrossOver USB 2.0 Flash drive is the latest line of flash media that also doubles as a microSD™ and microSDHC™ card adapter. For the on-the-go student, gamer, or professional, the OCZ CrossOver flash drive eliminates the need for card readers and transfers your important multimedia files to and from your computer, phone, and camera.

The integrated card reader is compatible with the latest microSD and microSDHC media cards. This convenient feature enables you to expand the CrossOver’s 2GB, 4GB, or 8GB onboard storage capacity, as well as view and transfer your files from your microSD device. Combining a durable aluminum design and discrete card reader, the sleek and versatile CrossOver features excellent instant plug-and-play and ingenious capability to store and transfer via high-speed USB and microSD.

All OCZ CrossOver flash drives come backed with a 2 year warranty for unparalleled peace of mind, upholding the OCZ commitment to quality.

Specs:
-USB 2.0 Certified
-Mainstream Speeds
-Dark Gray Aluminum Chassis
-True Plug and Play (Compatible with MAC OS X)
-Available in 2GB, 4GB, and 8GB capacities
-microSD and microSDHC compatible
-2 Year Warranty

The microSD card slot isn’t anything special, it’s not spring loaded like others, you just slip your card in and you’re set. One other thing I noticed is that you can attached the cap to the back over the card slot, it clips on nicely, but the hole for a lanyard is there, so if you use a lanyard you can’t clip the cap on the back, not the best design there. Also there’s no cover for the microSD card, but then again I don’t think you’ll be leaving a card in there, just using it for reading really.

When you plug the CrossOver into your computer the CrossOver will appear and a Removable Disk as well, in my case the drive ‘K’ appeared:

I also got an OCZ 2gb microSD card for review as well, you’ll see that review tomorrow, but I figured why not used it with the CrossOver, so I ran SiSoft Sandra 2009 Sp2 Removable Storage Benchmark Test with the OCZ 2gb microSD card in my card reader and then in the CrossOver and compared the results, and they were surprising…

As you can see I get better speeds with the microSD card in the CrossOver than I do with my card reader.

Here’s a closer look at the Read and Write performance using the 256MB files test:

What would a USB drive review be without a comparison? So I’ve compared the CrossOver to other 8gb USB drives that I’ve got on hand.

As usual we’ll start with SiSoft Sandra 2009 Sp2 Removable Storage Benchmark:

As you can see the CrossOver just doesn’t perform that well according to Sandra here.

Here’s a look at the 256MB Files test:

Well here you can see the Write and the Read speeds are fairly low, the lowest of those I tested.

Let’s move on to Diskbench, in this test I took a 350MB .AVI Video file and ran three tests, Copy To or Write to the USB drives, Copy From and Read From.

This first graph shows us the time it takes to complete the tasks, obviously lower scores are better here. Graph is ordered best to worst using Write speed as the reference point of ordering.

As you can see we’ve got over one minute to transfer the video file to the CrossOver, almost double that of the closest drive. The Read speeds aren’t too bad though, a couple seconds slower than the other drives, but not bad.

Here are the Transfer Rates for the above tests, since this is transfer rates, higher is better, or faster. Same ordering as above.

We can see the Write speeds of the CrossOver are abysmal, they’re just horrible, but I have seen worse, though not on an 8gig name brand drive. The read speeds are low, but not as bad as the write speed.

The CrossOver is not a bad product in concept, but I think using faster chips might be a good idea here.

8gig USB drives range from about $12 up to $45 and even up to over $200 for specialty ones like the IronKey, the CrossOver sells at NewEgg for $18 as of the writing of this review, so that’s not too bad, considering you’re getting a card reader as well.

Conclusion:
The OCZ CrossOver is a very unique and useful dual purpose USB drive, not only card you take your data with you but you can use it to read your microSD card on the go without having to carry an additional card reader with you.

Overall the design of the CrossOver is nice, it’s seems well made. I can forgive the lack of lanyard and many do not come with them, and the missing cover for the microSD slot is not a big deal to me as I wouldn’t keep a card in there at all times.

The write performance is pretty bad for the CrossOver, but surprisingly the speeds of the integrated microSD card reader are actually better than the one I’ve got in my computer.

Pros:
Dual use -USB drive and microSD card reader
Inexpensive
Well made

Cons:
Slow speeds, both write and read
No cover for microSD slot
No strap

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

OCZ 8gb CrossOver USB 2.0 Flash Drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

Yep, I’m at it again, this time I’ve got an assortment of 16gb USB drives, 17 of them in total from many different companies. I went and did a bit of searching and collected some of the more popular drives out there today, along with many others as well. I think we’ve got a nice representative sampling overall, we’ve got Sandisk, Verbatim, PQI, Kingston, OCZ, Patriot, Ridata, Imation, HP, Adata,Corsair, Memorex, Super Talent, PNY and Transcend in this little roundup.

I’d like to thank Super Talent, OCZ, PNY and Kingston for sending me drives for this little roundup.

So read on for some graphing fun… we got some extreme graphage going on inside…

So here’s the drives in the test:

Adata Sport Series RB19 16gb
Corsair Flash Voyager
HP USB Flash Drive v125W
Imation Swivel Flash Drive
Kingston Data Traveler100
Kingston DataTraveler HyperX
Memorex Traveldrive
OCZ Diesel
OCZ Throttle
Patriot Exporter XT
PNY Attache
PQI Traveling Disk 1221
Ridata EZdrive Lightning Series
Sandisk Cruzer Micro
Super Talent Pico-C
Transcend JetFlash Elite Enabled
Verbatim Store ‘n’ Go

and just for your information my system basically consists of:

Intel C2Q9650 CPU

8gigs OCZ Ram

EVGA NF680i SLI Motherboard

Windows Vista Ultimate x64

Ok, now onto the testing phase.

First up is SiSoft Sandra 2009 Sp2 Removable Storage Benchmark.

Combined Device Index: is a composite figure representing an overall performance rating based on the average of the Combined Index figures over the four file sizes. (Higher is better, i.e. better performance)

Endurance Factor: is a figure representing the Wear and Life Expectancy of flash devices; this is obtained by dividing the average performance (normal condition, i.e. sequential write) to the lowest performance (high-stress condition, i.e. same block re-write).

It measures the relative improvement of endurance caused by the wear levelling or flash management algorithm; the absolute endurance of a device (i.e. its expected life-time) is directly dependent, in addition to this Endurance Factor, on the nominal manufacturer rating of maximum erase/reprogram cycles, which is typically 100,000+ for SLC and 10,000+ for MLC devices. (Higher is better, i.e. longer life-time for the device)

In the following graph the higher scores are better, I’ve arranged the chart from worst to best according to how SiSoft Sandra scored them:

The top five as we see according to SiSoft Sandra are OCZ, Sandisk, Super talent, Patriot and Imation.

Here’s a closer look at the test, specifically the 256MB Files test, here we can see how Sandra scored the Read Performance and Write Performance of the drives. The chart is arranged using the Write Performance as the reference, worst to best, and of course higher is better.

As we can see we’ve basically got six drives tied for first place in this test.

Now, I’ve got Diskbench test up next, but I’ve done it a bit different this time, since there’s quite a few it gets a bit crowded, so I’ve broken the individual tests down into separate graphs. Also I added another test in here as well, I figured since these were 16gb drives, I would thrown in a nice large file transfer test as well, I used the Windows7 ISO file weighing in at 3.15GB. I also used the same 350MB .AVI Video file that I always use as well.

Diskbench is nice in that it tells us the actual times and transfer rates to complete the tasks of Copy To or Write To the USB drives, Read From and Copy From as well. I run these three tests on my USB drives because they are the most common things people are going to be doing with their USB drives.

First up is testing with the 350MB .AVI Video file, lower scores are better as they are shown in seconds. The first test is for Copy To or Write To the USB drives.

As you can see the OCZ Throttle drive has the fastest write time for this size of file, coming in three seconds faster than the closest competitor. The other fast drives all come it at around 20 seconds to complete the task which is very good overall. We can also see the Adata and Sandisk drives are over one minute, not that good really.

Next test is Read From, this test simulates reading a file from the USB drive, again it’s in seconds so lower is better.

Here we see a bit of rearranging going on with the ordering, with the top drives coming in at around 11 seconds.

Next test is the Copy From test, this gives us the time it takes to copy from the USB drive to my hard drive.

The ordering here is close to the Read From test but not the same, still though the PQI drive is number one.

Now here are the transfer rates for the tests in MB/s, so higher scores are better or meaning faster.

First graph is showing the results for the Copy To or Write test:

Clearly the OCZ Throttle is a fast drive coming in almost a full 3MB/s faster than the nearest competitor. Though 16 and 17 MB/s isn’t bad at all either, it’s nice and fast.

Next graph is Transfer Rates for the Read From test, higher is better of course:

Over 30 MB/s is good, very good actually for a USB drive, and we see quite a few hit 30 and above in this test.

Finally we have the Transfer Rates for Copy From:

Again over 30 MB/s is good, hitting 32 MB/s and above is even better as we  can see a few are able to accomplish, most of the drives though aren’t too bad in this area really.

Ok, now for the last set of tests using Diskbench, this is where I used the ISO file that is 3.15GB in size. Same tests here, Copy To, Copy From and Read From, but I decided to only show you the times it takes, and not the transfer rates as they are pretty much the same as the other test, but seeing the actual time to do something can sometimes tell us more than seeing the transfer rates, at least I would rather see the times to do something, it’s easier to understand.

First up again is Copy To or Write to the USB drives, lower scores or times are better.

Over two minutes to copy the file to the USB drive for all of them, with the OCZ Throttle coming is number one here again, with a good 20 seconds better time. The main reason I wanted to show this is that things change with file sizes, the ordering of the drives has changed with the larger file as opposed to the smaller file transfer. Some drives got better when transferring the larger file, while others performed worse.  The Patriot drive got worse, while the HP drive got better, the Kingston HyperX got worse, and so did the Verbatim drive. The PNY drive was actually in 12th place on the 350MB file test, here we see it moved up a few spots to number eight on the list.

Next is the Read From test:

Again the OCZ Throttle drive is number one, still the top five drives are all very close in performance for this test. Again the ordering has changed from the 350MB file test.

and finally here’s the results for the Copy From test:

and yet again the OCZ Throttle drive is in the top spot, and one thing has remained the same for all of the tests I think, the worst is still the worst no matter how you look at it… anyone want a Transcend drive?….

Seriously though, if I had a choice of these drives it would be the OCZ Throttle, but then again it might not be. Yes it’s the fastest of the bunch, but it’s a hybrid drive, it’s got both eSATA and USB connections on it, and to use the USB connection you need to carry a small USB cable with you with mini-USB connector to plug into the Throttle, to me that’s a bit of a hassle really. The next choice would be tied between the Kingston HyperX and the Patriot Exporter XT drive, both are fairly fast and both have good qualities in their construction as well. Then again why would I bother with 16gb drives when I’ve got 32gb and 64gb ones on hand?

If I’m looking for a USB drive, the first thing I look at is the Copy To or Write speeds, this is what is most important to me, the next thing would be the Copy From speeds, as for me what I do most is put data on it, then take it off, reading from the drive is not that important to me really. So it all depends on what your priorities are concerning USB drives, the results are here, you can judge for yourself which is best for you.

If I had to give an ordering for the top three drives, taking everything here into account ,including my preferences, it would have to be the OCZ Throttle coming in first with the Kingston HyperX in second, the Patriot Xporter in third. Those are the ones that I would buy personally.

I hope you enjoyed this, I had fun doing it, I’ve got an even larger one in the works as well, but it’s going to be a bit different, so be on the look out for that within the next couple weeks.

16gb USB Drive Comparison – 17 Drives Compared is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

The Kingston 16gb DataTraveler HyperX USB drive sports the name HyperX like Kingston’s line of enthusiasts memory, ram that’s known for it’s speed and performance. With a name like HyperX, one expects this to be one fast USB drive right? Well that’s what I’m here to find out, if it is as fast as it’s namesake. I’ve got the HyperX USB drive compared to several other 16gb capacity drives as well to see who comes out on top, so continue on…

and I promise, no more UBS drive reviews for at least a week….

The Kingston HyperX 16gb USB drive comes packaged in the standard sealed plastic clamshell packaging, we can see the drive through the front and we find spec and features listed, front and back.

The only thing included with the drive is small nylon string with clip so you can attach to keys or wherever.

The HyperX USB driver is nicely made, mostly of plastic but with a blue colored metal accent on the top. It feel sturdy and solid like it will last for quite a while. There is no cap, the HyperX features a sliding USB connection, the slider is on the bottom of the drive.

Specifications:

Kingston 16GB DataTraveler HyperX2 USB drive

DataTraveler HyperX

With a read speed up to 25MB/sec. and write speed up to 16MB/sec., DataTraveler HyperX gives the enthusiast in you the power you want from your portable Flash storage solution. If you’re running Windows Vista, DataTraveler HyperX is made for you as it is enhanced for Windows ReadyBoost. And with capacities reaching 32GB, you can store more digital files than ever before on one drive.

Introducing DataTraveler HyperX, the best of two worlds
If you’re a fan of Kingston’s HyperX memory modules, you’ll love the latest addition to Kingston’s DataTraveler USB Flash drives, the DataTraveler HyperX, combining the best of speed and design from the name you trust.

Kingston’s flagship enthusiast brand of memory modules, Kingston HyperX has a longstanding history as the ultimate memory module for enthusiasts and PC gamers that want the best from their system memory. Now with DataTraveler HyperX, the speed you crave has crossed technology platforms to the world of USB Flash drives.

Featuring a capless design, with a metallic blue case and black grips for easy handling, DataTraveler HyperX is a sleek and durable solution for any enthusiasts rig. Simply plug DataTraveler HyperX into an available USB port and you are on your way to transferring photos, videos, music and data to carry with you to your second system, notebook or fellow enthusiasts system.

DataTraveler HyperX is backed by legendary Kingston reliability plus a five-year warranty and free tech support.

Kingston DataTraveler HyperX Part Number: DTHX2/16GB

Features/Specifications:
-Capacity: – 16GB
-Dimensions – 2.76 x 0.88 x 0.44 (70.0mm x 22.4mm x 11.3mm)
-Fast – data transfer rates up to 25MB/sec. read and up to 16MB/sec. write
-Enhanced for Windows ReadyBoost on Vista-based systems
-Simple – just plug into a USB port
-Guaranteed – five-year warranty

The Kingston HyperX USB Drive does have a small blue LED in it that blinks for activity to let you know something is going on.

So now we know what it looks like and how it looks in operation, but how does it perform?

First up with testing we’ve got SiSoft Sandra 2009 SP2 Removable Storage Benchmark.

Before we get to the graph, here’s a refresher of what the things in the graph mean exactly:

Combined Device Index: is a composite figure representing an overall performance rating based on the average of the Combined Index figures over the four file sizes. (Higher is better, i.e. better performance)

Endurance Factor: is a figure representing the Wear and Life Expectancy of flash devices; this is obtained by dividing the average performance (normal condition, i.e. sequential write) to the lowest performance (high-stress condition, i.e. same block re-write).

It measures the relative improvement of endurance caused by the wear levelling or flash management algorithm; the absolute endurance of a device (i.e. its expected life-time) is directly dependent, in addition to this Endurance Factor, on the nominal manufacturer rating of maximum erase/reprogram cycles, which is typically 100,000+ for SLC and 10,000+ for MLC devices. (Higher is better, i.e. longer life-time for the device)

Ordering for the following chart is worst to best:

Hrmm, according to my girl Sandra here, the HyperX isn’t that good is it? Let’s take a closer look at things in the 256MB Files Test:

According to this part of the test, the HyperX does very well, basically tying a few other drives for second place.

Sandra is nice for testing to learn more about a product, but it can be a bit technical, personally I prefer down to earth, easy to understand stuff like the next test.

DiskBench is the next test I have, it tells out in seconds how long it takes to do a task, for measurements I like to test the Copy To, Copy From and Read From speeds of a USB drive, as these are the most common things people will be doing with their USB drives. For all testing I used a 350MB .AVI Video file.

In this first graph ordering is best to worst with Copy To or Write Performance being the base for the ordering of the graph, lower time is better to complete a task, and ordering is best to worst.

Here we see a different story than what Sandra can tell us, if you look closely you can see the Kingston HyperX drives has the lowest times for Read From and Copy From, and a very decent Copy To or Write speed.

Here’s the actual transfer rates for those tests, same ordering with Copy To as the reference and best to worst.

As the other chart told us, the HyperX has the fastest transfer reading rates.

but I’m not done just yet, one more graph for you, I thought it might make the comparison a bit easier if I isolated just the 16GB USB drives:

The OCZ Throttle is a little bit faster in terms of Write Performance, but again you can see the HyperX is the fastest when it comes to reading.

If we go back and look at the specs listed we see ‘read speed up to 25MB/sec’ but in my tests the HyperX easily broke the 30MB barrier. If we go back again and look at the Write speeds we see ‘write speed up to 16MB/sec’ and looking at our charts I got 17.27MB/s, which is better than the rated speed.

Conclusion:

The Kingston DataTraveler HyperX 16gb USB drive is the fastest 16gb USB drive I’ve tested to date in terms of read performance, it easily bests all of the competitors.

For write speed, well it’s still fast, not the fastest, but coming in a close second to the fastest of my 16gb drives, so not bad overall really. So if you’re looking for a 16gb drive then this is the one to get.

Pros:
Fast
Well made
Capless

Cons:
None really

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

Kingston 16GB DataTraveler HyperX2 USB drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

I remember when 64MB flash drives were just coming out, they were expensive and considered a luxury item, now not so much, they’re pretty much useless at this point in time. The latest drives on the market today are 64GB in capacity, that’s a huge jump from the 64MB of just a few years ago. On a 64GB USB drive you can fit a little over thirteen and a half DVDs wort of information, that’s a lot on such a small device. I love doing what I do as it allows me to see things evolve more closely than the average person, it’s amazing how far we’ve come in just a short amount of time with technology.

Today for review I’ve got a product from our friends over at Kingston, it’s their DataTraveler 150 64GB USB drive. Only a handful of companies today produce 64GB flash drives, so it’s a treat to be getting one of these for review really, and of course in this review I’m comparing the DataTraveler 150 to another 64GB drive and some other high capacity USB drives.

So read on…

The Kingston DataTraveler 150 64GB USB drive comes in our favorite sealed plastic clamshell style package. Through the front we can plainly see the drive itself, and there’s some basic specs and features listed.

The DataTraveler 150 does not come with a lanyard but it does come with a small nylon cord with clip ring on the end to be able to attach the drive to your keys or wherever.

The drive itself has a plastic housing colored red and black, the DataTraveler log is on the front and the Kingston log is on the back:

The top is the cap, it comes off to reveal the USB connection, the cap can also be attached to the back end for storage.

Specifications:

Kingston DataTraveler 150 64GB USB Flash Drive

Model: DT150/64GB
64GB USB flash drive (2.0) – Red & Black

Affordability meets high capacity
DataTraveler 150 USB Flash drive is big news in mobile storage. With a capacity of 32GB & 64GB, it lets you store more digital files than ever before on one drive.

DataTraveler 150 from Kingston helps budget-conscious users break storage barriers, allowing them to easily store and move files in a 32GB & 64GB device no bigger than a pocketknife. As easy as click and drag, DataTraveler 150 can hold just about any file you can think of — term papers, theses, digital images, spreadsheets or other important documents.

Backed by legendary Kingston reliability plus a five-year warranty and 24/7 tech support, DataTraveler 150 is a reliable, inexpensive solution for carrying digital files with you anywhere you go.

Specs:
-Capacity – 64GB
-Fast – Data transfer rates of up to 20MB/sec. read and 10MB/sec. write2
-Dimensions – 3.06" x 0.9" x 0.47" (77.9 mm x 22 mm x 12.05 mm)
-Operating Temperatures – 32 F to 140 F (0 C to 60 C)
-Storage Temperatures – -4 F to 185 F (-20 C to 85 C)
-Convenient – Pocket-sized for easy transportability
-Simple – Just plug into a USB port
-Practical – Stores cap securely on end of device to prevent loss of cap
-Guaranteed – Five-year warranty

The DataTraveler 150 does have a small blue LED in it near the back end to indicate activity.

Overall the DataTraveler is a nice drive, it seems well made, and it does include the small strap to be attached to a keychain or wherever. I like the idea of being able to attach the cap to the tail end of the drive, but it’s not very secure there, it’s fairly loose and just a slight bump will knock it free, so it’s a good idea, but just not implemented very well.

Now we can move onto the testing, I dug out my Patriot Exporter Magnum 64gb drive for this test, and re-ran the tests of course as I’ve upgraded my system since I reviewed the Exporter back in November, you can read the review HERE if you wish, it will open in new window.

As you can see the Exporter is shorter but quite a bit wider than the DataTraveler is. The Kingston does have the LED indicator on it, while the Exporter does not, some people care about those things. The Exporter is made almost entirely of metal, while the DataTraveler is basically plastic, but it does feel sturdy, and well made.

If you’ve paid attention you’d know that I reviewed a bunch of USB drives lately, so I’ll be comparing the Kingston to those as well, in the charts though I dropped the lower capacity drives, the 4gb and 8gb ones are not there for the comparison, only the 16gb and 32gb ones are.

First up is SiSoft Sandra 2009 SP2 Removable Storage Benchmark, higher scores are better.

As you can see with the Combined Index scores the Kingston doesn’t look too good, let’s take a look at the 256MB Files Test:

Here we can see the DataTraveler excels at handling large files, it’s the best in this test.

Let’s move on to DiskBench, this test gives me actual time in seconds it takes to do certain tasks like Copying and Reading to and from the USB drives. I used a 350MB .AVI Video file for the tests.

Since these are time, lower is better of course, the chart is arranged from best to worst with Copy To or Write time are the reference point of the ordering.

Here we can see the DataTraveler 150 does very well, coming in at a hair over 20 seconds to complete the transfer to the drive. We also see the scores for Copy From and Read From are very good as well.

Here are the Transfer Rates for the above tests, higher score is better, same ordering for this graph:

Now here on this chart we see something that totally surprised me, I was not expecting much from this drive, if you look at the specs you’ll see "Data transfer rates of up to 20MB/sec. read and 10MB/sec. write" but if we look at the rates I got it does quite a bit better than those listed specs, much better in fact.

So we see the Kingston DataTraveler 150 64GB USB drive can hold it’s own when compared to others on the market today.

I did a search of NewEgg for this drive and compared prices to other 64GB drives available now, I found that the Kingston is actually the least expensive, at regular price, with no rebates or anything.

The DataTraveler also has a 5 year warranty on it as well, which is pretty nice, though in 5 years we’ll probably have 1 terabyte flash drives and this thing will be completely obsolete, but it’s still a good warranty length.

Conclusion:
The Kingston DataTraveler 150 64GB USB drive is fast, much faster than it’s specs state it to be actually. Considering this is the least expensive of the 64GB USB drives on the market today, I think it’s the one to get and worth the cost if you need the large capacity.

The DataTraveler 150 is decently made as well, it seems rugged enough to be able to last though our daily lives, and if anything should happen there’s always the 5 year warranty.

The design is nice, I like the look of it, but I don’t like the fact that the cap isn’t secure on the the drive.

Pros:
Well made product
Decent speeds overall
5yr warranty
Least expensive (regular price)of the 64GB drives on the market
Large capacity

Cons:
Cap isn’t secure on back end
Still expensive

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

Kingston DataTraveler 150 64GB USB Flash Drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

Surprise, surprise, I’ve got another USB Drive for review today, I think I’ve got too many now… I should add them all up and figure out just how much flash storage I’ve got, gotta be close to half of a terabyte by now!

Up on the review block today I’ve got the OCZ Rally2 32GB Flash Drive, being 32gb obviously there’s a lot of room for your stuff, and we’ve all got stuff, we’ve got stuff everywhere, we’ve got stuff with our stuff, and the Rally2 will hold a lot of our stuff. Sometimes we need a larger place for our stuff, the stuff we have on those other USB drives is piling up, and making us delete some of our stuff to make room for more stuff, but the Rally2 can alleviate that problem and allow you to put more stuff on it, 32gigs of stuff to be exact. So read on to learn more about a better place to put your stuff…

The OCZ Rally2 32gb drive comes packaged in everyone’s favorite sealed plastic clamshell. Through the front you can see the Rally2, though the back you can see the included lanyard, basic specs and features are listed as well.

The only thing included with the Rally2 is the lanyard, and it’s a nice lanyard.

The Rally2 has a metal housing, so it’s fairly durable, the cap is removable to access the USB connection. One side of the drive has the Rally2 logo on it while the other has the OCZ logo and web address, the cap also has a small OCZ logo as well.

I’ve got the Rally2Turbo 4gb and use it constantly, they both look basically the same, and I can attest to the durability of this style of drive, it’s very well made.

Specifications:

OCZ Rally2 32gb USB 2.0 Dual Channel Flash Memory Drive

Model: OCZUSBR2DC-32GB

The enthusiast’s favorite flash drive! The OCZ USB 2.0 Rally2 Flash Drive features a sleek and ergonomic design housing and is one of the fastest flash drives available. Thanks to the implementation of leading edge Dual Channel technology, the Rally2 puts data transferring in the fast lane and leaves the competitors in the dust.

Pick up the pace and transfer your music, pictures, videos, and data to your laptop or desktop in record time or simply "Plug and Play" them instantaneously from the convenience of any USB port. The Rally2 Drive excels when managing a wide range of media, and is optimized to more rapidly transfer today’s larger (5MB and up) files.

The ultra durable OCZ Rally2 stores vital documents, presentations, images, music and more in an ultra sleek pocket-size drive, so you can access your files without having to disconnect other USB ports to make room, a common problem with many oversized competitor drives. Available in a modest 1GB all the way up to an ample 64GB capacity, choose the capacity that’s right for your storage needs.

The incredible OCZ Rally2 Flash drive is designed to be the fastest most reliable USB flash memory drive on the market, and makes use of cutting edge technology and comes backed with a limited lifetime warranty for the ultimate peace of mind.

Specs:
-High Speed USB 2.0 Certified
-Up to 32-35MB/s (read), 8-15MB/s (write)
-True Plug and Play (Compatible with MAC OS X)
-Dual Channel Technology
-Dimensions: 2 5/8"(L) x 5/8"(W)
-Aluminum Chassis
-Orange LED Status Light
-Lifetime Warranty

Accessories
-Lanyard

System Requirement
-USB port
-Operating System:
Windows 98SE, Windows Me, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Mac OS 9.0 or later, Linux Kernel 2.4.2 or later >/span>

The Rally2 does have an orange LED in the end of it that lights up and blinks for activity.

So the OCZ Rally2 looks good and it’s well made, but that doesn’t mean much if it can’t perform, so that’s why I’ve run some more tests.

First up is SiSoft Sandra 2009 SP2 Removable Storage Benchmark. Higher is better, and ordering is worst to best. I’ve slightly highlighted the Rally2 to make it stand out in the charts.

Well the OCZ rally2 falls square in the middle of the chart, with five better and five worse, so I guess we could call that average. We can see that the Rally2 also has one of the higher scores for the Endurance Test as well.

Here’s the 256MB Files Test, ordering is again worst to best.

Here we see the Rally2 picked up a few spots in the charts, tying with another OCZ drive for third place. Also you might notice that three OCZ drive take the top spots, not bad.

Next up is DiskBench, one of my favorite tests actually, it tells us in real time how long it takes to do a certain task like Copying To, Copying From and Reading From the USB Drives, it also tells us the Transfer Rates. For the tests I used a 350MB .AVI Video file.

In this chart ordering is best to worst, lower times to complete the task is better of course, I used the Copy To or Write speed for ordering reference.

As I’ve mentioned before, smaller capacity drives tend to perform better than larger ones, at least that’s what I’ve seen from my experiences with them. Of course there are exceptions as well, there’s not much you can do with a drive that just doesn’t perform well no matter what. Here though we can see the Rally2 beats out both other 32gb drives in my charts, so that’s something there.

If you look at the Copy To or Write Time of the OCZ Rally2, we can see it comes in at a little under 20 seconds, that’s not bad at all really. The Read and Copy From Times are very good also.

Here’s the Transfer Rates for the tests:

If you look at this chart you might think that 17.7MB/s is a bit slow, but if we go back to the specs we see the Rally2 listed as writing as up to 15MB/s, so it actually outperforms it’s own specifications and that’s very good. Though if we go back and look at the Read specs it says up to 35MB/s and I only got 31.09 MB/s in my testing, still though over 30MB/s is very good really, and it’s right on par with the other drives that lead the tests.

Conclusion:

Of the three 32gb USB Drives I’ve tested so far, the Rally2 performs the best by far, so if you’re looking for a high capacity drive that performs well then look no further than the Rally2, I can easily and honestly Recommend it.’

As I mentioned I’ve got an earlier version of this drive and it has been through quite a bit, I use it most often actually, and it has never failed me yet, in terms of build quality and performance.

Pros:
Fast overall
Well made
Includes lanyard
Exceeds specs for Write Speeds

Cons:
Nowhere to put cap

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

OCZ Rally2 32gb USB 2.0 Dual Channel Flash Memory Drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

Yes, another USB drive review, why sort of, but not really, but then again yes it is? Confused? Well what I have for review today is the OCZ Throttle 16gb Flash Drive, it has both USB and eSATA connections on it for blazing fast transfer speeds. The Throttle is a sleek black flash drive that is a bit larger than most out there today, but that’s because of the eSATA connection on the end, it also has a mini-USB connection as well that can be used for standard USB transfer or additional power for the eSATA port.

So read on to learn about one of the fastest flash drives on the market today.

The OCZ Throttle 16gb flash drive comes in a box instead of the familiar plastic clamshell that most products of this type come in.  The box has a picture of the Throttle on it along with specs and features listed.

Inside we find a USB cable and the Throttle wrapped in padding for protection:

The Throttle is larger than most USB drives out there, pretty much the largest of my vast collection, but as I mentioned that is partially due to the eSATA connection. On the front side we see the Throttle logo with eSATA drive under that and the capacity, the cap has the OCZ logo on it as well, the back of the Throttle also has the OCZ web address.

The cap is what covers the eSATA connection:

On the back of the Throttle is where you’ll find the mini-USB connector. This connection does double duty actually, it can be used for standard USB file transfer or to provide power for the eSATA connection if your motherboard does not have powered eSATA ports. OCZ was nice enough to include a USB cable as well for us.

Specifications:

OCZ Throttle 16gb eSATA Flash Drive

Model: OCZESATATHR16G

The OCZ Throttle eSATA drive offers performance and versatility for enthusiasts that demand the best hardware. The integration of eSATA (External Serial ATA) connectivity now extends beyond desktop systems to laptops, offering increased data transfer rates with extreme portability while eliminating extra cords and power cables.

A sophisticated alternative to conventional USB drives, the OCZ Throttle’s primary eSATA interface offers an incredible 90MB/second read speeds and 30MB/sec write speeds, increasing productivity to new heights. The substantial 8GB ~ 32GB capacities offer plenty of storage for your diverse multimedia files including high-resolution photos, high-definition movies, or large quantities of music. Additionally, users can access their data via an auxiliary mini USB port for ultimate flexibility.

Travelers, enthusiasts, and business professionals will benefit from the greater overall user experience that this new high-capacity, high speed Throttle has to offer. With true plug-and-play capability, instantaneously access your data from any computer without the need to install any additional hardware or drivers. Backed by a 2-year warranty, the Throttle eSATA drive will perform with OCZ’s ultimate commitment to quality.

Specs/Features:

-eSATA interface (plug directly into any compatible motherboard or laptop with powered eSATA port)      
-Additional mini USB 2.0 port (type B)      
-Dimensions: (L)79.1mm x (W)29.9mm x (H)10.3mm      
-Read: Up to 90MB/sec      
-Write: Up to 30MB/sec      
-True Plug and Play      
-Available in 8GB, 16GB, 32GB capacities      
-Includes mini USB cable for non-powered eSATA ports or USB access      
-2-year Warranty

Here’s a size comparison of the Throttle next to another OCZ drive and a Verbatim USB drive:

The Throttle does have two LEDs in it actually, one is green and one is red, green is power, while red is activity.

So we know what it looks like but how does it perform? Let’s move to the testing to find out shall we?

First up of course is SiSoft Sandra 2009 SP2 Removable Storage Benchmark. In this test higher scores are better and it is arranged from worst to best, since the graphs are getting a bit crowded I highlighted the OCZ Throttle with yellow:

Well, you see that really long bar there? That’s the Throttle hooked up via eSATA, pretty much blows all the other drives out of the water. We see a different story though when we hook it up via USB, a bit slower but still very good performance.

Here’s the 256MB Files Test ordered worst to best with Write Performance as the base for the graph ordering:

Here we see a bit of a difference, yes we have that very large line again for the Throttle in eSATA mode, but we also see it’s Write Performance isn’t that great overall, still not too shabby.

Next up for testing we have DiskBench and the time it takes to do three tasks, Copy To, Copy From and Read From the flash drives. I used a 350MB .AVI Video File for all tests. Ordering of the graph is best to worst, of course the lower the time is better.

Here of course we see the eSATA Throttle leading the pack in all testing with some very short times to do the tests. Looking at the USB Throttle though we see the Copy To or Write Time is a bit slower than the rest, but again very good coming in under 20 seconds.

Here are the actual transfer rates in MB/s for the flash drives:

There’s not much to be said about the eSATA Throttle, hands down it’s a winner in all tests with speeds that are well above the competition. Looking at the USB Throttle though we see again it’s the Copy To or Write Speed that ultimately lowers it in our charts, but the read speeds though average over 30MB/s which is very good indeed. Still though even with the slower write speeds the Throttle has very good performance overall.

As we can see the Throttle using the eSATA interface really has no competition, and it ain’t too shabby while using the USB interface either…

It might seem like an excellent drive, and it is performance wise, the downside here is that not all PCs are equipped with an eSATA interface and those that do are like not the powered type. I’ve got two systems that are eSATA enabled and neither one are powered eSATA ports meaning I had to use the USB cable as well to provide additional power for the Throttle. What this means of course is that I’ll need to take the USB cable along with me when transferring files via eSATA, and of course I’ll need the cable for USB transfers as well. So until powered eSATA ports are a standard the Throttle might be considered a hassle for some.

Another small issue is the cap, there’s no where to put it when the drive is in use meaning that most likely it will get lost along the way. There’s also no lanyard included, and no place to even attach one if you’ve got a spare lying around, so you’re kinda stuck carrying the Throttle in your pocket or floating around in your laptop bag. Personally I like the lanyards, not to hang around my neck, but to fasten then in my laptop bag or other bag I might be carrying at the time, just loop it through a zipper pull or other part of the bag and I can easily find the USB drive and I know it’s secure as well. Also they’re great for just hanging from the mirror in my car if I’m just taking the flash drive with me.

Conclusion:

The OCZ Throttle eSATA drive is the fastest I’ve ever tested while using it’s eSATA interface, it easily bests every other USB flash drive out there today. Using the USB connection, it’s not quite the fastest of the bunch but it’s very close and performs very well.

Yes the Throttle is a great drive, but until powered eSATA ports are standard you’ll need to carry the USB cable to provide power for the eSATA interface, this can be a hassle when compared to a regular USB drive with no need for an additional cable.

Pros:
Super fast eSATA transfers
Decent transfer speeds via USB
Seems fairly well made
Cool looking design

Cons:
Need cable for USB interface
Powered eSATA ports are rare
No attachment for lanyard or cap

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

OCZ Throttle 16gb eSATA Flash Drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog

Anyway, today we’ve got another product from OCZ, yes it’s another USB drive, but this one is made for us urban warriors. The OCZ ATV drive with it’s rubberized housing is 100% weatherproof and shock resistant and being 32GB in capacity it can carry quite a bit of stuff for you also.

So without more chatter from me let’s continue on to find out how it compares to other drives I’ve got on hand…

The OCZ ATV 32GB USB Drive comes in everyone’s favorite plastic clamshell style package, we can see the ATV through the package and there’s some basic specs and features listed as well.

The OCZ ATV drive is made to be very resilient, and most likely will handle anything you throw at it, or on it. The housing is rubberized making it weatherproof and shock resistant and easy to grip as well.

The cap of course is removable but the ATV features a little attachment on the keychain so you can secure the cap when the drive is in use so you don’t lose it.

Specifications:

OCZ ATV 32GB USB 2.0 Flash Drive

Model: OCZUSBATV32G

The shock-proof ATV features mainstream speeds offering consumers an affordable option and was designed to safely accommodate a wealth of important data and media files. Not only are these premium flash drives aggressively fast at transferring files of all types and sizes, but are optimized for Windows Vista Ready Boost, offering true performance advantages to this latest operating system.

ATV flash drives feature durable and colorful rubber tread housing, which is a 100% weatherproof storage solution to keep digital files safe in any conditions, even fully submerged in water. The attached cap holder will help prevent misplacement of the protective key cover, while the chain can easily fasten to your key ring for ultimate portability.

Features:
-High Speed USB 2.0 Certified
-True Plug and Play (Compatible with MAC OS X)
-Dual Channel Technology
-Waterproof Rubber Housing
-Orange LED Status Light
-Lifetime Warranty

The OCZ ATV has an orange LED on it that blinks to indicate activity:

On to the testing…

As usual first up is Sisoft Sandra 2009 SP2 Removable Storage Benchmark, ordering is lowest to highest

According to SiSoft Sandra the OCZ ATV isn’t that good overall, but let’s dig a bit deeper..

next is the 256MB files test.

ok, with 6 Ops/min Read Performance and 3 Ops/min Write Performance the OCZ ATV sort of falls into the middle of the chart.

Next up for testing is DiskBench and the times it takes to Copy To, Copy From and Read From the USB Drives. For the testing I used a 350MB .AVI Video file. Ordering is best to worst, lower scores are better of course as we are talking about time in seconds.

The OCZ ATV falls directly in the middle of the chart, and we can see it easily bests the PNY 32GB drive.

Next is the transfer rates for the tasks, higher is better and chart is ordered best to worst again. Ordering is using Copy To or write speed for reference.

I’m very surprised the OCZ ATV did not hit 30MB/s transfer rates fro Read and Copy From tasks, but still it’s not bad at all.

One problem with comparisons like this is that inherently smaller drives are faster than larger ones overall, so it gives us a comparison yes, but is it a good comparison? Sort of, in that at least it gives us an idea of the performance, don’t worry though I’ve got more 32GB drives so it’ll even out in the end.

Conclusion:
The OCZ ATV 32GB USB drive is admirably well made, it provides excellent protection for your data, and being 32gigs it can carry quite a bit. When compared to the PNY 32gb drive it easily bests it in sheer performance, so if you’ve got a choice between the two obviously the OCZ wins hands down.

The performance of the OCZ ATV is about average, honestly I expected a bit more from it, but it’s just the ‘regular’ version and not the ATV Turbo that’s also available from OCZ, so I’m sure things would look quite different when using the Turbo version.

Pros:
100% Weatherproof
Decent speeds overall
Rubberized housing for durability and ruggedness

Cons:
Dust and lint collector

Grades:
Overall
Design
Performance

OCZ ATV 32GB USB 2.0 Flash Drive is a post from: Testfreaks | The Blog