Key Post: Memory Sticks

H

harza

Guest
Has anyone any recommendations for Memory Sticks that connect to your pc through the USB port and appear as an additional drive in 'My Computer'.

The main player in the market seems to be Disgo, a Mayo based company.
Sony have a similar product and another product is the TwinMOS PenDrive.

Does anyone have an experience with any of these devices?
 
Re: Memory Sticks

Not those specific products but otherwise, yes - they work and they're very handy. What more can I say?
 
Re: Memory Sticks

Hi ClubMan,

Have you experience with any specific other brands?
What size storage is recommended? I think that 64MB should be ample but will have to think about it some more.
 
Re: Memory Sticks

I can't actually remember what brands as I've only used borrowed devices. The technology used is pretty standard across the board (FLASH memory usually with c. 1,000,000 erase/program duty cycle - after which FLASH memory can start generating bit errors thus becoming unreliable) so once you decide what capacity you need that should be the hard part of the decision. On the other hand some people might feel more comfortable with "big brand" products rather than generic devices.

Note that the prices in this part of the world versus the US, Asia etc. are exhorbitant (nothing new there) - for example check out Froogle and weep... :| Unfortunately most US sites seem to ship only within the US, and sometimes Canda, while those that ship worldwide have fairly hefty shipping charges. If you know anybody travelling, even to mainland Europe, it could be a good idea to ask them to pick one up for you. Lidl were selling them (64MB I think) a few months ago for €40 which was a bargain but unfortunately I missed my chance... :\
 
Re: Memory Sticks

I've recently been doing some research on the prices of these devices and the best I've come up with is is €42.36 for a 32MB Kingston Data Traveller at [broken link removed].

I have, however, also seen something called Jet Flash at [broken link removed] but I can't find any reviews about this device. Don't know whether it's reputable or not. The price is good though €50 for 64MB.
 
Re: Memory Sticks

The price is good though €50 for 64MB

Plus a whopping €8 for delivery though!
 
Memory Sticks

Through the Disgo site they list retailers who sell their devices. The difference between stores is large in some cases. Cheapest is ComputerBits.

fatherdougalmaguire
The Disgo 32MB USB Device is €44.13 from ComputerBits and probably a safer bet than the Kingston Data Traveller for the sake of a euro or two. They're located in Sligo and so p+p should be minimal.
 
Re: Memory Sticks

They're located in Sligo and so p+p should be minimal.

€9 delivery. Ridiculous!
 
Memory Sticks

€9....ouch.
I will be in Dublin next week and think I'll go for the Disgo 64MB unit in ITDirect for €61.86.

I know that Disgo is a very reputable brand and I think they were the first to come up with the concept.
Plus, its nice to be able to buy Irish without sacrificing on quality.
 
Re: Memory Sticks

Just after finding another option!

[broken link removed] sell a 64MB unit for £23.99. Adding £1.50 for postage and then converting to euros gives €36.54. I am going to e-mail them to see if they'll ship to Ireland.
I expect that they will for some extra postage charge. Hopefully I could get the 64MB unit for €40 delivered.
 
Memory sticks

It seems that you can only get the [broken link removed] products via Amazon, and the relevant page on http://www.Amazon.co.uk (www.Amazon.co.uk) says that the supplier does NOT ship outside the UK.

However, I have discovered that you can get a 128Mbit USB memory stick from www.usb007.com for about €40, including delivery and a USB extension cable (it costs even less if you don't want the USB extension cable). I have never bought from them before but double the memory at the same price - it seems like a good deal to me. You may have to wait a bit longer for delivery, but I am thinking of giving it a go.

Iano

Links fixed by ClubMan.
 
Re: Memory sticks

Thanks for that information - very interesting. By the way the capacity of these devices is measured in bytes not bits just in case anybody is confused - so that's US$40 for a 128MByte device including shipping (US$5 worldwide) and excluding USB extension cable (US$7 - only really necessary if your USB ports are not easy to access - e.g. at the back of your PC). I'm tempted.... ;)
 
I have been doing some more reading up since yesterday and one thing that is worth pointing out is that all the devices mentioned so far are USB 1.1 standard devices. There are now devices available for USB 2 (and are backward compatible). USB 2 allows for much faster read/write times when transferring data. Obviously, they are more expensive as a result of being newer and faster. However, you can get a USB 2 device with 128MB capacity for €55. Compared to a best price for Disgo of €61 with 64MB and only USB 1.1.

One thing I notice is that the Disgo seems to be the only device that has a driver for WinNT. There are still alot of companies/offices with NT on their systems and so this may be a problem.
 
Really get p*ssed off with postage charges for Irish online businesses. The USB 2 device with 128MB capacity for €55 that I mentioned earlier would cost an additional €11.95 to have delivered from [broken link removed] in Dublin. There is no way I'd pay 20% of the cost of the device (which weighs less than 25g) in postage.
 
Hi Harza - I presume it's being sent by courier, rather than ordinary post- hence the increased cost. As there is no traceability in the normal post system, it's not really suitable for items of any value (regardless of weight).
 
Yes, it's sent by DHL (next day delivery). There should be a choice of postage options given (similar to when shopping on Amazon).
 
USB 1.1 supports up to c. 1MBytes/sec transfer read and write (write is always a bit slower) for such FLASH devices. What does USB 2.0 support? Since these devices would probably tend to be used for backup/restore purposes (e.g. moving stuff between dislocated PCs) and not for continuous use I would have thought that read/write speeds were not that critical for most uses?
 
I don't think Komplett is an Irish business. They just have a .ie site for Irish orders. In fact, I think they are based in Norway.
 
USB 2.0 has a raw data rate at 480Mbps, and it is rated 40 times faster than its predecessor interface, USB 1.1, which tops at 12Mbps. Originally, USB 2.0 was intended to go only as fast as 240Mbps, but then, USB 2.0 Promoter Group increased the speed to 480Mbps in October 1999.

Your pc would have to have a USB 2.0 port to take advantage of the increased speeds. However, as said earlier USB 2.0 is fully back compliant. Actual read/write speeds would be device dependant.

As for whether the increased transfer speeds are worth the extra money...it depends on your patience level ;)

A good USB FAQ can be found here
 
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