USB Flash Drive Roundup - 10/2005
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 4, 2005 11:28 AM EST- Posted in
- Memory
How We Tested
Originally, when we set out to compare the drives in this roundup, we wanted to do so with 100% real world tests that we would put together ourselves, which we ended up doing. We devised three separate tests consisting of 500MB of small files, 500MB of medium-sized files and one 500MB file. We performed read and write tests using each of the file groups individually, and recorded the time that it took for those tests to complete.
Alongside our own home-brew tests, we also took a look at SiSoft Sandra 2005's built-in Removable Storage/flash Benchmark, which measured performance of the drives at various file sizes. To be more specific, Sandra's test looks at performance of 512-byte, 32KB, 256KB, 2MB and 64MB file sizes. Much to our surprise, Sandra's results almost entirely echoed our own, all while providing more points of reference. So, we scrapped our tests and moved entirely to Sandra; not only were the tests easier to run, but they can also be run by our readers as well. Obviously, the test system does impact (to a certain extent) the numbers, but it is better than not having anything to which you can compare at all.
Since the vast majority of the Sandra tests focus on smaller-file write performance, we found that many manufacturers' claims weren't even remotely close to being true. While we expected that small file read/write performance would be significantly slower, we also seemed to surprise a few manufacturers in how poorly their drives did at some of the medium-sized file tests. It seems that most manufacturers tend to only pay attention to large file transfers, which are useful, but more users tend to copy lots of smaller files rather than one or two massive files onto these drives.
Case in point is something that we discovered when running our own real world tests. We copied about 2000 files, totaling 500MB in size, to some of these USB drives. Most of these files were digital camera photos, while others were small text files. The fastest drive completed the copy in just under two minutes, but the majority of drives took more than 8 minutes to complete the task! Keep this scenario in mind when you evaluate the usefulness of a drive that performs well at small file sizes as well as large file sizes.
We also looked at the impact that AMD vs. Intel systems had on the devices, but most drives exhibited platform-independent performance.
Test Hardware
Originally, when we set out to compare the drives in this roundup, we wanted to do so with 100% real world tests that we would put together ourselves, which we ended up doing. We devised three separate tests consisting of 500MB of small files, 500MB of medium-sized files and one 500MB file. We performed read and write tests using each of the file groups individually, and recorded the time that it took for those tests to complete.
Alongside our own home-brew tests, we also took a look at SiSoft Sandra 2005's built-in Removable Storage/flash Benchmark, which measured performance of the drives at various file sizes. To be more specific, Sandra's test looks at performance of 512-byte, 32KB, 256KB, 2MB and 64MB file sizes. Much to our surprise, Sandra's results almost entirely echoed our own, all while providing more points of reference. So, we scrapped our tests and moved entirely to Sandra; not only were the tests easier to run, but they can also be run by our readers as well. Obviously, the test system does impact (to a certain extent) the numbers, but it is better than not having anything to which you can compare at all.
Since the vast majority of the Sandra tests focus on smaller-file write performance, we found that many manufacturers' claims weren't even remotely close to being true. While we expected that small file read/write performance would be significantly slower, we also seemed to surprise a few manufacturers in how poorly their drives did at some of the medium-sized file tests. It seems that most manufacturers tend to only pay attention to large file transfers, which are useful, but more users tend to copy lots of smaller files rather than one or two massive files onto these drives.
Case in point is something that we discovered when running our own real world tests. We copied about 2000 files, totaling 500MB in size, to some of these USB drives. Most of these files were digital camera photos, while others were small text files. The fastest drive completed the copy in just under two minutes, but the majority of drives took more than 8 minutes to complete the task! Keep this scenario in mind when you evaluate the usefulness of a drive that performs well at small file sizes as well as large file sizes.
We also looked at the impact that AMD vs. Intel systems had on the devices, but most drives exhibited platform-independent performance.
Test Hardware
| CPU: | AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ (2.2GHz/512KBx2) Intel Pentium 4 530 (3.0GHz) |
| Motherboard: | ASUS A8N-SLI Deluxe Intel D955XCSLKR |
| Motherboard BIOS: | ASUS: Version 1013 Dated 08/10/2005 |
| Chipset: | NVIDIA nForce4 SLI Intel 955X |
| Chipset Drivers: | nForce4 6.66 Intel 7.0.0.1025 |
| Memory: | OCZ PC3500 DDR 2-2-2-7 Crucial DDR2-667 5-5-5-15 |
| Video Card: | NVIDIA GeForce 7800GTX |
| Video Drivers: | NVIDIA ForceWare 78.01 |
| Desktop Resolution: | 1280 x 1024 - 32-bit @ 75Hz |
| OS: | Windows XP Professional SP2 |
| Benchmarking Software: | SiSoft Sandra 2005 SR2a-1060 |
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sprockkets - Thursday, October 6, 2005 - link
Although not reviewed here, I got the A Data key from newegg.com simply because they say it works with Linux on the package. I know any key will, but they are the only ones to have the guts to say it. Thanks for admitting Linux exists. Lifetime warranty too.jgh - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
here is a link for another link, to an app that can make many (but probably not all) usb drives bootable and a couple of other hints/tips.http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/5735">link
O.T. - for some reason i get a message that says i do not have permission to access this forum when i tried to create a new login with my e-mail address. did i get banned or something? i have only posted once (it was about the gta:lcs website). i also cannot log in with the origianl user name and password.
p.s. - it is o.k. to post links like this right?
Toolsac - Tuesday, October 4, 2005 - link
I just wanna say thanks to anand for bring us all so much info on every nook and crany of computing. When ever I am getting ready to upgrade or have a problem with my computer, Anand can help me. THANKS GUYS YOU ROCK!!!GameManK - Tuesday, October 4, 2005 - link
also curious about the memorex drives like the m-flyerhoppa - Tuesday, October 4, 2005 - link
Cool article, and a nice summary of the market (the intro stuff), but seriously, who really cares that much about the perfomance of these things when the entire thing can be written or read in <1 minute anyway. I do love benchmarks though (born and will die a stat-whore)!I have a suggestion for the article: can you post a single picture of all the drives (preferably with a key). I'd like to see what they all look like but I wasn't too crazy at all about clicking through 20 pages. In fact, I only made it through 4.
-andy
vexingv - Friday, October 21, 2005 - link
its an iomega 256mb and claims to be usb2, but is ridiculously slow compared to a generic 64mb drive i have. i've tried transferring about 20mb worth of portable firefox on the two drives side-by-side and the iomega drive took close to 5 minutes while my other drive took less than a minute.these benchmarks are really useful for that purpose of finding drives w/ faster flash memory controllers.
Souka - Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - link
REad the article....less than 1 min? Read it....not happening.Write times had the biggest delta....upto 20x speed difference....
So would you rather watch your drive write data for 3.5mins, or almost an hour?
Far as "clicking through 20 pages" Click once on the "Print this Article"....then you just use page down(or equivalent button) to scroll through
Chriz - Tuesday, October 4, 2005 - link
This was a good roundup, but I was also curious on some other drives that can be found on Newegg. Mainly interested in the Apacer drives and also the Memorex M-flyer...which got a good review in Maximum PC because of the retractable USB connector which seems convenient to me, but I am really not sure on the performance compared to other drives.intellon - Tuesday, October 4, 2005 - link
And why was iPod Shuffle excluded? Is it cuz of security matter/ bigger size/ higher cost? Cuz I use half of my shuffle for transfering files to and from - work, home and school.jkostans - Tuesday, October 4, 2005 - link
Because its an mp3 player. There are plenty of ipod shuffle type players out there which aren't included, some smaller and more compact. I'm sure they would be with the slowest of the slow.