USB Flash Drive Roundup - 10/2005
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 4, 2005 11:28 AM EST- Posted in
- Memory
USB Flash Drive Security
Even the largest of the drives in today's roundup is still fairly small, and with a device that you're always carrying around to various places and using in various computers, chances are that you may eventually lose the drive.
If you lose your drive, and you happen to have some sensitive information on it, making sure that it doesn't end up on the web the next day may be a concern of yours. Thankfully, almost all of the contenders in this roundup offer some sort of "security" for their flash drives, but the degree of security really varies from one drive to the next.
The most rudimentary security that is on most flash drives is the ability to create a password-protected partition on the drive; that is, only accessible using a password. You use a manufacturer-supplied utility to divide your drive in two, creating a public and a secure partition. For the most part, these two partitions aren't accessible simultaneously; you usually have to "login" to the secure partition and doing so hides the public partition (although some controllers don't feature this limitation). With a special utility, someone can always re-partition your drive, but at least they won't gain access to the data stored on the secure partition.
The downside to drives with encryption support is that some drives perform the encryption in software, which results in a performance penalty when encryption is enabled. Kingston is the only manufacturer in this roundup that actually has a hardware-based encryption engine designed to encrypt/decrypt files at drive speed so that there's no performance penalty when accessing your secure, encrypted partition.
The problem with both approaches to security is that they are largely software dependent, and most manufacturers only provide software support for Windows. So Apple and Linux users are generally out of luck here; while you can still access the public partition on virtually all systems, secure partition access will require Windows in most cases.
Even the largest of the drives in today's roundup is still fairly small, and with a device that you're always carrying around to various places and using in various computers, chances are that you may eventually lose the drive.
If you lose your drive, and you happen to have some sensitive information on it, making sure that it doesn't end up on the web the next day may be a concern of yours. Thankfully, almost all of the contenders in this roundup offer some sort of "security" for their flash drives, but the degree of security really varies from one drive to the next.
The most rudimentary security that is on most flash drives is the ability to create a password-protected partition on the drive; that is, only accessible using a password. You use a manufacturer-supplied utility to divide your drive in two, creating a public and a secure partition. For the most part, these two partitions aren't accessible simultaneously; you usually have to "login" to the secure partition and doing so hides the public partition (although some controllers don't feature this limitation). With a special utility, someone can always re-partition your drive, but at least they won't gain access to the data stored on the secure partition.
Kingston's SecureTraveler software allows you to partition a compatible Kingston drive into public and secure partitions.
The downside to drives with encryption support is that some drives perform the encryption in software, which results in a performance penalty when encryption is enabled. Kingston is the only manufacturer in this roundup that actually has a hardware-based encryption engine designed to encrypt/decrypt files at drive speed so that there's no performance penalty when accessing your secure, encrypted partition.
The problem with both approaches to security is that they are largely software dependent, and most manufacturers only provide software support for Windows. So Apple and Linux users are generally out of luck here; while you can still access the public partition on virtually all systems, secure partition access will require Windows in most cases.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
39 Comments
View All Comments
BJL - Monday, October 16, 2006 - link
Do the read and write speeds change for the 1gb and above models? Would I get the same performance, or should I stick with the 512mb?NeoZGeo - Monday, October 17, 2005 - link
what kinf of benchmark are you guys using? How come some of those drive write speed is sooooo low!? Like Trenscent, OCZ Rally, i've seen some reviews out there which says other wise.NeoZGeo - Monday, October 17, 2005 - link
here's the review by tom'sif you look at the trenscend jet flash, it actually has the highest write speed average out at 23.3 mb/s vs anandtech's 8.7 mb/s !? what the hell?
NeoZGeo - Monday, October 17, 2005 - link
haha oops, forgot about the link :Dhttp://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20050520/usb_f...">linky
quanta - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
It looked like Tom's test is testing the write speed between USB host and flash drive's controller's memory buffer, instead of actual write speed, which can only be verify by doing a read after writing is completed. There are also reports that http://www.auphanonline.com/articles/view.php?arti...">cluster size may affect the write access behaviour. BTW, Tom's http://www.tomshardware.com/2005/08/10/two_fast_an...">later review has simultaneous reads and writes benchmark, which slows Memina Rocket to a halt.quanta - Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - link
In addition, even when using buffered write in SiSoft Sandra, it is extremely unlikely that Transcend Jetflash 110 can write anywhere near 23.3MB/s. http://www.oc.com.tw/article/0510/readparticle.asp...">This benchmark shows that when doing random write with Kingston DataTraveler ELITE, write speed dropped more than a half compared to sequential write.gaintstar - Wednesday, November 15, 2017 - link
More updating news about custom metal usb drives factory wholesale,advertising companies gifts, Flason Custom mini usb flash drives,Personalized plastic USB flash drives, custom twister usb flash drives, corporate brand building company gifts items,customized PU body memory sticks,promotional mobile phone usb 3.0 flash drives memory sticks,imprinted promotional products giveaways,custom plastic usb 2.0 drives,custom body usb storage flash drives suppliers....welcome to visit our website: www.flason.com, or send us your enquiry by email: sales@flason.comTrueWisdom - Wednesday, October 12, 2005 - link
I'm the in-house support for a university building and I've had absolutely horrible luck with Lexar drives. Lexar often fails to detect entirely on somewhat older machines (the Latitude C840, for example) and has also displayed a relatively high failure rate for me. I don't have any positive or negative impressions of Kingston drives, so I can't say anything there, but I will say that I've had by far the best luck with Sandisk drives. I've never had one fail on me, and I've seen them go through wash cycles, get run over by a car, and get left out in the rain. Compatibility has been universal as well. They may not be the fastest drives but they really are the only ones I've ever trusted.gaintstar - Wednesday, November 15, 2017 - link
More updating news about custom <a href="http://www.flason.com/Metal-USB-Flash-Drive.html&q... target="_blank">metal usb drives</a> factory wholesale,advertising companies gifts, Flason <a href="http://www.flason.com/Custom-PVC-USB-Drives.html&q... target="_blank">Custom mini usb flash drives</a>,Personalized <a href="http://www.flason.com/Plastic-USB-Flash-Drive.html... target="_blank"><a href=http://www.flason.com/Plastic-USB-Flash-Drive.html target='_blank'>plastic USB flash drive</a>s</a>, custom twister usb flash drives, <a href="http://www.flason.com/Branded-USB-Flash-Drive.html... target="_blank">corporate brand building</a> company gifts items,customized PU body memory sticks,promotional <a href="http://www.flason.com/Mobile-Phone-USB-Drive.html&... target="_blank">mobile phone usb 3.0 flash drives</a> memory sticks,imprinted promotional products giveaways,custom plastic usb 2.0 drives,custom body usb storage flash drives suppliers....welcome to visit our websitependrivethis - Friday, October 7, 2005 - link
i work for a flash memory controller maker and in all honesty the most meaningful performance test is random write. and no one really advertise that since sequential read speeds seem much more appealing and marketable. i can get a dual-channel & interleaving enabled usb 2.0 pen drive with micron or samsung nand-type flash to go up to 34mB/s in sequential read, but the engineer who designed this still tells me that he'd rather use and-type flash from renesas (formerly hitachi) since and flash has a better random write than nand flash.and knowing what i know, if you use your pen drive very often, and i suspect some of you may be in that boat, i'd check out some of the burn-in testing results especially since companies are not entirely using only samsung nand flash. certain new flash whether nand-type or ag-and-type and even some high-density samsung flash seem to be displaying a need for extra care in ecc. data-verify errors are fatal, especially if it's the only copy you got...
anand, perhaps a little visit to some of the design houses for these controllers the next time when you're in taiwan is in order. computex is only 9 months away.