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SSD that looks like a USB Thumbdrive

Probably spitting some hairs there.

Not sure any USB gets near a SATA link, for the money you could buy a small SSD these days that size easy.

Depends a bit on the computer you are plugging it into I would think as far as the transfer rates.

Looks a pretty nice thumb drive at any rate, Muskin has always had a good reputation to the best of my knowledge.
 
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abalter said:
This item calls itself an SSD. Can I expect that it actually has the advantages of a true SSD, such as reliability and longevity (read/write cycles)? Or is it just a renamed USB drive.

http://www.amazon.com/Mushkin-Enhan...F8&qid=1452744844&sr=8-14&keywords=pocket+ssd
Click to expand...

Flash drives and SSDs are basically the same thing. The more powerful, more expensive controller chips and parallel NAND channels is what makes a "proper" SSD faster.

Any SATA device can be adapted to USB.

Anandtech did a review of the thing. Basically it's a USB-adapted Sandforce SSD. Performs more or less like it ought to, with the usual caveats regarding compressible vs. incompressible data, and less-than-awesome random I/O performance and write performance. (probably skimped on the NAND. Performance reminds me a bit of the post-refresh Kingston V300s.)

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8709/mushkin-ventura-ultra-usb-30-120gb-flash-drive-capsule-review

The other ThumbSSD drive discussed in that review is better.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8567/corsair-flash-voyager-gtx-usb-30-256gb-flash-drive-capsule-review
 
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Yeah, a thumb is basically a smaller mobile SSD in general.

I guess I didn't word it too well, but Dave hit the points.
 
I'm less worried about speed (fast enough for my purposes--holding a VirtualBox disk image). I'm more concerned about reliability/longevity that comes along with the better NAND found in SSDs vs stick drives (from what I've heard). Do you think I can rely on the Mushkin or Corsair to not crash after extended use?
 
Crashing has zero to do with reliability, and no, there has never been, nor will there ever be, a USB thumb drive that has anywhere near the longevity of a real SSD. BTW, you can buy a great 256GB SSD for $90, and it will not only have 200% the space, it will also have 500% the maximum performance of the USB drive you linked. That said, I'm sure that the thumb drive you linked is considerably better quality than the $27 128GB thumb drives.
 
i have one of those on my key ring (lost the cap first couple days). don't believe the claims on it for a second. i've never gotten over 180MB/s sustained writes. i tried it because i was curious first on my 3x1TB 840 EVO array, then on my SM951 M.2 SSD, and both produced roughly the same speeds ~180MB/s. tested a bunch of random data, music, movie files, etc.

it also looks like crap physically now, as the paint chips off really easily and you're left with a peppered looking, rather LARGE USB stick. they also get very hot just being plugged in to a USB port (even USB2) whether you're copying to it or not.

i've been using it for maybe 6 months? i can't remember.. i got it when they were being listed at $120 for the 120GB and i use it to move large downloads home all the time (i live out in the boonies and limited to my lonely bonded T1s, so easier to do big downloads at work). i've done a tone of rewriting and never had an issue. when you plug it in to your PC, it is not detected as a USB drive, it is detected as an external HDD/SSD/whatever drive.
 
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