World's Smallest Waterproof 1GB USB2 Superstick £19.98 inc VAT at DABS

seth

Just some thoughts on the reliability of flash...

I have a compact flash stick it is routinely washed, spun and tumbled dried not problems, it is an only 128Meg (USB1!) intelligent stick over 4 years old. I use it often no problems. It is very small and fits in my wallet.



The bit on the left goes into the USB slot and it weighs 3g Home page here: http://www.pqi1st.com/products/istick.asp I'm not recommending this brand or model it is VERY OLD, just saying mine works fine.

You can buy USB holders for SD card and SD cards are so cheap the SD USB converts are tiny and cheap $7 inc postage from http://www.ledshoppe.com/index.html or 7day shop have some cheap. Then stuff in an SD card, I'd put my money on the SD card surviving anything, even if the adapter was trashed it would still be readable.

As long as the contacts are not damaged the flash memory inside is fine as it is sealed in epoxy resin. The FLASH memory itself is very hardy as is its data.

Remember the contacts on write protect switches and logos and sliding covers for the contact may fail so I'm not recommending you coat these with honey and set them on fire but on the whole they are tough.

You can "damage" them by writing to them a few 100,000 times, not likely in normal use, but if you use them to boot an operating system like Linux and use them for log file make sure you write the log to ram disk and sweep to flash every 10 minutes other wise the flash will fail in a week or 2! Most places replace them under warrantee but now you know!

I saw this on TV last year I think the video might still be there:

"To demonstrate this, I saved a video file onto several USB key rings and then subjected them to deadly peril. I boiled one, drove over another, hit a third with a golf club. But no matter what happened, even though the casing suffered, the data I had stored on the USB key ring was still there, uncorrupted, after bashing and boiling."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/4257005.stm

quidsinquentin

Nice one...

tightus_wad

"coat in honey and set on fire" ROFLMAO!!!! nice one!!

GDB2222

CDR1122 wrote:

bewarned though, the paper clip is actually this big:

Just out of interest, say you are a group and you want a giant paperclip, where do you go to? I have not seen these in any of my local shops.

seth

GDB2222 wrote:

Just out of interest, say you are a group and you want a giant paperclip, where do you go to? I have not seen these in any of my local shops.

http://www.greatbigstuff.com/paperclip12.html

Or the multi pack



http://www.greatbigstuff.com/paperclip.html

If you really care there is a statue of a giant paperclip in Oslo you could shoot your Video there?

Johan Vaaler (1866–1910) was a Norwegian inventor who was granted patents for a kind of paperclip in Germany in 1899 and in the United States in 1901. Vaaler was born in Aurskog in Norway[For more, click on this link]. Vaaler was a patent clerk at Bryn's patent office in Oslo. Although Norway had patent legislation at the time, he chose to have his invention patented abroad. But his paperclip was never produced and marketed, since the much more functional "Gem" paperclip was already in production in England. Most literature on the subject falsely credits Vaaler with the invention of the "Gem" clip, the now common type. Norwegians have created a national myth out of the fact that Vaaler invented some kind of paperclip, although imperfect.

The paperclip became a symbol of Norwegian resistance to Nazi occupation in World War II after badges bearing national symbols or the initials of the exiled King Haakon VII were banned. A giant paperclip has been erected near Oslo in honour of Vaaler.

From http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/enc3/johan_vaaler

Some history..


http://www.officemuseum.com/paper_clips.htm

Little_John

Waterproof isnt a big claim, my 512 stick gets washed almost weekly and it still works.

I remeber the gadget show doing tests on some of the water/dust proo devices, mp3 player, mobile phone, memory stick and a camera the subjected them to the extremes like a ride on a jet ski and even 2 C4 explosions in a paddling pool with the device in there and the !!!!!!s still worked. they did manage to stop some of them working I think they drive somthing over them or blew them up and even then they managed to recover data from the memory stick after re building it.

As for buying from Dabs, if they stock system is correct and the items are in the correct bins in the warehouse you dont have a problem when things are in the wrong place then it can get messy when the wrong item turns up, they ignore the problem and send you another whihc is normally ok but it came from the same bin and no one checked the contents of the bin. I have had other stuff and no problems so as with every company they make mistakes every so often. nobody tells you that they ordered 2000 times before but the 1 that is wrong everyone knows about.

GDB2222

No objection to DABS, except (1) they are not at all cheap and (2) they are not good at sorting out mistakes. Ebuyer are cheaper, and they have sorted out mistakes much better than DABS, at least in my experience.

Thanks for the info about big paperclips. I was going to order some of the big 4" ones, but the firm is in the States, and I am applying trade sanctions at the moment because of GTO Bay.