Before You Buy a USB Memory Stick

Instead of the CD ROM or the floppy device that is used for reading a CD or a floppy disk respectively, a USB memory stick can be plugged right into the USB Port of any computer. The USB connectivity helps by making your pen drive easy to use and the data collected on your computer can be transferred faster to and from your memory stick.

Depending on the manufacturer, each pen drive will have a different name. Today, the USB memory stick goes by the name of pen drive, thumb drive, jump drive, USB key drive, USB flash drive, Travelers drive and so on.

USB memory sticks are smaller, almost ubiquitous, inexpensive and very, very handy. They are generally available in the 1GB to 8GB range, making them one of the greatest mediums since the invention of floppy disks and CD’s. In comparison with them, CD’s and floppy disks look like ridiculously useless storage mediums don’t you think?

Let me brush you up on how these devices were first invented. The credit of being the inventors of these awesome gadgets would go to none other than IBM. The USB memory stick was first invented in the year 1988 and has since then replaced floppy disks as well as CD’s, though IBM never really patented it. To manufacture the pen drive, IBM contracted with M-Systems, and the patent is now rightfully theirs.

Yes, the USB memory stick is a modern floppy disk. The only difference being that the floppy has movable parts that make the data stored on the drive more or less vulnerable to loss. On the other hand, the USB memory stick is a device, which is in its solid-state and has no moving parts. This makes it possible to seal the memory stick completely, which in turn makes it dust-proof. Thus, the USB memory stick is a safer option if you want to store data – beyond doubt!

All the latest operating systems like Linux, Mac OS 2 and Windows XP are able to recognize these USB memory sticks and can mount them automatically. Once connected, it will be automatically recognized and mounted by the concerned operating system and will appear like any other partition of the hard disk, except that it is named removable storage.

Your USB memory stick can be removed whenever you want, but first it will have to be safely un-mounted and then it can be re-plugged into a different machine or even the same one again.

A memory sticks most important use would be to transport files and data from one computer to another. For instance, you can simply go ahead and copy all the files and word processing documents, spreadsheets and images onto the pen drive, take it along with you and then copy all those files onto your work or personal computer. As simple as that!

Some people have even found the USB memory stick useful for moving their Cookies, Internet browser History, Cache and any other transient data. This goes a long way in improving the security and privacy, as no real traces of the work completed on the computer will be left behind on the PC. Once the data is copied onto the drive, the files will automatically be made secure through an encryption or any other security method.

Pen drives can also be used to store whole operating systems if you want to boot your computer! This is what makes them so popular for diagnostic work or for repair. Instead of carrying along all those burdensome maintenance software applications and tools on several CD’s, a USB memory stick will be faster and can be easily manipulated in case the software is no longer useful or needs to be upgraded.

Yes, a USB memory stick is indeed one of the most inexpensive and economical mobile mediums for storing data when you are considering the cost per unit storage space. They are robust and light weighted in nature, making them huge hits in the market. Of course they are considered by most to be an indispensable and important tool. Now that you know what a USB memory stick, its time to go out there and check out the different types available!