Best flash drive for iPhone

[MiniGeek]

Hello,

My iPhone 8's storage is getting full, and I'm not so sure I want to use the Cloud library. I have an iPad, and both devices are connected to Photostream. The iPad is older and has older photos, so it had photos that are not on my phone. I have different albums on each device, and I do not want them to sync.
I am wondering if any of you could recommend the best flash drive to use with the iPhone, ie Sandisk or some other brand. I'm nervous about using the lesser known brands, since one never knows if there could be malware or spyware preinstalled on these devices.
I see Apple does sell SanDisk products on its site, although only for Macs.
I would like to be able to move photos and videos to the drive and view them from there, if need be.

Thanks for any input or suggestions.

 

[Stephen.R]

If you don't want to use iCloud or iCloud Photos specifically I'm not going to try to convince you why you should, but I would strongly advise against moving your precious photos and videos to a flash drive of all things. They're about as reliable as stale bread for long-term storage.

 

[MiniGeek]

I'm looking at the SanDisk iXpand at the moment, and it can be connected to a Mac or Windows computer and photos transferred to that.

 

[Porkchop Sandwich]

Can’t say it’s the ‘best’ b/c it’s the only one I have but, it seems to work pretty well.

 

[MiniGeek]

Thanks, I did end up going with the Sandisk, after watching a Youtube review which answered the questions I had about it. I haven't tried it yet, but I'll report back when I do.

 

[MiniGeek]

I've just tried the iXpand now on my iPhone 8, iPad mini 4, and my Windows 10 laptop. I had already installed the iOS apps on both Apple devices. All devices easily recognised the iXpand flash drive, and there was no further setup or updates required.
I transferred one photo from my iPad to the flash drive. I had been trying to create a folder on my flash drive, but that option wasn't available until I actually was about to transfer the photo. Then I was given the option of creating a new folder. I was also able to easily transfer that same photo to my Windows laptop from the flash drive, as well as to my iPhone. The youtube video review I saw made it appear that a thumbnail of the photo would not show when navigating to the flash drive, which did concern me. However, in my experience, the thumbnail did show up.
One thing I don't understand is the low storage warning that the flash drive generated when I chose to transfer the photo from the flash drive to my iPhone. The flash drive said I had 1 Gb of storage remaining on my iPhone, but my phone information says I have about 11 Gb remaining.
The iXpand does not come with anyway to protect the parts that actually plug into the Apple devices and the computer, so I would recommend some sort of small carrier. Other than that, I am so far happy with it.

 

[MiniGeek]

I wanted to add something here that I've just learned. Apparently my iphone 8 takes pictures in a format I had never heard of, the HEIC format. In the phone's settings, you can configure it so that if the file is transferred to a PC, it will automatically convert it to a compatible format, which would be jpg. However, this conversion does not happen when transferring pictures to the flashdrive. I transferred a whole bunch of picture files that weren't critical for me to the flash drive, then plugged the flashdrive into my Windows laptop and transferred them to the laptop. Lo and behold, I had a bunch of these HEIC files which my computer couldn't open unless I installed a codec, which I had to pay for. Only pictures I had taken with the iPhone were in HEIC format, some of the others were pictures I had saved from the internet. They remained in jpg format. I tried emailing a photo I had taken with the iPhone to the laptop, and it arrived in my email as a jpg. I have installed the codec on the laptop, but I think it's important to know that you photos aren't going to necessarily transfer to a flashdrive as jpg files. I'm a little short on time right now, but I would be interested to know if connecting the iPhone directly to the laptop would result in those files being converted to jpg or not.
I'm not sure why Apple would pull a stunt like this. Jpg is the standard for compatibility, we all need to get along here.
[doublepost=1553376098][/doublepost]Updated to add, I've managed to connect my iPhone 8 to my Windows 10 laptop and I can explore the photo file folders on the iPhone. All files there appear in jpg format. So it is just in the process of transferring to a flash drive that they will not be converted, apparently.