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Why are all Flash Drives Junk?

Benjamindaines

Benjamindaines

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Mar 24, 2005
2,841
5
A religiously oppressed state
Why is it that you can't find a normal USB flash drive anymore? Every single one that I've seen in stores now has some sort of software on it (U3, Sony's Vault, Lexar's Secure II encryption, Migo, etc), why has it become so hard to find a normal flash drive with no extra crap on it?

//vent
 
Where are you shopping? I got an OCZ 2Gig from Newegg.com, cheaper than any store and I have not had one problem and no proprietary software.
 
dukebound85 said:
can't you just delete the software?
Click to expand...
Depends, U3 you can't delete unless you download and install removing software that only works on a PC. I don't know about the others, but I really like the Sony drives.... but they're the ones with compression and I really hope you can kill that (on a Mac).
BdON003 said:
Where are you shopping? I got an OCZ 2Gig from Newegg.com, cheaper than any store and I have not had one problem and no proprietary software.
Click to expand...

I'm shopping on B&H.
 
Benjamindaines said:
Depends, U3 you can't delete unless you download and install removing software that only works on a PC. I don't know about the others, but I really like the Sony drives.... but they're the ones with compression and I really hope you can kill that (on a Mac).


I'm shopping on B&H.
Click to expand...

Odd, I have a U3 and I can delete items off the Flash Disk without installing software. I use it with both my PC and Mac, only my PC has the software. When I stick it in my Mac it works fine without any software.
 
I suggest you look a little harder. There are plenty of flash drives without value added junk available. In the entirely arbitrary purchases of my users I've yet to find a drive as such.
 
You can also just buy generic... Generic flash drives (at least the ones you can get at big boxes like Newegg, OfficeMax, etc) are pretty reliable and inexpensive.
 
Hankster said:
Odd, I have a U3 and I can delete items off the Flash Disk without installing software. I use it with both my PC and Mac, only my PC has the software. When I stick it in my Mac it works fine without any software.
Click to expand...
You can use the drive but you can't remove the U3 software.
Slip said:
Could you not just reformat the drive?
Click to expand...

No, its made so the computer sees the U3 software as an unwriteable partition so there's nothing you can do by formatting.
 
I have 2 Sandisk Micro drives. They both had a couple of free bits of software on them, but I swiftly deleted them. They are great drives - small, come with a rubber slip, and a lanyard to prove my uber-geekness.
 
if you live anywhere near a MicroCenter, i suggest you go there they have 1gigs for around ten and just have the MicroCenter name on them.
 
Yea, I really like SanDisk cruzers. But I hate the U3 software being on there, it's a waste of space. However, if you plug it into a PC when the u3 box pops up there is an option to uninstall the software on the drive.
 
Can also remove U3 stuff in a VM

I "uninstalled" the U3 software, and reformatted using Windows XP in VMWare's Fusion. Presumably Parallels will work as well. So if you have a VM, as well, you can regain that space used by the U# partition. That was my problem with the U3 stuff - it was a waste of space.

Cheers....
 
I got the mobile keydrive when it was on newegg from a friend for Christmas one year. No software on it, it's smaller than any other flash drive I've seen so I keep it in my wallet (2 credit cards thick) and it fast enough to run 1080p video from.

EP5130993.jpg
 
mkrishnan said:
You can also just buy generic... Generic flash drives (at least the ones you can get at big boxes like Newegg, OfficeMax, etc) are pretty reliable and inexpensive.
Click to expand...

I was at Office Depot today, and saw a 512MB drive for $9.99 (USD). I remember when I bought my first flash drive 3 years ago--a 256MB for $40. And it was a pretty good deal then.
 
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