At 12:35 PM 2/1/2010, Harry F. Schiestel wrote:
128GB Kingston - yes I too suspect it is a Chinese knockoff. If you
get one for $50 let us know how
it works.
Kingston Memory Verification: http://www.kingston.com/asia/verify/ and
http://www.kingston.com/asia/verifyflash/
Requires UPC Bar Code, Authentic Code and License Key - they send an
email verification to your
inbox.
Here's the promised follow-up.
My advice is don't do it.
I got one. I'm sending it back for a full refund. Fortunately, I
bought it from an ethical seller, even if the manufacturer is
unethical. Here are the problems I found with it:
(1) It was not a genuine Kingston. I was able to ascertain that by
sending the code numbers (serial number and authentication code) to
the Kingston site, which said they were not Kingstons. So far that
bothers me a bit, but let's find out if it's a competent knockoff.
(2) The first thing I did was to plug it in and run a virus and a
malware scan on it. AVG Anti-Virus and Lavasoft AdAware declared it
clean. Then I saved a file on it and read it back off; it was a
competent flash drive. Finally, I ran the built-in software, then ran
scans again on my entire computer. They came up clean; so at least it
is safe to use. It neither contains a virus nor spreads one to your computer.
(3) The encryption software that came on the flash drive was useless.
I downloaded the encryption software from the Kingston site. It
recognized an unauthorized device, and refused to run. So I can't do
secure backups. But that's OK, I've been doing backups in the clear
for years; may as well continue.
(4) The 128GB is phony. I tried a backup, which started OK, but gave
lots of "corrupted file" warnings after a while. I tried several
reformats (a 12-hour process for a 128GB flash), and each time
proceeded with more careful partial backups. In each case, the
corrupted file messages started at about 1GB.
My conclusion, based on behavior and my EE knowledge: I believe the
device is wired to respond as a 128GB drive, but actually contains
only a 1GB flash memory chip. Wiring only the low-order address bits
will probably make it respond to formatting and simple write/read
testing like a 128GB memory, and even really BE a flash drive until
you try to use more than the 1GB already there. At that point, the
memory gets corrupted as more data is written over the data already there.
Ouch!
Well, I had an eminently workable backup scheme, and I'm continuing
with it: the Western Digital MyPassport 500GB hard drive. And I
remembered I have a fireproof box that will easily contain it. So I'm
going to keep it there and put the box in a corner of the basement.
DaveT
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