The Pen Drive Lottery – Will You Buy Fake This Year?
USB Flash Memory storage devices are a practical and highly portable method of storing and moving data between places. Flash Memory is highly practical for this task as it has no moving parts, supports fairly large storage and if used properly has very little chance of failing in any serious manner.
Unfortunately recently there has been a massive increase in the failure rate of these previously ultra reliable USB devices, so much so that the data recovery sector is now placing a lot of emphasis and time on USB memory stick recovery. The question has to be asked however what is the problem all of a sudden?
As with any storage technology over time costs drop and adoption increases and the humble USB memory stick is testament to this paradigm. From the time the technology went mainstream it has had a massive growth rate and recent years have seen a doubling of sales year on year . The expectation for the end of this year is expected top be circa three hundred million.
With the higher number of units in the market place it goes without saying that that the actual physical numbers of failures of portable storage devices will increase, double the units = double the failures. However along side the number of failing units of more concern is the increase in the ratio of failed units that is being seen.
So why is it that a storage media famed for its reliability fail in such high numbers? Well in about 98% of cases it is not the Flash memory that fails, in fact, following a failure it is not uncommon that the NAND memory chip within the USB device is found to be in perfect working order.
Part of the problem lies with the consumer to some extent as the demand for ever cheaper products leads to the need for lean and more efficient or cheaper manufacturing requirements. A lot of failed devices are said to originate in the far east as are marketed as generic memory devices. In addition there is also a large increase in the number of fake devices in the market place as noted by one of if not the leading UK data recovery company in this article:
These fake devices often take advantage of the consumer by reporting much higher storage capacity than is actually available which is very misleading right from the off. Another problem here as well is the cost , yes they are cheaper but what are you actually getting for your money? The manufacturing process can only go so far and that only leaves one option, cheaper and substandard components!
Often These portable devices will hold a lot of your valuable data that if lost and not backed up could be lost forever. You get what you pay for as the saying goes so is it really worth the increased risk of data loss to save what is in reality a tiny sum compared to the cost of a branded device?
You can find more great advice on data recovery here or for general computing advice visit the Computer repair website.