TOP 5 best fast and bulk flash drives

The American brand SanDisk, which is part of the conglomerate WD, is one of the most famous and recognizable manufacturers of flash drives and memory cards. The brand's products attract attention due to the combination of affordable price, high quality and interesting functionality. For example, the Ultra Fit 3.1 model is one of the most compact flash drives with a memory reserve of 128 GB ― its dimensions are 30x14x5 mm with a weight of only a couple of grams.

The peculiarity of the flash drive is its invisibility, such a one will easily enter the port of a car radio or a third USB slot of a TV or laptop, without blocking access to neighboring ports, like some larger flash drives. When connected, it takes up less space than a tiny wireless mouse receiver.

Its speed indicators are within the norm for low-cost models: according to official data, the buyer receives 130 MB / s when reading and it is unclear how much when writing. Measurements in CrystalDiskMark showed figures in the region of 109 Mbps during reading and 48 Mbps for writing. When copying files larger than 4 GB, there was a twofold drawdown in speed, and in some cases the case was noticeably heated. The tiny plastic case is not designed for efficient cooling. Given the speed drawdowns, dimensions and heating, it seems to us that SanDisk Ultra Fit 3.1 is more likely to come down to the role of a compact media storage (movies on TV, music for the radio), and not an indispensable assistant who will scatter dozens of gigabytes of small files every day.

Stylish, fast and capacious flash drive from SanDisk, which will appeal to people who appreciate drives with a simple classic design. It has no sliders to push the opening out of the case, no protective caps or adapter caps, which are constantly lost. Instead, a simple oblong case, on one side of which there is a USB connector, on the other a notch to hang it on a carabiner or a bunch of keys.

At a very affordable price of just over $ 20, the SanDisk Ultra Luxe USB 3.1 boasts decent speed indicators. According to official data, the buyer receives a peak of 150 Mbps when reading and it is unclear how many MB/s for writing, since the manufacturer has not made this data public. In tests, when recording a movie with a volume of 4 GB on a flash drive, the "speedometer" showed about 58 MB / s, and this is a very decent result. And during read operations, the counter even slightly outstripped the claimed speed, stopping at 153 Mbps. At the same time, the speed drawdowns were insignificant in nature, and the case itself practically did not heat up.

A small bonus to SanDisk Ultra Luxe USB 3.1 is a package of proprietary software from SanDisk, which allows you to create a secure folder with support for 128-bit AES encryption or recover accidentally deleted or lost files. A great bonus against the background of penny nouname drives from Aliexpress.

DataTraveler became the first flash drive from Kingston, which worked according to the USB 3.1 standard and provided unprecedented at that time (for flash drives, that's for sure) the speed is around 100 Mbps. After five years and hundreds of other models with USB 3.1, its speed no longer seems like a gift from the gods, and the main advantage in our opinion has become compactness.

Thanks to the modest dimensions of 25x12x4.5 mm, a metal case and a large notch for a carabiner, it literally asks for a carabiner to a keychain and a keychain from a car alarm. In addition to the miniaturization of the case, there are two more advantages. The case is solid here, no caps for protecting the USB connector, which are constantly lost. The second plus is minimal heating while recording large files. If you plan to use it daily, overwriting tens of gigabytes of data, do not underestimate the importance of this parameter.

Now let's move on to speed measurements. With a passport read speed of up to 100 Mbps and only 15 Mbps for writing, Kingston DataTraveler Micro 3.1 surpassed these figures in synthetic tests of CrystalDiskMark. When performing linear read operations, we got 105 Mbps, with linear write 67 Mbps. That is, it takes a little more than half a minute to copy a 4-gigabyte movie from a USB flash drive to a PC.

If the creators of memory had their own award for the best merits, then Samsung would have received the "Oscar among flash drives" in 2019. When viewed from the outside, its FIT Plus model seems almost an perfect USB flash drive, which has a full advantage, no disadvantages at all, and the price tag is slightly higher than that of entry-level models.

First, the speed. During linear read operations, FIT Plus outputs up to 300 Mbps. That is, it is 2 times faster than most competitors working with USB 3.2 gen1 and a little slower than inexpensive SSDs, whose speeds seemed fantastic a couple of years ago. According to the company, to copy a 4 GB file from FIT Plus, you will need a little more than 10 seconds. Writing files to a USB flash drive is traditionally slower, it cannot jump more than 80 Mbps.

The second advantage of the model is the size. This is one of the tiniest models with a volume of 128 GB, when connected, it only looks out of the USB port by a centimeter. An invaluable plus for laptops, car radios, routers and other devices where there are risks of damaging the drive by inadvertently hitting. At the same time, the USB flash drive case is reliably protected from surprises from the outside world: Samsung FIT Plus can stay up to 72 hours in seawater at a depth of 1 m, is not afraid of electromagnetic and X-ray radiation, and its shock resistance reserve is enough not to worry about the safety of data when falling. The range of operating temperatures is also impressive: from -25 to 85 °C in active use and from -40 to 85 °C in passive mode. All this is backed up by a five-year warranty from the manufacturer.

With the development of the USB interface, modern flash drives have accelerated tremendously, without requiring an eternity to record a 10-gig rip of some Avengers or Transformers. However, Transcend's new flagship JetFlash 910 model demonstrates sprinting speed even by these new standards.

In order to unlock the full potential of this flash drive, we will need a laptop with first-generation USB 3.2 ports. In this case, JetFlash 910 almost catches up with modern inexpensive SATA SSD drives, demonstrating a read speed of 420 Mbps, and 400 Mbps for writing. These are very, very cool indicators, which, for example, allow you to copy a 4 GB movie to it in just 10 to 15 seconds. No less cool is that in synthetic and field tests, she reached the claimed speed with one left and even slightly surpassed them. Naturally, when copying large files, the speed sags, but flash drives, conventional HDD, and SSD suffer from this to one degree or another. Therefore, JetFlash 910 seems to be an excellent option for those users who need a more compact and affordable analogue to an external SSD. Especially when you don't need to copy terabytes of data, but hundreds of gigabytes are enough.

Other advantages of the Transcend JetFlash 910 include a strong and stylish aluminium case that does not heat up too much during prolonged use, a package of Transcend Elite and Transcend RecoveRx utilities for copying, archiving, encryption and data recovery, an extended service life (10 times longer than conventional TLC memory-based flash drives) and a 5-year warranty. You can only complain about the protective cap for the USB connector, which tends to get lost. Well, her price tag is twice as high as that of simple 128 GB models, as they say, you have to pay for everything.