Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

1GB USB Drive on a Keychain

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the portable-pr0n dept.

sparcv9 writes "JMTek looks to be about ready to release a line of keychain-sized USB drives, ranging in capacity from 16MB to 1GB. The 1GB models are a bit pricey at almost $900US, but the 16, 32 and 64MB models are all under $100. These devices require no external power supply, claim a data retention of 10 years, and are 'driverless' -- which means that the drives will work under Linux, according to JMTek (see the 'Operating Systems' row in the specs table.)"

6 of 274 comments (clear)

  1. Tens years? by dozing · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Nothing would last ten years on my key chain. If I don't lose them I break them.

    --
    Dozings.com -- Its kinda funny... If you're as crazy as me.
  2. Less than 1CM Thick? Use it in a camera! by Bonker · · Score: 3, Insightful

    According to the product spec page:


    67mm w/cap x 20mm x 9mm
    60mm w/o cap x 20mm x 9mm

    I'm not sure they have anything more than prototypes at the moment, but this is still a pretty nifty advance for people who need more storage for digital video and digital photography.

    --
    The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
  3. You've got to want this for size or coolness... by Spamalamadingdong · · Score: 3, Insightful
    ... because CD-R media are a heck of a lot cheaper until you've burned quite a few. At least the price will eventually come down.

    But I really don't see what it's good for. Storing lots of stuff? CD-R or CD-RW; your computer probably has a drive already, and you can stash more data than even the 1/2 GB drive. Holding encryption keys? You want something a lot smaller, cheaper and more rugged. Having something neat to put in your pocket? Okay, but that's not going to sell lots of them.

    --
    Scientists restrict study to entire physical universe; creationist
  4. Perhaps "Generic Drivered"? by Christopher+B.+Brown · · Score: 5, Insightful
    It appears that it uses some form of generic disk storage protocol.

    In recent Linux releases, there is a USB_STORAGE driver that can be included in the kernel; I would presume that's what they're referring to, at least vis-a-vis Linux support.

    It's entirely likely that three years ago, W98 didn't include drivers for disk storage devices, thus meaning that if you want to use the device with W98, you need such a "generic driver."

    Similarly, Windows NT 4 is getting pretty old; it likely didn't include support for USB storage devices either.

    In a sense, this may be regarded kind of like having SCSI support. You do need a SCSI driver to access SCSI devices, but once you've got that, there's no special driver for Seagate drives as compared to Quantum or IBM...

    --
    If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
  5. Re:Win98 doesn't conform by rhombic · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The 1.x linux kernel doesn't support it, either. I guess that means Linux is lagging behind. I'm as much of a linux person as anybody else here, but why beat up on M$ for not adding support for new devices to their old OS's?

    --
    1984 was supposed to be a warning, not an instruction manual.
  6. Re:1GB = 900? Yeah right by LinuxHam · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How many PDAs do you know with 1 GIG of storage?

    Seriously! And who the hell compares the functionality of a batteryless keychain hard drive with no moving parts to a freaking PDA! The only way to get a gig on a PDA is to find one that takes CompactFlash and use the IBM 1GB CompactFlash microdrive... complete with moving parts!

    --
    Intelligent Life on Earth