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The Swiss Army Knife of USB Drives

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the see-'cuz-its-a-knife dept.

Mudzy writes "The Tech Zone reviews what has to be the coolest Swiss Army Knife ever made. The Swissmemory USB Victorinox is the first knife to be equipped with a USB flash drive. " Besides 64 or 128mb of data, it includes such useful items as a ballpoint pen, red light, scissors, nail file, and not surprisingly, a knife.

22 of 314 comments (clear)

  1. Old news. by Jaywalk · · Score: 5, Informative

    These have been available from Thinkgeek for a while now. They also make a "travel version" without those fearsome weapons of mass destruction. (Meaning the scissors, nail file and that itty-bitty knife.) Not that the travel version is necessary, since the USB drive is removable.

    --
    ===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
    1. Re:Old news. by cs02rm0 · · Score: 5, Funny

      since the USB drive is removable

      Ohh... that's why the site's down?

    2. Re:Old news. by cosmo_the_third · · Score: 5, Informative

      As they have been around for a while, there are plenty of other sites with pictures if you want to see what it looks like. (The site listed no longer works)

      -Cosmo

      --
      http://cyclocosm.com Pro cycling at its worst
    3. Re:Old news. by will_die · · Score: 4, Informative

      It also has been reviewed at slashdot.

  2. Usefull... by R2.0 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Until you can't take it on a plane with you.

    --
    "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
  3. Oh great just what I need on an airplane ... by Average_Joe_Sixpack · · Score: 5, Funny

    Shot by an airmarshall whilst trying to back up my data

  4. Why? by wackysootroom · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Swiss army knives traditionally used out in the wild on camouts, hiking, fishing trips, etc.

    The concept of this gadget is cool, but could someone enlighten me to the uses of a USB flash drive out in the wild?

    1. Re:Why? by I+confirm+I'm+not+a · · Score: 4, Funny

      GPS data? Backup camping photos? MP3s for round the campfire (and if you've ever heard me singing campfire songs you'll know why taking an MP3 player camping is a good idea...)

      --
      This is where the serious fun begins.
    2. Re:Why? by Lxy · · Score: 5, Informative

      Swiss army knives are handy around the home and office just as much as the outdoors. I carry one with me and use it many times a day for odd things. Adding USB memory to it just adds to its usefulness.

      What would really be handy is if they started making Leathermans with USB drives.

      --

      There is no reasonable defense against an idiot with an agenda
      :wq
    3. Re:Why? by miskatonic+alumnus · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You need to expand your horizons. I've used my Swiss Army knife for such diversified tasks as tuning my carburetor and slicing a wedding cake. You never know when you may need one of these little James Bond tools.

    4. Re:Why? by lcsjk · · Score: 4, Funny

      The knife might come in handy for that also! :)

  5. wtf? by Lxy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Thinkgeek, OWNED by OSDN if I'm not mistaken, has been selling USB swiss army knives for months now.

    Is it obvious to anyone else that /. has happily traded in sanity for advertising dollars?

    --

    There is no reasonable defense against an idiot with an agenda
    :wq
    1. Re:wtf? by RWerp · · Score: 5, Funny

      What's even more bizzare is that the article doesn't link to the ThinkGeek page for this. Instead, they link to a competitor, thetechzone.com.

      Congratulations slashdot! you've just shot your sister-company in the foot!

      No, they've just DDoS'ed^H^H^H^Hslashdotted the competition.

      --
      "Long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. In the long run we are all dead." (John Maynard Keynes)
  6. Durability by keiferb · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I have to wonder how this thing would hold up, though. I'm rough on pocketknives, and while it's true that there aren't many parts, I don't think it would take me long to render the flash drive useless.

  7. Actually, the iPod is the Swiss Army Knife of... by Deep+Fried+Geekboy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...storage devices.

    I always have it with me, and it has my emergency backup documents plus it functions as an emergency boot disc. It also has all my contacts, registrations, passwords etc. Obviously it functions as a transfer disc too. The only thing it doesn't do well is function as a card reader, which would be the icing on the cake. Oh yeah and it plays music.

    I have a nice SAK that I use for back country camping, during which time the USB drive does not get much of a workout.

    --

    I'm not wrong. You haven't thought about it hard enough.

  8. Slashdotted already? by thenetbox · · Score: 5, Funny

    They should have used the dual xeon pocket knife.

    1. Re:Slashdotted already? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      "They should have used the dual xeon pocket knife. "

      Evidently blade servers don't scale as well as expected...

  9. Keep them seperate by JohnnyKlunk · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Don't know about you lot, but I'm quite happy having them seperate. I've got a 15 year old swiss army knife. It's been soaked/dropped/heated and been through every other possible mistreatment and it's still great. I don't see one of these coping with that.
    Will 128mb still be enough space for useful storage in 15 years, will we still have USB?
    My way I only ever buy top quality tools and keep them many, many years. My technology I can replace whenever I like.

  10. Dupe by philbert26 · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's not only old news, it's also a dupe.

  11. Re:Missing the target market by Jtheletter · · Score: 4, Informative
    a) Hasn't this been out for a while? b) Why do I want a USB drive I can't take on a plane?

    Answers:
    a) yes.
    b) they make a travel version and the drive is removable from the rest fo the tool.

    Homework assignment: RTFA

    --
    -- I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist. It's not my fault that life sucks so much. --
  12. If only MacGyver had one of these... by Xpilot · · Score: 4, Funny

    Back in the day when MacGyver got stuck in that "smart building" and got attacked by dalek robots, he had to devise all kinds of things to stop them... if he had this he could have done a Jeff Goldblum-esque "upload virus" from his Swiss Army knife and have the rampaging robots under his control!

    --
    "Backups are for wimps. Real men upload their data to an FTP site and have everyone else mirror it." -- Linus Torvalds
  13. /.: news for nerds who only read read /. by junk · · Score: 4, Funny

    you know you're on the cuting edge of technology when Stuff and Maxim have both already covered your articles in print. come on, this is retarded. raise your hand if you didn't already hear about this. everyone else, reach over and smack those people.