Password-protecting folders on a USB flash drive

Archived from groups: comp.sys.laptops (More info?)

The USB flash drive I carry with me serves two purposes. First, it holds
copies of the presentation files (primarily PDFs) I need when I visit
clients, in case my laptop breaks down or is lost or stolen. Second, it
holds files that I need to keep at least minimally secure by
password-protecting them. These files may be hundreds of megabytes in
size.

My goal is to set up two directories on the flash drive, one for
unprotected files, the other for protected files. I'd then
password-protect the folder for protected files.

There are many encryption products that will do this kind of thing, but
they seem to work by encrypting all the data in the folder being protected.
When this is hundreds of megabytes in size, the process takes a very long
time -- too long to be practical. I also found a product, lockngo
(http://www.keynesis.com/products/), that is very fast, but seems to work
only on entire drives. I suppose I could partition my flash drive into two
logical drives and use lockngo on only one of them, but I'd prefer to blow
only one drive letter when using the flash drive.

Does anybody know of a product that will let me password-protect a folder
and its contents, but that runs quickly, regardless of the total size of
the files in the folder? I'm not looking for the most secure system in the
world, just something that would keep normal non-hacker people from getting
at the protected files should my USB drive find its way into somebody
else's hands.

I'm running Windows 2000.

Thanks,

Scott