An Inconspicuous Looker: Kanguru Defender
The Kanguru Defender series of USB flash sticks was developed for professional use. The housing consists of robust aluminum, which makes the USB sticks enjoyably lightweight. The removable protection cap for the USB port and the lanyard clip are made of plastic. The weight of the USB stick is less than an ounce (10 g) and thus insignificant.
By way of comparison, a Kingston Data Traveler Secure USB stick is more than twice the weight at 24 grams. The dimensions of the Kanguru Defender are 2.5” x 0.75” x 0.35” (64 mm x 19 mm x 9 mm).
Another feature that is rarely found anymore in USB sticks is the switch that locks the stick, preventing unintended writing and erasing.
The accessories that come included with the stick are a lanyard, USB extension cable and CD. On the disc are forms to register the product as well as the manual in Adobe PDF format.
Laser Engraving As An Option
Our test sample is black, but the USB flash drives are also available in different colors such as red, green, blue and yellow—Kanguru Solutions offers the ability to have custom laser engraving done on the USB stick. This allows companies to visually distinguish between privately used and company-owned flash drives.
The Kanguru Defender series offers storage capacity ranging from 1 GB to 16 GB. All drives work with interface based on USB 2.0 standards, and are also backward compatible with USB 1.1. The manufacturer specifies a shock resistance of 1000 G and resistance against vibrations of up to 15 G. Problem-free operation is guaranteed at temperatures between 0 and 70 degrees Celsius and with humidity between 20 and 90 percent.
Supported operating systems include Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 and higher, Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 2003. The aforementioned systems are supported in their 32-bit as well as 64-bit versions. The Kanguru Defender Pro series devices differs from the Kanguru Defender series by a different Flash memory module, which guarantees high data transfer rates. In contrast to the higher transfer rate, the Kanguru Defender Pro drives are available with a maximum storage capacity of up to only eight gigabytes.
The price for a Kanguru Defender USB stick with 1 GB storage capacity is $50, while a USB stick from the Kanguru Defender Pro series of the same capacity will cost $65.
Simple point is, some companies actually care about making the jobs of their employees easier, and if that means supplying a $10 USB drive (that they can confiscate at any time) they make that effort. Most companies, however, spend as little as possible to aid their employees and don't understand why their productivety suffers. Their IT departments are also people who have simply undergone a multi-day training session, and are only there to look confused and package the broken components and ship them back to HP or Dell, they don't understand nor care that someone can copy sensitive information to a USB drive and walk out the door with it.
While it's interesting to see a product like this, the prohibitive cost and complexity will never see a vast market segment. Too many large companies simply care more about the bottom line than anything else.