31 USB 3.0 Thumb Drives, Tested And Reviewed

Round-ups
By , published

It's hard to believe that the fastest USB 3.0-rated thumb drives can outperform the hard drive in your desktop PC. On the other hand, the slowest models shouldn't even be allowed USB 3.0 branding. We test 31 different drives to determine the quickest.

Results: 4 KB Random Read And Write Performance

Why you can trust Tom's Hardware Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test.

All of the USB 3.0 thumb drives finish relatively close to each other in our 4 KB random read and write performance benchmarks, regardless of queue depth.

One exception is SanDisk's Extreme, which posts 4 KB random write numbers in excess of the competition. Aside from Toshiba's TransMemory-EX and Patriot's Supersonic Magnum, the other drives fall apart in this benchmark. The Toshiba TransMemory-EX places second, but it's four times slower than SanDisk's offering. Still, it fares much better than most of the competition. Crazily, the drives in tenth place and below are more than 100 times slower than the winner.

35 Comments Comment from the forums
  • rolli59
    It would have been nice to see price performance index as well but good article.
    Reply
  • psikick
    It's not a surprise the Sandisk wins because this USB drive is actually a small SSD.. It uses the same controller used in Sandisk's ReadyCache SSD drives... the great thing about it is it is priced reasonably considering.. :)
    Reply
  • Madn3ss795
    Been using this usb3.0 *SSD from Sandisk for half a year and I haven't got disappointed.Great device for the price. The only drawback I found is that its enclosure gets quite hot after 15mins of heavy use ( benchmarking ) because heat might reduce a SSD' durability.
    Reply
  • razor512
    The sandisk extreme works well.

    I currently have the 16GB version (was $20 when I got it)
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/razor512/8272978749/does 200MB/s read and 57.3MB/s write

    not as good as the the 64GB version but it is still really good

    Read speed: http://i.imgur.com/TdcufSg.png
    Write speed: http://i.imgur.com/jQVkBCa.png
    Reply
  • daveys93
    I have the 32 GB version of the SanDisk Extreme and it is a great thumb drive. The 16 GB version is a bit slow and the 64 GB is a bit expensive for some, the 32 GB is a good middle ground. Here are the benchmarks I used when trying to decide which USB3.0 drive to get:

    http://www.whoratesit.com/SanDisk-Extreme-USB-30-32GB/Rating/1466

    There is a toggle on that site that allows you to view the benchmark results for all three sizes.

    Here is the full whoratesit.com article as a complement to the Toms article: http://www.whoratesit.com/Best-Flash-Drive/Comparison/1#rank1
    Reply
  • WyomingKnott
    In my case the limiting factor is the controller / port. I've got three USB 3.0 controllers: On my notebook at work, built into the motherboard at home, and a PCI-E one. The PCI-E one is twice the speed of the lowest one in 4k random writes.

    If I were home I'd post the controller and the thumb drive model, but I'm not there so don't ask.
    Reply
  • a1sealc4
    Very interesting read I assumed most 3.0 usb drives were similar in speed.
    Reply
  • aznriptide859
    Why no Corsair Flash Survivor? :( I love mine, albeit the write times aren't the speediest.
    Reply
  • __-_-_-__
    finally a good article... -.- tkx
    Reply
  • RedJaron
    11204798 said:
    In my case the limiting factor is the controller / port. I've got three USB 3.0 controllers: On my notebook at work, built into the motherboard at home, and a PCI-E one. The PCI-E one is twice the speed of the lowest one in 4k random writes.

    If I were home I'd post the controller and the thumb drive model, but I'm not there so don't ask.

    Too true, don't forget the controller speed. The Etron controller in my old-ish Z68 board ensures my USB 3.0 devices rarely go above 25 MBps even though I can get double that performance on my newer work computer.
    Reply