31 USB 3.0 Thumb Drives, Rounded-Up
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Most of us have had pretty bad experiences with thumb drives, dating back to USB 1.1 and 2.0. Heaven forbid you had a DVD-sized video file that you wanted to move to another machine. So, it's a little weird to think that a USB 3.0-connected thumb drive should be able to outperform the mechanical disks inside of your desktop PC. But the fastest models in today's round-up are indeed quite a bit faster. In fact, two drives manage to serve up sequential read speeds in excess of 300 MB/s. That's more throughput than a previous-gen SATA 3Gb/s port even allows.
At the same time, we're going to see that not all USB 3.0-compatible thumb drives are fast. Plenty of them are straight-up duds. Knowing a drive's performance is very important before you decide to drop your hard-earned cash on it. To that end, we're benchmarking 31 different products to help you in your search for the right one.
Because we have so many drives in the lab, we're not going to introduce each one individually. Instead, we're going to focus on the ones we recommend and find most interesting. This includes the winner, the fastest seven drives, the most robust drives, and drives with special functionality.
The Technical Specifications
| Manufacturer | Adata | Adata | Corsair |
|---|---|---|---|
| Model | S102 Pro | S102 Pro | Flash Voyager Slider |
| Model Number | AS102P-16G-RGY | AS102P-64G-RBL | CMFSL3-32GB |
| Interface | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 |
| Capacity | 16 GB | 64 GB | 32 GB |
| Removable Cap | Yes | Yes | No |
| Weight | 9 g | 10 g | 13 g |
| Manufacturer | Corsair | Corsair | Corsair |
| Model | Flash Voyager Slider | Flash Voyager GT | Flash Voyager GT |
| Model Number | CMFSL3-64GB | CMFVYGT3A-32GB | CMFVYGT3A-64GB |
| Interface | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 |
| Capacity | 64 GB | 32 GB | 64 GB |
| Removable Cap | No | Yes | Yes |
| Weight | 13 g | 20 g | 20 g |
| Manufacturer | Dane Elec | Extrememory | Extrememory |
| Model | Row 14 - Cell 1 | USB Drive designed by brinell | Xplorer |
| Model Number | - | EXMEUFD332GDBS | EXMEUFD332GXPLB |
| Interface | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 |
| Capacity | 16 GB | 32 GB | 32 GB |
| Removable Cap | No | Yes | No |
| Weight | 8 g | 23 g | 12 g |
| Manufacturer | Integral | Kingston | Kingston |
| Model | Crypto Dual | DataTraveler HyperX 3.0 | DataTraveler R3.0 |
| Model Number | INFD32GCRYPTODL197 | DTHX30/64GB | DTR30/32GB |
| Interface | USB 2.0 | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 |
| Capacity | 32 GB | 64 GB | 32 GB |
| Removable Cap | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Weight | 10 g | 17 g | 16 g |
| Manufacturer | LaCie | Mach Xtreme | Mach Xtreme |
| Model | RuggedKey | MX-ES | MX-FX |
| Model Number | 9000146 | MXUB3SES-32G | MXUB3MFX-32G |
| Interface | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 |
| Capacity | 16 GB | 32 GB | 32 GB |
| Removable Cap | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Weight | 30 g | 10 g | 25 g |
| Manufacturer | Mach Xtreme | Patriot | Patriot |
| Model | MX-FX | Supersonic Rage XT | Supersonic Quad |
| Model Number | MXUB3MFX-32G | PEF32GSRUSB | PEF64GSUSB |
| Interface | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 |
| Capacity | 32 GB | 32 GB | 64 GB |
| Removable Cap | Yes | No | No |
| Weight | 25 g | 8 g | 8 g |
| Manufacturer | Patriot | Patriot | PQI |
| Model | Supersonic Boost XT | Supersonic Magnum | Nano |
| Model Number | PEF32GSBUSB | PEF64GSMNUSB | - |
| Interface | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 |
| Capacity | 32 GB | 64 GB | 32 GB |
| Removable Cap | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Weight | 12 g | 24 g | 10 g |
| Manufacturer | PQI | Sandisk | Toshiba |
| Model | Tiffy | Extreme | Transmemory-EX |
| Model Number | - | SDCZ80-064G | - |
| Interface | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 |
| Capacity | 16 GB | 64 GB | 32 GB |
| Removable Cap | No | No | Yes |
| Weight | 6 g | 11 g | 14 g |
| Manufacturer | Toshiba | Transcend | Transcend |
| Model | Transmemory-EX | JetFlash 700 | JetFlash780 |
| Model Number | - | TS32GJF700 | TS64GJF780 |
| Interface | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 | USB 3.0 |
| Capacity | 64 GB | 32 GB | 64 GB |
| Removable Cap | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Weight | 15 g | 7 g | 10 g |
Benchmark System
| System Hardware | |
|---|---|
| Hardware | Details |
| CPU | Intel Core i5-2400 (32 nm, Sandy Bridge, D2), 4C/4T, 3.2 GHz, 4 x 256 KB L2 Cache, 6 MB Shared L3 Cache, w/ HD Graphics 3000, 95 W TDP, 3.6 GHz max. Turbo |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte G1.Sniper M3, LGA 1155, Revision: 1.0, Chipset: Intel Z77 Express, BIOS: F10c |
| RAM | 4 x 2 GB DDR3-1333, OCZ OCZ3G2000LV4GK |
| SSD System Drive | Samsung 470, 64 GB, Firmware 0901, SATA 3 Gb/s |
| Controller | Intel PCH Z68 Express, SATA 6Gb/s |
| Power Supply | Seasonic X-760 760 W, SS-760KM Active PFC F3 |
| Benchmarks | |
| Software | CrystalDiskMark 3.0.2 x64AS SSD 1.7.4739.38088Xcopy Benchmarks |
| System Software and Drivers | |
| Operating System | Windows 8 x64 Pro |