I've had problems with large thumb drives in the past. I never really got to the root of the problem, but I don't think yours are necessarily defective.

Anyway, I think the primary disadvantages to SD cards are the relative cost and possibly the read/write speed.

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

Alright, this is probably the sixth time I bought defective USB thumb drive that corrupts my files. It seems the local computer stores are flooded with fake 16GB thumb drives.

So, would a micro SD-USB adapter be better than USB thumb drive? I can see the advantage of switching the micro SD as I need, but what kind of negatives I would suffer, compared to a flash drive?

Depending on what system you are using sometimes the copy function shows it has completed before it has actually finished the operation. I always use the "eject" feature when using USB storage devices as that will cause the system to wait till the copy has actually finished before telling you it's safe to remove the drive.

This is just something I noticed please excuse the suggestion if you are already doing this and still have the problem.

I was not aware that fake USB drives are still common, but maybe it is different in your country.

There is software to check those USB drives, eg. H2testw (Software is in German, I suppose you'd be able to work it out though.)

It seems that there are fake SD cards, too. Same check works here. If you have been burned before testing the medium is probably the first thing you should do.
http://www.chinaelectronicsinsider.com/techni … ke-flash-memory
http://www.ebay.com/gds/FAKE-SanDisk-Ultra-Se … 01254879/g.html

What is the brand?

I used to buy Kingston drives. So far no problems yet.

I recently bought a 16GB thin USB drive by Kingmax (Taiwan Kingston wannabe?). It works fine too.

Usually I face problems with the USB multi-card readers. Some don't work, some die halfway.

Thanks for the suggestion.

My Kingston is the "swiss army knife" model, which looks similar to the picture below.

I don't mind the extra cost of the micro SD reader, as long as it is reliable. Right now, I'm using my android (it has 32GB of SD) as portable storage, but it's not really handy since you need to do a couple of steps to make the storage visible.

I have great luck with older Verbatim usb sticks. Up to 32 GB.

eL_PuSHeR wrote:

I have great luck with older Verbatim usb sticks. Up to 32 GB.

The problems I experience seem to happen on newer USB thumb drives. It seems that everytime I buy a new thumb drive, it's always short-lived due to file corruption, forcing me to buy another thumb drive, only to get the same result. And again, and again. I still have an old, 1GB thumb drive, yet it never has the problem described above.

Malik wrote:

Usually I face problems with the USB multi-card readers. Some don't work, some die halfway.

Mine is OK for some cards but not others. Some speed or format issue with newer cards I think. The cards work in other devices. I think we even had some newer cards that worked in an old kodak camera we had, but the pc software bundled with the camera could not access the pictures, the card had to be put in another camera for that (to use other software).

Yes, an SD adaptor is better than a flash stick. With a flash stick, if the reader electronics fail, you're out of luck. With an SD adaptor, if the reader electronics fail, you can just buy a new adaptor.

Hatta wrote:

Yes, an SD adaptor is better than a flash stick. With a flash stick, if the reader electronics fail, you're out of luck. With an SD adaptor, if the reader electronics fail, you can just buy a new adaptor.

Hmm...that makes sense.

So, a USB drive's breakdown might just be in the reader electronics built-in rather than the memory chip within it.

And if the memory chip is a goner, than the USB drive is still non-functional even if the reader mechanism is working well.

It's an interesting way of looking at it, but then I've never had a thumb drive fail on me yet.

One might also consider that it's easy to lose a micro-SD card. Granted, some of those readers hold on to them pretty snugly.

Malik wrote:

Hmm...that makes sense. […]
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Hatta wrote:

Yes, an SD adaptor is better than a flash stick. With a flash stick, if the reader electronics fail, you're out of luck. With an SD adaptor, if the reader electronics fail, you can just buy a new adaptor.

Hmm...that makes sense.

So, a USB drive's breakdown might just be in the reader electronics built-in rather than the memory chip within it.

And if the memory chip is a goner, than the USB drive is still non-functional even if the reader mechanism is working well.

Yup, that's what I'm thinking too bro. 😀

I'm not used with SD adaptor though... Regarding thumb drive, I've already had bad experiences with defective and probably fake thumb drives. I think I'll be safer with SD, because it seems fake/defective SDs are much less popular than fake/defective thumb drive. But correct me if I'm wrong.