Can you trust USB thumbdrives to always keep important files safe?–PC Pitstop.
Do USB Thumb Drives Ever Die?
By Leo Notenboom
I have a database application that I share between multiple computers. We keep the database itself on a USB thumb drive and simply move that drive to the other computers as needed. The database is never copied off the thumbdrive, we just update it in place. Seems very simple.
A friend of mine just told me that I was asking for trouble. He said something about thumbdrives “wearing out”, and that sooner or later, probably sooner, the data on my thumbdrive would become corrupt. Is that true? Do these USB drives actually wear out?
While the technology continues to improve, the fact is that flash memory has a limited number of times it can be written to. It can, in fact, wear out.
Yes.
I strongly recommend that you backup the contents of that drive – yes, sooner rather than later. And perhaps even rethink how you’re sharing that data.
Inexpensive flash memory, the type used in USB thumb drives, memory sticks and other devices, is very, very cool. But there is a dark side that people don’t talk about much.
Flash memory “wears out”.
This excerpt appears with permission from Leo Notenboom.
