Technical info aboutt usb drives plz

[chessonly]

What specs to check before buying a usb drive

HI ppl

the purpose of my buying a pen drive is to run some programs of it and do regular backup of some small files. So i'll be happy with 64Mb drive as long as it works reliably.
what specifications shld i be looking at - speed, transfer rate, read/write rate, brand etc.

after reading a bit it seems that it is more important to get a usb 2.0 port first(after determing which i hav currently) , is it true.

lastly is it ok to run programs of flash drive regularly ? or will it just explode

btw when they say 20mb write speed do they actually mean data transfer @20mb/s ??

c ya

 

[Nodsu]

You will get more speed out of USB 2.0 indeed.

Please try to tell the difference between b and B. Many people get shafted for not bothering to.

 

[chessonly]

Please try to tell the difference between b and B

didn't get that!

 

[crossedup]

There is a certain number of write cycles for flash ram, I cant remember the exact number but it is finite.

http://www.bellevuelinux.org/flash_memory.html

Quote from the link.

NOR flash was the first type to be developed, and it was invented by Intel Corporation in 1988. It has a life expectancy of 10,000 to 100,000 write-erase cycles. Although it has slow erase and write speeds, it has random access for reading and writing, thus making it suitable for the storage of data that needs to be updated only infrequently.

As compared with NOR flash memory, NAND flash memory features faster erase and write speeds, a greater memory density, a lower cost per bit and a much longer life expectancy (roughly ten times the number of write-erase cycles). However its I/O (input/output) interface allows only sequential access to data.