ADATA UV128 128GB USB 3.0 Retractable Capless Flash Drive, Blue (AUV128-128G-RBE)

I work in IT for my line of work and these work fantastic. The 16G is a perfect size and for $12.99 (how much they were when I made the purchase) is a steal considering they are USB 3.0. UPDATING YOU ON 10/04/2013 : I just noticed these are now $10.79. . .buy these that is a great price.The quality of the product is fine, nothing made of metal, aluminum. It is made of plastic making it light weight. You do not need a USB to be indestructible, unless you're planning on dropping this device (which can happen but, shouldn't).I use these both for work and personal for mostly a bootable usb and it works great! the read and write speeds are always going to be better than USB 2.0 I appreciate speed so I chose these because they're less than $15.00 and they're USB 3.0.UPDATE ON 10/04/2013: Also they're backward compatible if you need to put one into a usb 2.0 port. With my line of work I work on several types of laptops and computer desktops of all types of models that work fine running OSX Mountain Lion 10.8.5, Mavericks beta, Windows 7 professional and Windows 8 (have not tested Windows 8.1 for it yet). The usb stick will read for all of these OS's that I have been able to test. If you laptop/ computer does not read it make sure the usb is not formatted in a way that the OS cannot read it and ensure your drivers for the usb on your machine are up to date.I have no problem at all when using these for boot stick placing them into a usb 2.0.

I got this USB more than two years ago because I needed color-coded USB with retractable connector. This was cheap, fast enough for capacity and surprisingly sturdy. Mechanism is still as good as it was the first day. Speed is not fantastic but it's not dreadful either - realistic write speeds are in 20 MB/s range while read went to 70 MB/s. Considering 8 GB capacity, that's rather OK.There are smaller USB drives, there are faster USB drives, but I haven't seen any USB drives with retractable mechanism as good as this.The only downside is that it comes in only two colors - blue and yellow. A few more would make it ideal for color-coded storage (e.g. install USB where each OS gets another color).Also, cannot be used as food for sheep.

I love these things. I use them for so many things;- Backing up temporarily- Carrying my Support files, programs and software- To create website demo's for would-be clients to tryVERY useful, durable and consistently reliable. PLUS, NO annoying caps to lose.SOME warnings.1) 2.0 vs 3.0 ports for speed.If these are stuck in a 2.0 port first, just like with an external hard drive stuck in a 2.0 port first, some computers will use that 2.0 driver and NOT install the a 3.0 driver, EVER. So you lose the advantage of the 3.0's speed. Only way around it is to remove the driver, and stick it in a 3.0 port and only use it there.2) Even with 3.0, the more data you are transferring, the longer it will take. These hold a LOT compared to older, smaller ones, or other forms of media, so if you want to move large amounts, you need to realize it will take a while, and you need to be patient.If it's in a 3.0 port and it's using the right drivers though, you will see a great improvement in transfer speed.I love these little things. It's not too small and I always have one on me because it fits in my wallet's zipper pocket perfectly.The prices are so reasonable now, and they seem so reliable now, that I am getting the largest one next...

I enjoy Adata products, they are inexpensive and work well. A nice attribute for an inexpensive Chinese made product is that I have nave had an Adata product fail on me, which sets it apart in my book. I use their products for non-mission critical use so I thick they are idea for home use and non-critical corporate use. This flash drive is no different. I like the caplets design, since caps always fall off eventually. This one is nice because the button that slides the USB connector locks in both the retracted and extended position, and the contrasting button color makes it easy to see and remember that its a slider. There is really only one characteristic I want to illuminate to you before you consider purchasing this product and that is its speed. This is advertised as a USB 3.0 product and by using System Profiler on my Mac, I verified that this device is reporting that its connected at USB3 at 5Gbps, which is exactly what we expect. What I did not expect is the 7.4 Mbps Write speed I measured using Back Magic Speed Test. The Read speed is quite good at 38.8 and I'm perfectly happy with that especially considering how inexpensive this unit was at the time I purchased it.7.4 Mbps Write speed is so slow (relatively speaking) that a regular USB 2.0 flash drive could out run it. This is not such a big deal if you match your needs to the device. In my case I wanted to make an emergency restore flash drive for OS X Mavericks that was just released. Yes, I know its a free download but just in case someone does something to their machine that inexplicably renders it unable to connect to any network, I wanted to be able to restore the OS in just a few minutes.Thats where this Adata USB 3.0 flash drive comes in. Any flash drive will do, and until recently we only used USB 2.0 flash drives, most of which are pitifully slow, so we slowly restored or upgraded our OS's with the turtle-like flash drives and just waited.I was hoping for more from this Adata flash drive, with its USB 3.0 capability and I did get more that the truly pitiful USB 2.0 flash drives that litter my drawer, some of which can barely Read and Write at 1 Mbps. Since I only need to write to this flash drive once, to install OS X Mavericks on it, then in the future it will only be used to Read from for each installation, the slow Write speed did not bother me, it didn't take very long to install the 5GB operating system on it, and the great part is that it Reads so fast that it does a reasonable job installing Mavericks onto other machines.If this pattern suits you then you will probably like this drive. Its built robustly, has to cap to lose, the USB 3.0 connector retracts and locks in place like an Exacto knife and its faster than any other flash drive at this amazingly low price point.