Storage medium maker Memorex Products Inc. on Wednesday introduced its Memorex USB 2.0 ThumbDrive, a new portable USB-based flash storage device designed to support USB 2.0 interfaces.
USB 2.0 is the faster peripheral interface found on Power Mac G5s and some Macs equipped with third-party expansion cards. The USB 1.1 interface maxes out at 12Mbps, while USB 2.0 operates at up to 480Mbps. USB 2.0 devices like Memorex’s new ThumbDrive are downwardly compatible with the USB 1.1 interface as well, although they’ll function at lower speeds.
The new Memorex USB 2.0 ThumbDrive operates at nowhere near the maximum speed of the USB 2.0 interface, although it does work relatively fast for a flash drive. Memorex benched the ThumbDrive’s read performance at 8MB per second and its write performance at up to 5MB per second.
The Memorex USB 2.0 ThumbDrive is available in 128MB, 256MB and 512MB capacities at US$59.99, $99.99 and $179.99 respectively. Memorex also plans to introduce a 1GB model early next year.