Kingston 2GB USB 2.0 DataTraveler with ReadyBoost (DTR/2GB)

List Price: $32.99 Discount Price: $16.98

Features:

• 5 Year Warranty
• 100% Tested for Reliability
• Free Technical Support
• Easy to Follow Installation Instructions
• Designed to Meet or Exceed Industry Standards for Performance and Reliability

Customer Reviews:

Works like a charm, and does as advertised for Vista to boot! [Posted on 2007-06-01]
Well, it took me a while to get my Kingston DataTraveller 2 Gb Flash Drive, but it worked flawlessly. I plugged it in and Vista immediately found it, and activated it for me. When I decided to try ReadyBoost with it, it fired right up, and smoothed out my machine quite a bit. I only have one GB of RAM on my system and Vista would often go into fits of paging my programs to the hard drive to make room as I flipped back and forth between them. Now, it will occasionally slow down, but far more rarely. So a big thumbs up to Kingston and to MS Vista's ReadyBoost feature! Way to go guys!

Good Product...performance is swift on a USB 2.0 port [Posted on 2007-10-03]
In May 2007, after much research I settled on purchasing this device.
I have not regretted my purchase.

It's easy to forget that 2GB of portable storage is a lot of storage. (i.e. given the larger sized offerings on Amazon)

I don't use this flash drive with Windows VISTA's Ready Boost feature,but I know it works.... because when I inserted it into my PC, VISTA gave me the choice of doing so.

When taken out of the package, it appears exactly as shown in the picture.
It has a slim profile that allows the use of other nearby USB ports.

It has no place to put a key ring.... so I primarily use in office, with a folder synchronization program.
(i.e. as backup device for important, current files)

No problems so far, and peace of mind (i.e. so far) that I can always go back to the content of this flash drive.

Performs as promised [Posted on 2008-01-23]
I used to use a CD, ripping and burning with Sonic RecordNow!, to backup and transport data. A USB flash drive like this one is much more convenient. You just plug it in and read and write with it, just like any other drive. My home PC is a Dell, with their infamous recessed USB ports, placed close together. A slim device like this fits one of these ports easily and does not block the adjacent one. You may find it more convenient to use an extension lead. If so, an A to A, male/female extension is very cheap -- around a dollar.

In addition, Vista will make use of this drive for caching, using ReadyBoost. When you plug the device in, Windows asks you how much space on the device you want to use as cache. You can use the whole 2GB if you want, or specify any lower amount. Whatever you don't use for cache is available for storage. For some reason (I must have read it somewhere) I thought ReadyBoost could only use a maximum of 2GB, but when I plugged in an 8GB SD card, using another flash drive, Vista offered to use up to 4GB. To be honest, I haven't noticed a dramatic increase in performance with ReadyBoost, but that may be a limitation of my creaky old Dell and its 1GB of RAM.

Whether you use USB flash drives for caching or storage or both, treat them with care. Always use the `eject safely' feature before removing them. If you don't know what that is, find out before using a flash drive.

This product is a neat, light-as-a-feather, effective little device that delivers what it promises, and now that it has halved in price it is a real bargain. My one gripe is that the cap comes off to allow you to plug in, but does not then fit on the back end of the device, such as is the case with many other models. The cap thus lies around, threatening to get lost. A minor problem, but one that could easily have been fixed.

USB 2.0 for Readybosst [Posted on 2008-05-27]
I bought this USB stick (along with a PCI card to support USB 2.0) entirely for ReadyBoost in Vista. My Dell 8200 was only running on 1Gb of RAM and RIMM memory is cost prohibitive to increase so it would appear that ReadyBoost was the answer. For that purpose, this USB stick fit well and has performed nicely in increasing load times for well used apps (Outlook 2007 takes about 4 seconds from clicking on the icon to being completely up and running).

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