Corsair 8GB Flash Survivor GT Review

Aug 23 2007, 12:00am CDT | by Shane McGlaun

USB flash drives are very common these days with so many different varieties and manufacturers around that consumers have lots of choice when they buy. What consumers don’t normally think of is how durable flash drives are. If you are prone to leave things in your pocket or drop them, the Corsair Flash Survivor GT 8GB flash drive may be just what you need. Read on for all the details.

Gallery

6 images

Benchmarks

Features & Specifications
As soon as you take the Corsair Flash Survivor GT out of the package you know right away that it is significantly heavier and more bulky than other drives on the market. If you are after the most compact device you can get, you won’t want to consider the Corsair Flash Survivor GT. This drive casing is about the diameter of a nickel and made form aircraft-grade anodized CNC-milled aluminum.

Corsair used a EPDM waterproof seal on the casing to give the drive water resistance to 200M. Each end of the Corsair Flash Survivor GT is wrapped in a shock dampening collar to allow the drive to better survive drops and falls. Once you unscrew the end of the Corsair Flash Survivor GT the flash drive itself is rather small and held in the center of the cap.

Along with the flash drive itself you also get a USB extension cable and a set of Corsair dog tags with the Corsair Flash Survivor GT. The Corsair Flash Survivor GT only comes in a 8GB capacity, but you can get a Flash Survivor drive in a 4Gb capacity that has slower transfer speeds. TrueCrypt 4.3 software is also included to allow you to encrypt data on-the-fly with 256-bit AES encryption.

Benchmarks & Testing
The worst thing that most of our flash drives will ever go through is probably a few drops onto the concrete garage floor or the occasional wash and dry cycle in the pocket of our pants. I threw the Corsair Flash Survivor GT down on my concrete driveway as hard as I could and the drive didn’t even show visible scratches. My Windows XP Pro test machine recognized it as readily as ever.

I decided to toss it in my washing machine for a full wash cycle and after the wash cycle was over the drive was still recognized without any issues by my computer. I did notice that a bit of moisture was on the base of the USB connector, but I can’t rule out that the water ended up there when I removed the drive from the housing. The interior of the housing itself was bone dry.

After the wash cycle I ran the Corsair Flash Survivor GT thorough a complete dry cycle on high heat with some towels. I figured if the heat didn’t get the drive all the static electricity might. After the dryer stopped, I pulled the drive out (while it was still very hot to the touch) and plugged it into my computer. Again the system recognized the drive and I could get data off the Corsair Flash Survivor GT or put data on with no problems.

The only thing I saw during these tests that might be an issue is that there is no method of locking the screw-on cap in place. After the dryer the cap was loosened a few turns from tight, which is where it was when I put it into the dryer. Had the cap come loose any more the drive most likely would not have survived and had it happen din the wash cycle the tests would have ended there.

To test the performance of the Drive I used the removable storage benchmark of Sandra XII. The test results were as follows:

SiSoftware Sandra- Removable Storage Benchmark

Benchmark Results
Combined Index : 9571 operation(s)/min
Endurance Factor : 16.4
Results Interpretation : Higher index values are better.

Performance Test Status
Run ID : QUAD-XP on Thursday, August 23, 2007 at 6:21:49 AM
Platform Compliance : Win32 x86
System Timer : 2.7GHz

512B Files Test
Read Performance : 28116 operation(s)/min (234 kB/sec, 1x)
Write Performance : 6483 operation(s)/min (54 kB/sec, 0x)
Delete Performance : 9114 operation(s)/min
File Fragments : 1.0
Combined Index : 12725 operation(s)/min

32kB Files Test
Read Performance : 15866 operation(s)/min (8462 kB/sec, 56x)
Write Performance : 6066 operation(s)/min (3235 kB/sec, 21x)
Delete Performance : 9499 operation(s)/min
File Fragments : 1.0
Combined Index : 10225 operation(s)/min

256kB Files Test
Read Performance : 4654 operation(s)/min (19857 kB/sec, 132x)
Write Performance : 2815 operation(s)/min (12011 kB/sec, 80x)
Delete Performance : 9333 operation(s)/min
File Fragments : 1.0
Combined Index : 4061 operation(s)/min

2MB Files Test
Read Performance : 673 operation(s)/min (22972 kB/sec, 153x)
Write Performance : 369 operation(s)/min (12595 kB/sec, 83x)
Delete Performance : 5899 operation(s)/min
File Fragments : 1.0
Combined Index : 581 operation(s)/min

64MB Files Test
Read Performance : 22 operation(s)/min (24030 kB/sec, 160x)
Write Performance : 18 operation(s)/min (19661 kB/sec, 131x)
Delete Performance : 1241 operation(s)/min
File Fragments : 1.0
Combined Index : 22 operation(s)/min

Endurance Test Status
Operating System Disk Cache Used : No
Use Overlapped I/O : No
Test File Size : 32MB
Block Size : 512 byte(s)
File Fragments : 1

Endurance Benchmark Breakdown
Repeated Sector ReWrite : 399 kB/s
Sequential Sector Write : 375 kB/s
Random Sector Write : 16 kB/s

Drive
Total Size : 7.7GB
Free Space : 7.7GB, 100%
Cluster Size : 4kB

The final performance test was with HD Tach to get read and wire speeds. HD Tach showed that the drive average read time for the Corsair Flash Survivor GT was 23MB/s and the average write speed was 20.6MB/s. corsair quotes the read speed at 34MB/s and the write at 28MB/s, obviously I didn’t see speeds close to those numbers. Corsair also gives the drive a 10-year warranty.

The included USB extension cable makes plugging the drive in a bit easier if you are using a very crowded USB hub, but the drive is thin enough that most users won’t have any issues with the Corsair Flash Survivor GT crowding other USB ports.

Verdict

Conclusion

Pros

Very durable
10-year warranty

Cons

Read and write speeds not up to claims
Cap came loose a bit during wash and dry tests

Verdict
If you need a big flash drive with good performance and the durability to survive your daily grind, and then some the Corsair Flash Survivor GT is the drive for you. You can wash this thing and dry it and so long as the cap stays on your data is safe. Couple the physical safety with the data safety of the included encryption program and the Corsair Flash Survivor GT is a real winner.

8.5

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Shane McGlaun
Leading our review center, Shane knows technology inside out. His extensive experience in testing computer hardware and consumer electronics enable him to effectively qualify new products and trends. If you want us review your product, please contact Shane.
Shane can be contacted directly at shane@i4u.com.