Flash memory warm?

[Alex Clayton]

Is larger amounts of Flash memory supposed to get warm in use? I bought a 16
Gig Flash drive to move copied DVDs around. I used to use an external drive
but since these larger jump drives have gotten so cheap I decided to buy one
for this since I figured it would be easier, and it is great. I have noticed
though that after 5 or 10 Min. of running a 6 or 7 gig file in and out of it
that it is noticeably "warm" to the touch when I remove it. I have never
noticed this with any of the 1 to 4 Gig Flash drives I have.
It's a Transcend if that makes any difference.

<http://www.amazon.com/Transcend-Jet...ATIW/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1293737634&sr=8-4>

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Is larger amounts of Flash memory supposed to get warm in use? I bought a 16
Gig Flash drive to move copied DVDs around. I used to use an external drive
but since these larger jump drives have gotten so cheap I decided to buy one
for this since I figured it would be easier, and it is great. I have noticed
though that after 5 or 10 Min. of running a 6 or 7 gig file in and out of it
that it is noticeably "warm" to the touch when I remove it. I have never
noticed this with any of the 1 to 4 Gig Flash drives I have.
It's a Transcend if that makes any difference.

<http://www.amazon.com/Transcend-Jet...ATIW/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1293737634&sr=8-4>

Maybe just time. You could hardly load a 7 GB file onto a 1 GB card, so
the operation time is ~ 1/7 of what you're doing with the larger card.

So the card has time to warm up.

Also if the newer card is a lot faster, you might be seeing the speed
phenomenon. Faster clock times create more heat; that's why faster CPUs
need more robust coolers, and why overclocked CPUs sometimes even
require water cooling.

The above ideas are speculative. (Obviously.)

 

[Alex Clayton]

Maybe just time. You could hardly load a 7 GB file onto a 1 GB card, so
the operation time is ~ 1/7 of what you're doing with the larger card.

So the card has time to warm up.

Also if the newer card is a lot faster, you might be seeing the speed
phenomenon. Faster clock times create more heat; that's why faster CPUs
need more robust coolers, and why overclocked CPUs sometimes even
require water cooling.

The above ideas are speculative. (Obviously.)

Thanks I was just curious more than anything else. Wondering if it was some
kind of sign of it being defective.
As for speed it seems to work about the same as the drives did. Takes
about 8-10 minutes to load or unload 7 or 8 Gigs on the laptops and about
half that time on the desktop. I always guessed that was do to faster
possessor on the desktop?? Anyway I had no idea Flash came in different
speeds either. When I decided to buy this I just glanced at which ones
Amazon had with free shipping at the best price. They seemed to be running
from the $22.00 I paid for this one up to almost twice that. Did not read
far enough to see if the more expensive ones were supposed to be faster.

 

[Paul]

Thanks I was just curious more than anything else. Wondering if it was
some kind of sign of it being defective.
As for speed it seems to work about the same as the drives did. Takes
about 8-10 minutes to load or unload 7 or 8 Gigs on the laptops and
about half that time on the desktop. I always guessed that was do to
faster possessor on the desktop?? Anyway I had no idea Flash came in
different speeds either. When I decided to buy this I just glanced at
which ones Amazon had with free shipping at the best price. They seemed
to be running from the $22.00 I paid for this one up to almost twice
that. Did not read far enough to see if the more expensive ones were
supposed to be faster.

I checked a datasheet for Flash, and the one I was looking at, draws
30 milliamps while read, erase, or program, and draws only 0.05 milliamps
while idle. So activity with the device, makes it warmer.

The question would be, what is a reasonable operating current for your
device.

Some flash drives (SATA kind), draw on the order of 2.5W (there could be
eight or sixteen chips inside). The fancy kind, tend to violate that kind
of power envelope (and can't practically be used on USB to SATA adapters).
So a high performance controller chip, could make the power higher.

But if you're using a USB flash stick, and it had two chips inside (one
on either side of the PCB), and they drew 3.3V * 30ma = 100mW each,
you shouldn't be able to feel that. If it gets warm, it could be
using more power than that.

I'd be more concerned, if it got warm when you weren't doing read/write
on it.

Paul

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Thanks I was just curious more than anything else. Wondering if it was some
kind of sign of it being defective.

That could be true, I guess, so you could keep an eye on it for signs of
smoke.

As for speed it seems to work about the same as the drives did. Takes
about 8-10 minutes to load or unload 7 or 8 Gigs on the laptops and about
half that time on the desktop. I always guessed that was do to faster
possessor on the desktop?? Anyway I had no idea Flash came in different
speeds either. When I decided to buy this I just glanced at which ones
Amazon had with free shipping at the best price. They seemed to be running
from the $22.00 I paid for this one up to almost twice that. Did not read
far enough to see if the more expensive ones were supposed to be faster.
-

You seem to be talking thumb drives, USB memory sticks, whatever name
you like. I know that different ones of mine show different speeds when
I run HD_Speed on them.

SD cards, on the other hand, are marked with a speed code, usually C2,
C4, up to even C10 (I don't think I've seen an odd number). They are
supposed to be linear factors times some base speed, so C8 is 4 times as
fast as C2, for instance. I'm too lazy to Google for it at the moment


CF cards are often marked with transfer speeds or X factors (10X card,
for instance), or at least the packaging has numbers like that on it.

Just some random related (I hope!) facts...

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

That could be true, I guess, so you could keep an eye on it for signs of
smoke.


You seem to be talking thumb drives, USB memory sticks, whatever name
you like. I know that different ones of mine show different speeds when
I run HD_Speed on them.

SD cards, on the other hand, are marked with a speed code, usually C2,
C4, up to even C10 (I don't think I've seen an odd number). They are
supposed to be linear factors times some base speed, so C8 is 4 times as
fast as C2, for instance. I'm too lazy to Google for it at the moment


CF cards are often marked with transfer speeds or X factors (10X card,
for instance), or at least the packaging has numbers like that on it.

Just some random related (I hope!) facts...

I hate it when people reply to themselves!

Just kidding - but I did get a new thought.

How warm? "Noticeably" warm could mean just a few degrees above ambient,
or it could mean almost hot to the touch.

Warm like a baby's formula dripped onto your wrist is probably fine;
warm so that you want to let go before 5 seconds is probably not so
fine.

....I almost said "not so hot", but I suddenly realized how it would
sound

 

[Alex Clayton]

How warm? "Noticeably" warm could mean just a few degrees above ambient,
or it could mean almost hot to the touch.

Warm like a baby's formula dripped onto your wrist is probably fine;
warm so that you want to let go before 5 seconds is probably not so
fine.

...I almost said "not so hot", but I suddenly realized how it would
sound

It was not hot, just warm to the touch enough that I could notice it. I
tried leaving it plugged in for a long while doing nothing with it and it
does not feel warm now.
It is just a USB stick drive. I looked on the sight for the CO. could not
find much info on it. I just hope that if it is going to die it does it
soon. Amazon will just replace it. Not sure how long I can have it before
they would tell me it was the manufacturers problem if it dies.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

It was not hot, just warm to the touch enough that I could notice it. I
tried leaving it plugged in for a long while doing nothing with it and it
does not feel warm now.
It is just a USB stick drive. I looked on the sight for the CO. could not
find much info on it. I just hope that if it is going to die it does it
soon. Amazon will just replace it. Not sure how long I can have it before
they would tell me it was the manufacturers problem if it dies.

I found my older thumb drives, stored in an Altoids can, of course.

There were three, all big enough to copy some movie files of a few GB,
two with plastic shells and one with a metal shell. All got warm enough
to notice.

Their speeds weren't constant, but one was mostly around 3.4 MB/sec, one
mostly around 3.9, and the third around mostly 10-11 (that one started
around 24 MB/sec, but dropped).

They show no signs of getting sick or dying

 

[Alex Clayton]

snip

I found my older thumb drives, stored in an Altoids can, of course.

There were three, all big enough to copy some movie files of a few GB,
two with plastic shells and one with a metal shell. All got warm enough
to notice.

Their speeds weren't constant, but one was mostly around 3.4 MB/sec, one
mostly around 3.9, and the third around mostly 10-11 (that one started
around 24 MB/sec, but dropped).

They show no signs of getting sick or dying

Sounds great, thanks for taking the time to try. Sounds like it is fine
then. I have never had one of these things actually "wear out". I still have
one of the first ones I ever bought back in 2000. Paid about twice as much
for them on sale at a big chain. 64MBs. I plugged the one in the other day
to see if it still worked and it does. I have a few 1 gig ones I have had
for many years that all still work, one held together with tape because the
dog chewed it up when he was a pup. I had just never noticed one getting
warm like that, but none of the ones I have had held enough to run for 5 or
10 minutes at a time.
How do you tell how fast one is moving files? I have never noticed it
saying anything about that, just the window showing the files moving and how
much time is left.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

snip

Sounds great, thanks for taking the time to try. Sounds like it is fine
then. I have never had one of these things actually "wear out". I still have
one of the first ones I ever bought back in 2000. Paid about twice as much
for them on sale at a big chain. 64MBs. I plugged the one in the other day
to see if it still worked and it does. I have a few 1 gig ones I have had
for many years that all still work, one held together with tape because the
dog chewed it up when he was a pup. I had just never noticed one getting
warm like that, but none of the ones I have had held enough to run for 5 or
10 minutes at a time.

I had a USB2 stick stop working on USB2 ports, while it continued to
work on USB1 ports. I was amused by that...

How do you tell how fast one is moving files? I have never noticed it
saying anything about that, just the window showing the files moving and how
much time is left.

Have you noticed the button that says "More details" at the bottom of
that window?

 

[Char Jackson]

Have you noticed the button that says "More details" at the bottom of
that window?

ClassicShell includes a tweak that expands the 'More Details' section
by default. Even without the rest of what ClassicShell does, that's a
good tweak by itself, although I don't know how to enable just that
one thing. I always like to see what's going on.

 

[Alex Clayton]

On Fri, 31 Dec 2010 09:24:58 -0800, Alex Clayton wrote:

Have you noticed the button that says "More details" at the bottom of
that window?

OK thanks. Speed seems to vary quite a bit as it's running.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

OK thanks. Speed seems to vary quite a bit as it's running.

Yes. Sometimes it can seem pretty weird.

Other programs, such as my two backup programs, also report speeds that
can vary pretty widely. It's probably partly real and partly an artifact
of how the data is sampled...