37 
USB sticks are those devices you know you should own, but just aren’t any fun buying. Kind of like insulation, or a new garden hose. I mostly use freebie sticks that once contained junk press releases, but for real power, ex-Gizmodo ed Brian Lam (over at his new site Wirecutter) has researched all the best available sticks, and discovered Patriot’s Supersonic USB 3.0 is the bee’s knees.
That’s mostly down to the killer combo of speed and price, which seems to be a sliver under £50 over at Play.com for a 32GB model, or £82 for a 64GB one at Pixmania. Of course, it’ll only come into its own when inserted into a USB 3.0 port, but if your machine’s a bit long in the tooth, Wirecutter’s got a list of quality USB 2.0 sticks for you to check out, too. So now you know, but shout out if you’ve got a particular brand you feel strongly about. [Wirecutter]
Emails From the Command-Line: The Lost USB Stick
Scosche's CoverCharge Doubles the USB Ports On Your iPad Charger
Sorry, This 28 Port USB Hub Still Doesn't Have Enough
I have a 16GB Kingston Drive, but that’s for my portable Linux hack and recovery install. I tend to use the cloud for anything else. If work need stuff moved about we have Ironkeys of various sizes.
I got a 32GB SanDisk USB 2.0 stick from Argos for £22.
Sometimes the slowness of data transfer can be a little grinding as i’m used to my Lacie External Drive on Firewire 800 but besides that it’s been really reliable and great value for money.
Some USB sticks are fun too buy, like mimobot’s or R2D2 http://www.toysrus.co.uk/Toys-R-Us/Gadgets/Star-Wars-R2D2-USB-Stick(0090870) , though a tad impractical, as it only holds 2GB’s and every time I use it I have to unplug everything else because it’s so big …
Ah, I love the Mimobot ones, but they’re pretty pricey for the capacity. Fun, though!
Yeah, I got a mimobot as well and its impossible to easily take off the cap. But it looks good sitting on my desk atleast.
I have a couple of Ironkeys. They’re expensive but that means you keep an eye on them.
am still surprised no-one’s made one that…
(a) has a lid that keeps dirt away from the connector, &
(b) is fixed to the drive with a wire or something, so that when you insert the stick into a PC it doesn’t get lost