Flash Drive

By now you've (hopefully) taken care of the big-ticket items on your holiday shopping list. But don't forget the stocking stuffers! We've put together a list of some great, yet inexpensive stocking stuffers, along with a few $5 toys you can sneak into your kids stockings - or even under the tree!

NewerTech NuTouch Gloves
NewerTech's NuTouch Gloves are the stylish and functional solution to keeping hands warm while using an iPhone, iPad, or other touch screen device in cold weather. Unlike other brands of gloves that limit finger use and touch capability, NuTouch Gloves have a special conductive fiber woven into all 10 fingertips so users can enjoy the fastest typing input on full-sized touch keyboards.

Made from a soft cotton mix and available in four hand sizes - S/M/L/XL, they come in a classic charcoal color and can be worn by themselves, or as liners with heavier cold weather gloves.Read more

A USB port is found on many new car audio players these days, and because of this, Verbatim has announced the new Store 'n' Go Car Audio USB Drive, a tiny flash drive that is perfect for storing and listening to your favorite MP3 music while driving. Just the size of a dime, the USB drive is barely noticeable once inserted into a car audio system, yet can store up to 2,000 songs – more than enough for any road trip!

The Store 'n' Go Audio USB Drive doesn't obstruct vehicle controls or protrude excessively from the dashboard, so you don't have to worry about accidentally hitting and damaging the flash drive while switching between audio tracks.

Even though Verbatim specifically developed the Store 'n' Go Car Audio USB Drive for automotive applications, the flash drive also works with all computers and devices equipped with a USB 2.0 port such as laptops, tablets, desktop PCs and digital picture frames.

Priced at just $29.99, the 8GB Verbatim Store 'n' Go Audio USB Drive is on my list of must-have auto accessories for my annual summer road trip to Florida. It is available in stores now.

SanDisk has a new USB flash drive that is super-tiny. In fact, it is the company's smallest to date. About the size of a standard size paper clip, the Cruzer Blade fits easily on your keychain or mobile phone dongle. It won't weigh it down either. The Cruzer Blade weighs about the same as a penny.

The SanDisk Cruzer Blade is available in capacities ranging from 2GB to 16GB, with a 4GB drive storing approximately 1,000 songs, 1,200 high-resolution photos, or 8 hours of 768kb/s video.

"At half the size of some other USB drives, our compact Cruzer Blade provides consumers with highly portable storage at a great value," said Kent Perry, director, retail product marketing, SanDisk. "The drive lets users transfer their digital data quickly between computers, and delivers a storage boost to devices such as netbooks that often need additional memory but are difficult to upgrade easily."

The SanDisk Cruzer Blade USB flash drive is available now at sandisk.com, with prices ranging from $14.99 to $77.99.

LaCie's new XtremKey USB flash drive was designed for the adventurous crowd. This rugged flash drive works 333 feet underwater, can withstand temperatures ranging from -58°F to 392°F, and can be dropped from 5 meters. It can even handle being run over by a 10-ton truck!

Measuring less than three inches, the XtremKey fits right on your key ring and will be available in capacities up to 64GB. It delivers writing speeds up to 30 Mb/s, reading speeds up to 40 Mb/s and is compatible with both PC and Mac computers.

"The XtremKey offers extreme durability and capacity in a convenient, well-protected and fun form factor," said Alexis Kobassian, Product Manager, LaCie. "Despite the robust, industrial-strength protection we've added, it's still a LaCie key that brings ease-of-use and reliability to customers looking to keep their data secure while on the go." Read more

What is this? A tiny little toy boombox? Think again. The Rad Blaster is the first ever boombox/mp3 player/recorder and flash drive/thumb drive…all in one device.

Featuring a 1.1 inch true color OLED screen, the Rad Blaster can play MP3, WMA, and WAV audio formats, and even has 7 EQ settings to make the music sound better. 2GB of built-in memory is included to store your music files, as well as a built-in microphone and record switch…you know…just in case you want to sing along.

The Rad Blaster is rechargeable, and you can even wear it as a necklace with the included chain. It is available now from SubUrban Toys for $59.99.

Check it out here:

There are plenty of USB Flash drives out there, but do you want to take your data with you knowing that it's 100% secure? You can with the Kingston DataTraveler Locker+ USB Flash drive. The device is secured with 256-bit hardware-based AES encryption. The drive's contents are accessed through an easy interface requiring a complex password. Worried about someone hacking into it? You don't need to. The drive locks down and reformats after 10 incorrect password attempts.

The 100 percent encrypted DataTraveler Locker+ is available in capacities of up to 32GB. Prices start at just $36 for the 4GB. Visit www.kingston.com for more info.

Kingston Technology just announced it is increasing read and write speeds on its DataTraveler 410 USB Flash drive to 20MB/sec. read and write. The faster read and write speeds make the DataTraveler 410 perfect for music, videos, high-definition photos and more. It also includes SecureTraveler software which lets you create a password-protected area of the drive called the "Privacy Zone."

The DataTraveler 410 USB drive features a swivel design and is available in capacities up to 32GB. DataTraveler 410 drives have a five-year warranty with 24/7 tech support. Prices start at $26 (4GB).

Corsair just announced a new USB Flash Drive…what they say is the world's fastest high capacity flash drive, the 128GB Flash Voyager GT. It is able to achieve read speeds of up to 32MB/sec and write speeds of up to 25.6MB/sec - the limiting factor being the speed of the USB 2.0 bus and operating system overhead.

The 128GB Flash Voyager GT features a durable, water-resistant rubber housing to protect it against damage, and sports Corsair's racing-red 'GT' styling.

"The 128GB Flash Voyager GT is ideal for those who need access to a huge volume of data in a format that's convenient, durable and extremely fast," said Jim Carlton, VP of Marketing for Corsair. "The 128GB Flash Voyager GT can store massive video, photo and music libraries, yet it's less than half the size of a solid-state drive, effectively obsoleting less-reliable, portable mechanical hard disk drives."

The 128GB Flash Voyager GT is available now and is backed by a 10-Year Limited Warranty. Although pricing information wasn't available on their website, I found it online at several retailers priced at a hefty $399.99.