INTRODUCTION

   I got my very first USB flash drive back in 2002 and since i was using it for work even then i knew just how important portable storage media really are. Of course today things have changed and so although back then even 4GB were more than enough to store all my files today even 128GB are simply is not enough. Things are even worse if you're in a field that has extensive storage requirements (like video editing) since i know many people who are going around with 2TB portable hard drives. Nothing of course beats a USB flash drive in terms of size so naturally manufacturers started upping their capacity to come close or even match that of portable hard drives. Kingston was the first manufacturer to address this matter with the release of the HyperX Predator 512GB/1TB USB 3.0 flash drives back in 2013 and 4 years later they are also the very first manufacturer to release a 2TB USB flash drive called the DataTraveler Ultimate GT.

   Kingston Technology Company, Inc. is the world’s largest independent manufacturer of memory products. Kingston designs, manufactures and distributes memory products for desktops, laptops, servers, printers, and Flash memory products for PDAs, mobile phones, digital cameras, and MP3 players. Through its global network of subsidiaries and affiliates, Kingston has manufacturing facilities in California, Taiwan, China and sales representatives in the United States, Europe, Russia, Turkey, Ukraine, Australia, India, Taiwan, China, and Latin America.

   The brand new DataTraveler Ultimate GT USB flash drive is a USB 3.1 Gen 1 model (USB 3.0 renamed) that features a durable enclosure (retractable design) made out of zinc alloy and plastic and is currently available in 1TB and 2TB capacities. The entire drive is based around a Phison PS2251-08 NAND flash controller (supports global wear-leveling and power saving functions) which Kingston has paired with Toshiba MLC NAND flash modules in order to allow it to reach data transfer speeds of 300MB/s read and 200MB/s write. Obviously these numbers may not compete directly with what we've seen in the past by some portable SSDs like both the T1 and T3 by Samsung (among others) but they are far greater than what we generally see with regular USB flash drives.