Solved May Have Fake USB 3.0

[jamezb3]

I just bought a USB 3.0 flash drive but it is running at USB 2.0 speeds.
I have a M5A97 evo which has the blue USB 3.0 ports on it and the correct driver installed. Is there any way I can verify that my flash drive is USB 3.0? I have googled it and cant seem to find how I verify if I have a legit flash drive or I was ripped off.

 

[norepli]

Hi, does the flash drive have a name and/or model number?

 

[jamezb3]

Adata c103/16gb usb 3.0

 

[norepli]

That drive is only listed as USB 3.0 supported but the speeds are clearly not 3.0. I don't think you got ripped off because you would be hard pressed to find a flash drive that can actually run at 3.0 speeds for a reasonable price.



I really think your PC down-clocked to USB 2.0 because of the limitations of the flash drive memory controller.

I think you are OK.

 

[jamezb3]

Thanks heaps. It was listed as a USB 3.0 but it looks like it is only supported, would it be fair to asked for a refund because I wanted a USB 3.0?
Can you recommend a good brand and/or model?

 

[norepli]

You can try for a refund but I don't think you're going to find any USB flash drive that conforms to the USB 3.0 standard of (up to) 625mbs per second (aka super-speed) and I doubt that you'll find one that even comes close to it. IMHO, the USB 3.0 standard is well ahead of its time and the hardware will have a hard time catching up to the new standard's requirements. Good luck.

 

[whs]

It is a legit USB3 with 10MB/sec Read and 90MB/sec Write. I don't think you have any grounds for a refund as non-USB3. Maybe you can think of another reason. But the thing is so cheap, is it worth the trouble??

 

[bobkn]

I wouldn't call it fake USB3. USB2 has a maximum transfer rate of 480Mb/s, which is 60MB/s (b = bits, B = bytes). If the drive can manage 90MB/s, it exceeds USB2 rates. That's not close to 625MB/s, but most 6Gb SATA SSDs don't come close to 625MB/s.

The Lexar "Triton" drives claim 145/110 MB/s read/write speeds for the 16GB version. (The larger drives are a little faster.) I don't see anything at www.newegg.com with faster writes in a 16GB drive. The 16GB Sandisk Extreme drive claims a read speed up to 190MB/s, but no write spec is listed.

Higher speeds (like 220/110) are claimed for some 64GB drives, but things start to get expensive.

I don't own anything like that. My only USB3 peripheral is a card reader. The only information I have on that is the data transfer rate display of Windows 8. (Or would have, if I remembered it.)

 

[whs]

I own a Lexar USB3 stick and these are the performance nums:

 

[bobkn]

I own a Lexar USB3 stick and these are the performance nums:

(snip)

Impressive. Is that a "Triton"?

 

[whs]

Not sure. I lost the Newegg link. But it was expensive. I bought a 60GB SSD for less money. That's the way to go anyhow. A cheap SSD and a caddy beat any USB3 stick.

 

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