CNET Editor's rating: 9.0 out of 10
Reviewed by
Justin Jaffe
Review date: 06/24/04
Release date: 05/03/04
The good: Syncs with Outlook; comes preloaded with password protection and backup utilities; extremely durable.
The bad: None.
The bottom line: SanDisk's Cruzer Titanium delivers a trinity of useful utilities and superior durability at a competitive price per megabyte.
Besides lending it a dash of style, the SanDisk Cruzer Titanium's "titanium-coated metal casing" gives it an exceptionally high degree of durability. SanDisk says this USB flash drive is "virtually indestructible" and is "capable of surviving a force of up to 2,000 pounds." We couldn't track down a 2,000-pound weight to drop on it to test this claim, but we stomped on it, tried to crack it in half, and chucked it really hard at a wall. The drive and its contents survived wholly undisturbed, and we concede that the Cruzer Titanium is certainly among the sturdiest USB flash drives around. It's not exactly the smallest, however, measuring just less than 3 inches long, about 0.75 inches wide, and a touch more than 0.25 inches thick. Still, it's not so big that it would obstruct neighboring USB ports on the back of most PCs. If you're inclined to sacrifice durability for sheer smallness, check out the Lilliputian Iomega Micro Mini.
The Cruzer Titanium comes preloaded with three nice applications. CruzerSync syncs up with Outlook (but not Outlook Express) and loads compressed versions of your e-mail messages (with or without attachments), plus contacts and other Outlook-related debris onto the drive so that you can access it wherever you plug in. And before you load your data onto the drive, it'll project how much space it will eat up in doing so. Also included are CruzerLock, a competent password-protection and encryption utility, and CruzerCache, which lets you back up your PC's files on the Cruzer Titanium.
The Cruzer Titanium supports most recent versions of the Windows and Mac operating systems. The drive's USB interface slides out from inside the case, and when you plug it into your PC's USB slot, the drive glows blue, and the blue light flickers during file transfers. SanDisk claims that the Cruzer Titanium is capable of 15MB-per-second read and 13MB-per-second write speeds. While we did not test its transfer speeds (throughput isn't a highly significant issue with drive capacities less than 1GB), we found the drive to be very fast. Note that although the Cruzer Titanium will work with a USB 1.1 connection, you'll need a USB 2.0 port to take advantage of its full speed potential.
As of June 2004, SanDisk offers only a 512MB Cruzer Titanium, although the company does sell the Cruzer Mini and the Cruzer Micro in smaller capacities. We found the drive selling online for about $150, or about 29 cents per megabyte, which is very inexpensive.
7 out of 10 - Very good Tough. but picky...
I am in the military currently serving in Iraq. I am overall happy with the drive. It is able to ...
I am in the military currently serving in Iraq. I am overall happy with the drive. It is able to withstand the harsh environment (although i need to blow the sand out of the slide all too often.) It has very fast transfer rates, when it works it's GREAT. Just recently i was in a humvee that exploded and i was thrown from the rear seat. and myself and thr drive took a REALLY good tumble. didnt think the drive would withstand the blast and the ensuing beating it took. But after wiping it down and blowing out ..... i plugged it and work liked a charm.
That being said. The drive seems to be very picky about where it's plugged into and not all usb ports are equal. when it doesnt power up, i hear a high pitch whine. normally when i plug the drive into a USB hub it works almost always too. When i REPEATLY attempt to insert it and take it out sometimes it will power up. so i have to gamble. but when it works its an AWESOME drive that's tough enough to survive these conditions.
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by DevilDoginthemud (see profile) -
April 9, 2005
1 out of 10 - Abysmal A sheep in wolf's clothing
Simply put, this drive performs very well, as the CNET reviewers suggest, but it is *not* -- repeat *not*-- ...
Simply put, this drive performs very well, as the CNET reviewers suggest, but it is *not* -- repeat *not*-- durable. It's ironic that they decided to house this feeble drive in a veritable coat of armor. My wife and I went through *three* drives in less than three months. We own other USB flash drives and have never faced data loss or drive crashes. In brief, our recommendation is that you stay away.
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by pmel (see profile) -
December 22, 2005
7 out of 8 users found this user opinion helpful.
9 out of 10 - Spectacular A drive well worth the money
After a lot of research I was stuck between Cruzer Titanium and Apacer Handy Steno HT203. My main preference was ...
After a lot of research I was stuck between Cruzer Titanium and Apacer Handy Steno HT203. My main preference was performance and design. Both of these flash drives are great in terms of no issues of losing caps. Titanium was a bit expensive but finally I got a very good deal at staples and bought it out for $40. Some users expreienced some issues that I didn't, mainly 1)It worked for me in all USB ports for my computer (I have front ones too), 2) As per arstechnica.com this drive is not bootable, but I was able to make it bootable and was able to boot. I used the known HP utiltiy; you do need a version of DOS so do make a DOS diskette handy, 3) Although the included software for synch and backup was trial initially, Sandisk has made it free and full functional in the new version for Cruzer titanium drives and believe me all three included utilities are worth the money. Moreover the software can also sych files and folders other than outlook in new version. 4) The drive never heated up as some reviwers experienced. The included keychain was a bit difficult to stuck in and I did scratch the drive a bit while doing that. Performance wise the drive ran three times faster on my machine compared to my friend's 1GB Apacer Handy Steno HT203. I cannot comment on the reliability of the drive as its too early for me, but you do get 5 years of warranty. Overall I am happy.
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by hmaliks (see profile) -
May 5, 2005
9 out of 10 - Spectacular Best USB Drive So Far
Best USB drive I have used till this date. It out lasted my other 5 drives in durability and it ...
Best USB drive I have used till this date. It out lasted my other 5 drives in durability and it survived my 2-year-old ?Bite Test? (only one that survived). Write and Read speeds are great. Solid performer!
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by kpmosi (see profile) -
June 6, 2005
5 out of 6 users found this user opinion helpful.
2 out of 10 - Terrible Wrecked CD ROM drive-Beware
I have used the USB stick to transfer data from one of my laptops (Gateway with XP Home) to my ...
I have used the USB stick to transfer data from one of my laptops (Gateway with XP Home) to my other laptop (HP Omnibook 6100 with XP Pro). After having inserting the USB stick on my HP and the transfer of data it changed my drives out of the blue: USB became D (instead of E or F) and the CD ROM drive D became an inaccessible DVD drive under E. System restore did not remedy it and San Disk "Tech support" on the Internet is a better joke and on the phone they make lousy excuses with even lamer comparisions and contends that the CD ROM broke (suddenly???) and I would have to contact the manufacturer of the CD ROm drive; thus deny any responsiblity whatsoever! Stay away from these guys!
Updated I had used this Flash Drive and was not too happy with it. At one time it screwed my USB ports up at my HP laptop. Tech support was the pitts. As the instructions are not too clear, I was of the opinion that one can transfer data from Outlook to another computer with this Flash Dive; one can only use the Flash Drive to back the data up; why one can not transfer these data to another computer is beyond me?!
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