Help with question for research paper on history of the flash drive

[georgiagal]

Hey there, lurked for quite some time but finally joined. My 13 yo son is doing a paper for his innovation & technology class on the flash drive, and we've researched much online, but there is little information as to when they first were commonly used.

If you don't mind, could you help us out by letting us know when (year) you first used a flash drive, and the type of place you purchased it? Was it at a large office supply store (like office max) or did you buy it online?

According to the articles we've read, the first flash drives were available around 2000.

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thx.

[strollin]

I'm a little hazy on the year but I believe it was 2001 and I bought it at a store (Fry's Electronics).

[Legodude522]

For a long time I wouldn't use flash drives. I just used SD cards and a portable USB card reader starting in 2004. I probably didn't even get any real flash drives until 2008.

[BK_123]

Yeah the same answer for me as well. I didn't start using a flash drive until 2008 and I cannot remember where I bought it from as I have had so many.

[ssc456]

I can't remember the date actually but i do remember that my first flash drive was a whopping 128Mb and set me back around £50 or so!!

But around a similar time i remember MP3 players coming out and i actually found a 128 Mb MP3 player for £35 lol so it was cheaper to get a flash drive with a built in media player and headphone port that's 128Mb than it was to just get a 128Mb flash drive.

[Dngrsone]

I bought a Kingston Traveller 512MB somewhere around 2004. I have replaced it under warranty four times (Flash memory having a limited number of writes). I still have it but rarely write to it anymore-- I have a Kingston 2GB drive and a newer 4GB drive now, which get all the writes... The 512MB drive has reference data I like to keep on me.