Review: Corsair Flash Survivor 32GB

So I just got the Corsair Flash Survivor in 32GB capacity (Shows as 30.2GB in Windows) which debuted at CES 2008 in Las Vegas, NV. It retails for about $180 from mwave.com It comes packaged with Corsair dog-tags and a 3 inch USB extension cord. The Survivor is aptly named because of its sheer ruggedness and supposed invincibility.

The drive is a hell of a lot smaller than a portable hard drive of the same capacity, but bigger than a normal flash drive. I was telling some friends of mine about the Corsair Survivor and how the first computer my wife and I bought as a couple only had a 20GB Hard drive. It’s amazing how this drive sizes up to that of a standard IDE drive. Of course, Corsair does make a 32GB Voyager that’s “normal” sized. I will have a review of the Corsair Voyager 16GB coming soon.

The Survivor is cased in aluminum and is supposedly waterproof. The rim has a rubber seal which keeps everything dry inside, or so we’ll see. Corsair even claims that their rugged product can even “survive” depths of 200 meters (600 feet)!

The drive inside has to be unscrewed from the casing to access the USB stick inside. I thought it took too many turns to unscrew it.

I’d like to do a basic review, but here’s my chance to shine, I’m going to torture it! The first of many tests start at loading data. I often see product reviewers who give specs out by the millisecond, but that never means anything to me.

I loaded my music library of 1669 MP3’s (5.83GB) from my C: drive to the Survivor. It took 19 minutes and 33 seconds, but only 36 seconds to delete them. Then I transferred all 3,072 pictures (478MB) I have for every mod I’ve ever done or thought of doing to the drive as individual files, not zipped. It took 83 seconds, which is 37.58 seconds per MB. Obviously if the drive is doing more than a few MB at a time it’s going to take longer. Case in point: transferring all of my 4074 fonts totaling 109MB only took 14 seconds; which is 7.78 seconds per MB.

The torture session was next. I had 13.7GB worth of data on the drive and HAD to test its ability to retain my data under extraordinary circumstances. First, I ran the Survivor over with my car a few times without a scratch.

The problem with this test is that not all the weight of the car is on the drive. Figure one tire holds approximately ¼ of the car’s total weight. That weight is distributed over the entire width of the tire. The flash drive is only an inch or so wide and round, where it gets its most distinct advantage. The shape, just like Roman arch, spreads the weight around the entire exposed surface minimizing the load and maximizing the chance that this test means nothing.

I then boiled the Survivor for a good 15 minutes and met the same fate. My final test was to freeze the drive in a block of water, then thaw it out and test the drive again. What do you think was the fate this time?

IT PASSED.

So what’s my opinion? The Corsair Flash Survivor is a pretty nice drive. It’s the smallest 32GB drive I’ve ever seen and it’s definitely the toughest. Is it Unbreakable? I’d love to drop it from a plane or pound it with a sledgehammer, but I don’t have these options available to me. Maybe when the 64GB drive comes out, I will.

Pros:
• 32GB in my pocket in about the size of a flash drive
• Faster than a portable hard drive
• Water, cold, heat proof
• Tough as nails


Cons:
• A bit bigger than a standard thumb drive
• Unscrewing it takes a few too many turns?


Rating: 9 out of 10

What? You didn't strap a stick of dynamite to it?? Psh, so much for being thorough! :D

+rep for the sweet review - god knows I wouldn't of risked being out almost two hundred dollars!

I would think, while this review was awesome, that I wouldn't even try that with something that costs almost $200.
+rep for the stones

+rep indeed. Warranty probably covers all that hey? :D

good review... tho i can't believe you don't have a hammer. come on... give it a whack... you know you wanna :)

+rep

I read another review of the Corsair Survivor @ 8GB and they did whack it with a sledge hammer with no effect on the drive