Why are Flash Drive Storage Less Than Advertised

This very interesting point from Patrick Marhsall of the Seattle Times explains why the actual storage space is actually less than indicated on the box. The first point is that some flash drives have software inside like the U3. Another is that because of the different storage architecture used by the manufacturers.

"Devices may also use different storage architecture and file systems, which will result in more or less overhead for file storage. These choices may also result in different performance levels, as will the type of controller chip being used in the flash drive and the number and size of storage chips."

Source:Flash-memory devices don't always have same innards

Technorati tags: Flash Drive / USB Drive / Storage / U3