Portable digital devices like flash drive and compact drive has increased dramatically. Digital Cameras, camcorders, mp3 players, PDA list is ever growing. As the internet bandwidth improves, we are now looking for devices which can not only hold huge amount of data but also can be carried right in our pocket. This can be flash based or compact regular hard disk. The most common of them is flash drive but they suffer is limitation on GB’s. External Hard disk is another good option but portability is an issue in it. Which is why people are turning to Micro drives.

What is a Micro drive ?

Choosing a Microdrive

Micro drive is an in-between solution. It is compact as flash drive and capacity is of regular hard disk.Micro drives are designed to fit into CompactFlash Type2 slots and some with capacities. starting from 1GB. They have data transfer rate around 4.2 to 7.9MBps and size of 1.7 x 1.4 x 0,19 ( inches).Today the leading player in this include Hitachi, Seagate and Western Digital. They come in both flash based and hard drive based.

How to choose ?

• Choose a Hard Drive based micro drive. They give advantage of higher speed over flash drive with same portability.
• Choose a micro drive with usb connectivity or direct pluggable.
• Choose for more space with less price but don’t compromise with too much with quality.
• Choose a micro drive with capacity over 2 Gb. They give a better capacity to price ratio than flash drive if you buy over 2GB.

Draw Backs:

• Sensitive to physical shocks and temperature variations.
• Consume more power than flash based drives.
• They are not designed to work on high altitudes, so if you are going work on air go for a flash drive.

This can be good deal if bought smartly. It can be very useful for It professionals and Music lovers who want to carry music any time anywhere and store right away when they download. Nothing like it.