ATP ToughDrive 1GB

Performance:

After the testing was complete with the ATP ToughDrive, we proceeded to our water-dunking test to see its water resiliency and luckily, it was not our first device to fail. After keeping the ToughDrive 1GB saturated in a glass of water for nearly 30 minutes we were impressed to see no damage had occurred.

For our read and write testing, we had used the following Linux system listed below.

As usual, we went with using hdparm to run the read benchmarks on the drive with the -t parameter for timed disk reads. Due to some inconsistencies during our write testing on the ASRock + SuSE system with the various drives, with the usual single and multiple file copy, our official results were omitted although the flash media's write speeds with the flash drives remained in the same positions as our other tests. For reference, with the write testing for real-world results the Linux time command was used to record the length of time required to transfer a 104.5MB file from the internal hard drive over to the USB 2.0 flash media. To establish redundant multiple file copies we measured the time to transfer 106.2MB worth of 135 JPG picture files. As with all of our benchmarks, we ran each benchmark three times and then recorded the average of the results. The other flash media devices we used to compare the ATP ToughDrive 1GB was of course the Corsair Flash Voyager 512MB and OCZ Rally 2GB as well as a Transcend JetFlash 110 1GB unit. Below are our results.

Conclusion:

When our results had wrapped up for testing the ToughDrive 1GB along with the three other drives used for comparison, we were simply in awe at the capabilities of this flash media device that came from ATP. ATP Electronics has over 14 years of experience in the manufacturing of memory products, mainly focused upon the server environment as well as various flash media formats, but when receiving the ToughDrive we could have never dreamed that the device could actually slaughter the Corsair Flash Voyager with its read and write speeds. Our Linux hdparm tests yielded speeds of 26.42MB/s average, while ATP has designed the device for 30MB/s operation, thus making the drive a sharp 6MB/s faster than the Flash Voyager while it fell short of the OCZ Rally by a mere 2MB/s. For further comparison, the ATP ToughDrive was over twice as fast as the Transcend JetFlash with the same memory capacity. Our write tests also yielded similar results clear across the board. In addition to its competitive level of performance, the drive is certainly durable with its rubber housing and is waterproof while also passing the Phoronix test. At approximately $80 USD for the 1GB model, the device is also along the cheaper end when it comes to portable flash devices. Not only is ATP AF1GUFT1BK tough when it comes to its build quality but is most certainly tough for some of its competition to beat.

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