Just in case you’ve never used a USB flash drive (sometimes called thumb drives or jump drives), I’m here to encourage you to do so. You can pick one up with just a small amount of space for nearly free, and that might be a good way to start, but these days, flash drives come in sizes up to 32 Gigs, which is just huge. You can backup most, if not all, of your data on one of these tiny devices. Of course, there’s lots of other things you can do besides just storing files on a flash drive, so I thought I’d throw out a few suggestions, in case you were curious.

• Backup important data and carry it with you
• Transport data between computers (sneakernet). Great for syncing with laptop.
• Carry around computer repair and antivirus programs to fix friend’s computers
• Store rescue/recovery data for pc
• Boot a tiny OS (operating system) such as PuppyLinux
• Run microversions of applications such as Firefox, Trillian, Opera and OpenOffice
• Music/videos/photo storage. Take your entertainment with you.
• Use it as RAM to speed up Windows Vista (ReadyBoost)
• Encrypt sensitive data with programs such as TrueCrypt
• Carry your passwords around securely with something like Keepass

I’m using an 8-Gig flash drive for most of my needs, but I’m going to be buying a 32-gig drive soon. It will be my backup drive so I never have to worry about losing all my important stuff in a hard drive crash, or a fire or a hurricane or a tornado or a flood or any other kind of disaster. I usually buy these from Amazon because there are always good deals to be found there. Here’s a couple I found today.

These little 1-giggers are great for moving files around from one computer to another. Your roomie’s laptop isn’t connecting up to your network for some reason? No big deal, just throw that file on one of these babies and hand it to him. I mean, they are so cheap, they’re almost free, so might as well have a few on hand.

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Now these 8-gig flash drives are what I use a lot. These have enough storage space to hold all my music and photos. These are files that I want with me wherever I go. This is my “personal” stuff.

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Finally, these ginormous 32-gig usb drives are just amazing. I can fit just about every bit of data I own onto just one of these tiny gadgets. This one is on my wishlist for Christmas. I’m not sure I can wait till then, though. I’m dying to get one now!

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