Japanese Company Buffalo Touts the World's Fastest USB Flash Drive

Although the most visible leaps forward in the area of flash memory in general and USB flash drives in particular are related to the available storage capacities, the transfer speeds are equally important, because, after all, what's the point of having a lot of GB if copying a large file takes forever? This is the reason why the Japanese company Buffalo has developed the SHD-U32GS, which, beside providing a whopping 32 GB of storage space, can also attain very high read speeds, of up to 36.8 Mb/s.

This is possible because the drive includes Buffalo's TurboUSB technology, which seriously improves the access speeds. Of course, this is mostly based on the company's own testing, so potential customers should take it with a grain of salt. However, since the company's previous 16 GB version seems to have proven its worth, chances are that this model will do the same.

The model does offer some other interesting features, the most important being the fact that it is "seen" by the host computer's operating system as a fixed drive, which means that it can also be used for storing files larger than 4 GB (not that uncommon nowadays).

Furthermore, like most other modern USB flash drives, Buffalo's SHD-U32GS comes packed with a few very useful software applications, the most important being the "Secure LOCK Mobile", which allows users to password protect certain files (or partitions altogether, because the drive can be very easily partitioned). The drive can also double as a PC Lock, namely a hardware "access key" that allows the user to "lock" a computer much like they would do a car or house.

The new ultra-fast drive from Buffalo will retail for around 286 US dollars, which is a pretty high price to pay for such a thing, but, then again, latest-gen technology does come at a price.

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