14 DAY TRIAL // USB On-the-Go is a technology that allows smartphones to act as host devices for flash drives, just like a PC or Wi-Fi hotspot would. Both the phone and the drive need to support it though, which is why Silicon Power made sure to include OTG in the name of the description of the new Mobile X20.
Mobile X20 has a micro USB port on one side (covered by a black cap) and the full-size Universal Serial Bus on the other.
Notice how the grey end fits precisely in a USB connector. No doubt, Silicon power would have gone with total simplicity if it didn't have to worry about buyers potentially losing the cap on the micro port.
Silicon Power calls it the “specialized anti-lost cap design,” but we're fairly certain that the resistance to water and vibration will rank higher in terms of importance on the lists of features that buyers are looking for.
Also, the flash drive is very small thanks to the COB (Chip-on-board) technology, which allows 8 GB, 16 GB and even 32 GB to be crammed in a very small space.
It's like having a memory card shaped like a USB device, but not quite. Memory cards are thin and not limited by the throughput of the interface.
Speaking of which, USB 3.0 technology doesn't come in micro-USB form factor, so we still have to make do with USB 2.0.
That means that the top speed is of 480 Mbps, a tenth of what USB 3.0 can accomplish (4.5 / 5 Gbps as it were). Of course, USB 1.1 is backwards-compatible as well.
Since we're on the subject of compatibility, we may as well specify the supported operating systems as well. We have Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8 on the PC side (presumably Windows 8.1 as well), and Mac OS 10.3.x on the Apple side.
Linux 2.6.x implementations are part of the list as well. It would be strange for the drives to be invisible to such systems and servers after all.
So we suppose that the Mobile X20 USB OTG drives from Silicon Power are pretty much universally compatible.
Finally, the newcomers (made of metal, plastic and rubber in case you were wondering) are compatible with smartphones running Android 4.1.X or the Windows Phone 8 OS.
The Silicon Power Mobile X20 is CE/FCC/BSMI/Green dot/WEEE/RoHS/KCC certified and ships with a lifetime warranty (product lifetime, until it's “replaced” by a new generation, so probably 1-3 years). No prices are known though.