The Flash Voyager Mini line of USB flash cards from Corsair Memory has been around for a few months without much ado on its release. After all, a flash card is a flash card is a flash card, right? Au contraire! This particular line of cards has a 4 GB model and an 8 GB model to hold all your data and then some!
The Mini is significantly smaller than your typical flash drive considering how much data it’s capable of storing. It’s less than half the size of a typical flash drive such as a Verbatim Store ‘n’ Go but just a hair larger than a Kingston microSD. It weighs just 5.4 grams and is just under 1.5 inches long. The Mini also has an all rubber casing for added protection from moisture and shock.
The Voyager Mini 4 GB version (PN CMFUSBMINI-4GB) and the 8 GB version (PN CMFUSBMINI-8GB) both come with a 10 Year Limited Warranty. If they fail, well you won’t get your stuff back but you will at least get a new drive for your trouble.
Corsair went with a capless design, which is nice. You just pop the USB connector out using your thumb. As a downside, however, there is no activity light on the drive so you don’t really know what’s going on. You’ll have to be careful so you don’t lose data by pulling the drive too early while transferring data.
Another downside to the Mini is the groove in the bottom side allowing a view of the “inner workings,” not that there are any. The problem is, all the lint, fuzz, hard candy ooze and anything else in your pocket winds up in your drive.
Performance-wise, the Minis aren’t exactly speed demons. But that’s not really their fault. They were designed for size not performance. 4 GB Read speeds on the 256KB test were around 17 MB/sec and write speeds a drab 5 MB/sec. The 8 GB was a bit slower.
The 4 GB Mini performed slightly better on the 64 MB test. On the other hand, the 8 GB Mini shined on the 64 MB test at 31 MB/sec read and 9 MB/sec write. On the up side, you’re not going to be using these to play WoW on, right? In real world, this translates into a few seconds longer waiting for data to load. No big deal.
Overall, the Corsair Voyager Mini series is a great pair of high volume USB flash drives. The performance was a bit anemic but all in all not that bad. The 4GB version will set you back around $20 and the 8 GB roughly twice that so even the price won’t take food off the table. They support Windows Me, 2000, XP and Vista. They also support Linux as well as Mac OS 9 and up so they should work for just about everyone.
If you have need for a high volume flash drive in an extremely compact size, the Voyager Mini series is made just for you!!