Customer Reviews

Ativa High-Speed USB 2.0 Portable Flash Drive

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

After 2 evenings of computer crashes and frustration, I have figured out how to make this junk work in my computer. My bottom line advice: do not buy thius USB flash drive from Ativa.

When you first insert this thing, it will give you many screens, warnings, etc. If you try to use any of these, the USB will automatically call up IE to talk to a website. Why, I do not know. The computer I used it in has IE disabled and is not hooked up to the internet. So, every time the USB called up IE, the computer froze, needing a warm re-start.

You are more or less obligated to access the USB via the supplied interface. This 'security inteface' is really cleverly disguised ad-ware. It will give you many warnings about security and functional deficiencies, and invite you to 'sign-up' to improve the 'free' included security applications via website and credit card. At first, I assumed that this flash drive had infected my PC with a virus, Trojan Horse, etc. Since I was not able to simply use the flash drive memory.

I finally figured out how to make this flash drive work, but my advice is to not buy it, even if it is offered at a deep discount.

The memory is a half gig, but the 'free' applications suck up 100 megs, so what you end up with is only 400M. So, when you are thinking of buying this, keep in mind that it is really only 50% more memory than a 256M flash drive.

Technical note: I tried to simply delete the 'free' applications to free up memory, like I routinely do to Sandisk flash drives. This Ativa, however, would not let me do this. As far as I can tell, it comes from the factory already partitioned into 2 different drives: a 400M one for your memory use, and a 100M partition where the chip stores its 'free' security applications. When you insert this USB flash drive, it automatically creates a virtual CD-Rom device where the Ativa stores it's 'free' software. I am a power user, but have no knowledge of partitioning, so could not undo this memory-wasting partition to get my full money's worth (not exactly true: I opened up Device Manager, clicked on the fake CD-ROM icon, and right-clicked and checked a box that said 'do not use this device', and then immediately went to the drive and deleted the programs in the root; I have since been able to use all the memory with none of those security warnings / interfaces / nag screens).

Modus Vivendi
I learned that when you first insert it, you will get 3 warnings and boxes telling you about problems, deficiencies, begging you to click on one of them. Just ignore them and think of them as the traditional 'nag' screens and either ignore them, or close them via task bar, upper right X button, or control panel. Open up Windows Explorer, and simply start using it, ignoring all the screens and warnings.

Now that I have trained this bad dog to behave more or less correctly, these are my thoughts. I usually use Sandisk. I miss the happy, warm, fuzzy, green LED that tells me what the flash drive is up to. The Ativa has a small, red LED that is usually off, and in a phyiscal position (side of the drive rather than the visible edge) so I cannot see it in action, so it is hard to tell what the Ativa is up to just by looking at the light. Like the sandisk, it has the happy habit of occupying only one USB port due to its small size. I also appreciate that it has an integral cover, unlike the Sandisk that has an easy to lose plastic thing-a-ma-bob; you just pull, flip, push, and insert.

Postscript. I can attest to the fact that this flash drive has survived the proverbial trip through the washing machine and dryer. It still works, and seems to be none the less worse for wear.

The Ativa 8 gigabyte drive i just bought failed after just 1 use!!! All the data i had stored on it was irreplaceable. The drive crashed my computer and then now refuses to ever read again. This is the most awful experience i have ever had with a product, i'd return it but i'm still trying to recover my data somehow. NEVER BUY ATIVA PRODUCTS!!!!! THEY ARE COMPLETE GARBAGE!

'Bought this for my son right before school started. The very first time he used it, he found that it wouldn't save his documents once it was removed from the computer. 'Called the company to exchange it for one that wasn't defective and get this - they don't guarantee the quality of their flashdrives (NO WARRANTY AT ALL). They said to return it to the store within 14 day for a refund [too late for me :]. What kind of company doesn't guarantee the quality of their products? Stay away from this one!

This ATIVA flash drive (hereafter refered to as "the piece of crap") worked fine for approximately ONE WEEK. After that, whenever I put it in the USB port, I got some weird message about how the drivers had failed. I tried it on my high-speed computer at work and got the same result! This piece of crap isn't worth the $2 it probably cost to manufacture. I am still trying (several months later) to retrieve the pictures I had put on the drive, and nothing seems to work! I HATE THIS THING!!! Do NOT use it, even if you get it free. You'll just end up losing all your data and wasting hours trying to retrieve it... ATIVA SUCKS!! I will NEVER buy anything with their name on it ever again!

I find the cap storage feature of the drive to be very useful. I find the U3 feature anoying.

I had an Ativa drive in one USB port that I had previously removed the U3 software from it. I inserted a PNY drive in another USB port, hoping to remove the U3 stuff from it. After attempting to run the U3 uninstall program on the PNY, I find all of the data removed from Ativa drive and all of U3 stuff still on the PNY. I use flash drives to port data to FAT16 devices. Obviously, the U3 interfaces make the data transfers impossible.

U3 needs to make it's uninstall software more intelligent. If I choose to uninstall the software from one of the drives, it should ignore the drive's existence when I am trying to remove it's software from a drive that has it.

Maybe I should have rebooted my computer when I put the PNY drive in the slot, but I'm not sure that the rebooting would have solved the problem.

I lost all of the data off of the Ativa drive with no backup.

In the future, I will only buy drives from manufacturers that do not use the U3 system.

I received an Ativa 2GB MP3 player for XMAS and read the user manual first. There was no section on set up. It turns out you are supposed to insert this in a live PC USB port for the initial charge. Over a few weeks I tried 3 different PCs for different time periods. The MP3 never charged up. I eventually started checking blogs as well as the Ativa website. The blogs indicate numerous problem and their website is very limited and outdated. They are probably in Chapter 7 or 11 by now or maybe they just shut dowen until the heat disaptes. I think this is just a USA company that imports cheap Chinese knockup electronics. They must not even test them before they buy a batch. The only thing to do is try to return it. Ativa products are total junk, sold cheaply and it is amazing the box big stores dont yet realize this.

The previous user/ reviewer is offering good information for all type of users. It's just worked fine with me, I'm running XP on my pc an used it at work on various operating systems. It's just doing what I expected to do and what's it's suppose to do. You have to know that these flash drives comes with additional utilities that try to show up and remind all type of users that it does exists on the drive purposely to help, or at least companies think they are to help all type of users programming it this way. I did not try to erase the U3 software on the drive yet, I'm sure if I want to erase it I will.

While I can understand a piece of hardware not working correctly (especially in the first 90 days), I have about 20 thumb drives in my computer bag. 2 Ativa 512's, 1 2gb Ativa, 1 8gb Ative, 8 kingstons, and a few others, mostly 2gb. I abuse the day lights out of these things, I use them for commercial work, so they are truly my job. I have never had any thumb drive fail until recently.. The Ativa 8gb failed last week 3/16/2011 after about 4 years of use, and I mean, 5 days a week for 4 years. This specific drive was my life and I forgot to back it up. Well I got 95% back with effort, so I am happy. Also, I have only stopped a device a dozen or so times in the last 5 or 6 years. I paid more for the 512 than I did for the 8gb. I push them in an pull them out.

My ativa 512 is set up to boot my customers computers and have been using this for over 5 years. The rest of my drives hold images of customers computers, typically 2-3gb files that are a single file.

What makes a good thumb drive, first a good name, Ativa,Kingston,are good names, a product that you trust as well as others trust, and these are additional items I have experienced as good to have - a cover that is part of the thumb drive and a lanyard.

Short of this 8gb Ativa that failed after 4 years, I love these things and will pay a bit more for an Ativa.

Ative done it again, they have the best portable flash drive in the market!