Customer Reviews

SanDisk SDCZ3-1024-A10 Cruzer Titanium 1GB USB 2.0 (Retail Package)

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(42)

 

 

PROS:

Rugged - This is the only flash drive I know that can survive a year attached to my keychain. After I got my new 1GB model, I tested my old 256MB model by stomping on it, and it wasn't even damaged.

No cap - The USB connecter slides out (somewhat like a ball point pen). This is a great feature, and I will never buy a flash drive with a cap again.


CONS:

Locking mechanism - The USB connecter slides out and locks in place. On my 256MB model, the locking mechanism gradually wore out. After about a year, I couldn't plug in my old flash drive without firmly holding the slider in place. A coworker has the same problem. From the look and feel, I think that the 1GB model has the same locking mechanism.

Ring that attaches to drive - the tiny 1 cm ring that attaches the drive to the lanyard or keychain is flimsy. It stretched apart when I was idly swinging my keychain.


HINT:

Remove the clip from the lanyard, and attach it directly to the flash drive. Now you can clip the drive to your key chain when you aren't using it.

Got the 1 GB Titanium Cruzer a week ago and so far it is better than I expected. I found the ring easy to attach (took less than 30 seconds and without scratching the exterior) and it doesn't seem flimsy to me and shouldn't unwind unless you chronically put tension on it. The good thing is that unlike drives with a flimsy plastic loop, the Titanium's attachment is metal and seems solid.

The sliding mechanism also appears to be very solid. It's my first one, but you have to put significant pressure to release the sliding mechanism to extend or retract the USB connector. There is also a nice neck strap with a clip that attaches to the ring you put on the drive.

Drive works well and transfers files quickly (although the Lexar Lightning is significantly faster). Very satisfied so far.

Quick update: Failed a third time, upon receipt. Total functionality, zero seconds. Wound up forcing SanDisk to replace the drive with another model. By company policy, replacement was worth half the retail I paid for the Cruzer... So all told, the score was three failed drives, one working drive worth half what I paid for it, repeated data loss, and much frustration.

Do NOT purchase this model!

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I purchased a SanDisk Titanium Cruzer 1.0 GB drive while working in the Gulf of Mexico doing Hurricane Katrina/Rita relief operations. It lasted three days, and then no computer could recognize it as a 'known device.' (It was fine until then.) Since I'm extremely careful to safely remove USB devices, and the feature which led me to buy the drive in the first place was the sliding connector, I figured it was a mechanical failure and simply replaced the device.

The new drive, identical to the first, functioned well until late December - when it did exactly what the first drive did. I plug it into a USB port (doesn't matter 1.1 or 2.0), the OS (Windows XP) decides it has malfunctioned - and poof! No drive, no data.

So far, SanDisk tech support has had me jump through hoops trying to figure out if it's the operating system that is at fault. Given that I have checked the device on both my workstation and my laptop and received the same results, it's fairly certain that it's not my computers or software which have failed.

Looking over the various reviews of this product, and the customer feedback, it appears that I'm not the only user to suffer this type of complete, abrupt and total failure. Hopefully, SanDisk will replace the drive with a better model - and I'll just run the risk of losing the cap.

I strongly recommend against purchasing this USB drive until SanDisk fixes the design problems. But I'll admit - the size of the drive, the case... I like them so well I will probably be among the first to buy one when they DO fix it!

We bought 3 of these 1G Titanium Cruzers. They looked rugged and had fast transfer, but by the end of the 4th week of using them, all three were either not functioning at all or working itermitently (USB device not working properly errors). Perhaps this was a bad batch, but beware. Also the shell was supposedly rugged, but one got bumped when it was in the computer and after that when the USB connecter slid fully into the main casing it would jam and not slide out of the casing again unless you got something to wiggle the USB connector.

Don't be fooled by SanDisk's claims of indestructibility for this "Titanium" Cruzer model. It may be able to withstand a crushing force of 2,000 pounds, but it was no match for a simple jolt of household static electricity, which fried the product within three weeks of my purchasing it, causing me to permanently lose all of my data (which of course I had not backed up). Data recovery services were unable to get the drive to light up or recover my data - they can only assist in "undeleting" deleted files, if the drive will actually mount. The static electricity prevented the drive from ever being mountable again.

I'm quite disappointed with SanDisk's response to the problem when I called. In my experience, their products are generally high quality and their tech support is good. But not in the case of this cursed model of Titanium Cruzer. I wish I'd read some of the online reviews before purchasing this model -- tons of people are having this same problem and poor response from SanDisk.

SanDisk Tech Support was only willing to replace the unit with the exact same defective model -- which is totally unethical, in my opinion, given the numbers of anecdotal reports I see with people having the exact same problem I had. SanDisk was not willing to replace my defective Titanium model (SDCZ3-1024-A10) with the newer Titanium model (SDCZ7-1024-A1) that has a safer plastic casing and U3 technology.

SanDisk - if you're reading this - are you sure you're willing to risk your reputation on your miserable handling of this situation?

Consumers, please, do yourself a favor and stay away from this model and buy the newer one with a safer plastic housing and U3 technology. Otherwise, your data will be at risk of permanent loss with a simple zap of static eletricity.

I have had some smaller usb flash drives and different brands, but this past weekend when I needed to put a full size CD ISO on my smaller thumb drive, I knew it was time for an upgrade that had more space. I was somewhat hesitant to get this model, not knowing how it would work with linux. Between all of the machines I bounce around to, I didn't want to have to worry about manually configuring drivers for each. I am happy to report, that when plugged into my Dell 600m laptop running Redhat's Fedora 3 (fc3) it was immediately recognized and the kernel (2.6.12-1.1372_FC3) loaded all necessary drivers. I have not tried it on other versions of linux yet, but so far, so good.

Although I had no trouble with the 512k version, BOTH the originally purchased 1GB unit AND the replacement obtained (after much nonsensical folderol evidently designed only to discourage returns of defective merchandise) failed without warning within a few months' use. The company has refused to issue a credit or reimbursement, but did offer to provide a third unit without going through the previous completely illogical "diagnostic" procedures.

My first 1G titanium flash drive failed in less than a month. The replacement failed in less than two weeks.

I bought this drive based on the slick case, the reliability of my Sandisk 256M flash drive (still works great!) and a recent tech review on fast flash drives.

Like other consumers in this group, my drive failed to be recognized by the PC after a very short time. I'm shocked that Sandisk hasn't resolved the issue. I'm annoyed that I paid a premium for a product that turned out to be total garbage.

The Sandisk RMA procedure looks more professional than the execution. Replacements took months. Sandisk's customer support is terrible.

Simply put, the SanDisk Cruzer Titanium is an unreliable memory stick that has failed to work on countless occasions, and I will definitely not buy another one in the future.

I have spent the past 18 months working in Central Asia, a place where memory sticks are the most common way to transfer computer files. Most of my co-workers have cheaply-made Chinese memory sticks that cost about US$10, and some have their own that they bought in the US, Europe, or Dubai. I, however, bought a SanDisk Cruzer Titanium while in the US, thinking that it would be able to handle the rugged environment and would be a more durable,long-lasting alternative. I was wrong.

My SanDisk Cruzer Titanium is not recognized by computers about 90% of the time. It often takes more than 20 attempts, pulling out the stick and reinserting it again, before computers can finally access the files inside. I have tested it on at least 50 computers and these failures occur on every one of them, both PC and Mac. Sometimes it's simply impossible to access files, and I have to try again after 10 minutes or so.

Not once have I ever had a problem with one of the cheap Chinese sticks or the other US-purchased memory sticks owned by colleagues, however. My problems are unique to the SanDisk Cruzer Titanium. I should note that I have never installed or used the encryption software that came with the memory stick, and that the software does not appear to have any relation to the problems associated with the memory stick.

I have no idea what is wrong with my SanDisk Cruzer, and I don't particularly care. All I know is that my SanDisk Cruzer Titanium is an inferior product, and that I could have been spent 1/8 of the price to get a more reliable memory stick. This is my first and last SanDisk Cruzer Titanium.

I have been using my 2GB SanDisk Titanium for only a few months. It was working fine and literally a second later it was no longer working. It won't work on any computer. I have lost the most recent version of several articles, some of the lectures for my classes, and on and on....I am furious. How can I recover the data????