I remember when I got my first computer and I took computer classes to learn how to use it. The teacher told us to buy a floppy disk to save our work. The floppy disc only had the capacity to load 1.44 MB. When the first flash drive came out I bought a 64 MB and I was so happy about it.
Lol my first computer had a 10Mb HDD and 256kb of RAM, I guess we are both showing our age, I did a course on word processing and think I was in the first year of high school where typing wasn't offered, at about, I think, year 8 (14yo). 5.25" floppy disk was by then the norm, the 3.5" 1.44Mb didn't come out until I was in my 20's! I pity kids of today who really don't live through much in the way of invention, mostly just upgrades to old inventions.
@@KrazeeKraftZ WOW! first computer was amazing compared to mine, which had 32K (not megabytes) of RAM… NO hard drive and a cassette tape to save your data to. 😝
One thing for sure. No one can put ransomware on a flash drive whenever it is unplugged. My preference is external hard drives to back up my important files like photos and other critical files.
Exactly. My banking accounts information, various subscriptions usernames and passwords, etc, are stored in a flash drive. If/when I need to retrieve them, the drive is read in a non-networked computer.
My preference is 2TB Buffalo drives per PC and phone. Easy and safe. I really cannot understand ppl putting their important files onto a network managed by other ppl. Crazy.
No such thing as In the olden days, USB DRIVES ARE THE BLEEDING EDGE OF TECHNOLOGY. USB , hard disk , SSD , memory cards are great storage mediums. With their own practical use case. A cloud is someone else's computer. Don't let them own you.
Agreed. I didn't agree with them being obsolete. Because of the cloud? some people like having data saved and stored on a small, incredibly portable device. It doesn't get any easier or more compact. No internet connection, no Google sign in. Just raw data organized and ready to go.
I've worked in IT for over 20 years and when seeing videos like this I hope to find at least one morsel of information that can actually be useful to users. OMG this video is one of those diamonds in the rough. 5 actual things of value that is not just clickbait. Excellent set of 5 functional options for old flash drives. Cheers Mate!
"I've worked in IT for over 20 years" Which of these things did you not know about? Let's be honest, any use the involves using the drive exactly as intended such as storing files, is literally what the drives are for.
@@Twirlip2 You are correct. It's tiresome and bothersome dealing with nitwits like you. I'll just presume all of these ideas are new to you as well as to @Whelp, There it is, despite most of them being the exact purpose of the flash drives from the very start. Oh well. "Excellent set of 5 functional options for old flash drives." LOL
I have been using these drives for years to play music in my vehicles, they work better than satellite radio (no commercials and higher quality and no subscription) plus you can put a lot of music way more than you ever could with a CD (at the highest quality setting). I also use some for portable apps but for those I mostly use a regular portable drive (they are small enough and not expensive anymore unless you get over 2 TB solid state that is).
@@salcanzonieri Ford vehicles have 2 USB ports, I just upload my music in mp3 format to the drive, plug it to the truck and select it as the audio source.
I hardly ever use cloud files (except at work) and with flash drives memory getting larger and larger, basically I treat them as a small, compact easy-to-carry additional portable hard drives. Thanks for the hints. Some of them are reallu useful. :-)
@@josephcontreras8930 yeah it’s getting pretty crazy for sure. storage capacity growth appears to be outpacing the average size that games tend to be by a wide margin. So like in my above illustration, before long a console player could bring every digital game they own to play at a friends house on their key ring
@@-_James_- I use my phone for that same but I guess that having on a extra USB drive is just a extra level of security in case your phone is unavailable
I was just surfing around and I found your channel. What a godsend you are! Every single thing that you discuss in every single one of your sites is exactly what i need!!! Thank you so much!! LIKED, SHARED, SUBSCRIBED, AND NOTIFICATION IS ON!!
An advanced option is to create a variety of restore drives with the thumb drives. That can include a variety of repair and optimization utilities that are usually included.
I use flash drives all the time have all kinds of stuff backed up on them. I've never used "cloud" in my life. When you do, you give tech oligarchs that much more control. I've even heard of people who found controversial content removed from their cloud storage. Not sure if that's true but it's pretty bad if it is.
@@theresajurrus6307 You might be able to. I'm not that up on E books but it's probably just text so likely it wouldn't take up much space. If the book is heavy on illustrations it'll take up more space. You can get some pretty beefy flash drives though. An E book might have some kind of copyright nonsense on it , not sure, but space wise I think you could do it.
@@theresajurrus6307 You can store them on the flash drive. You have to download them to your computer [by opening them with the appropriate app] then simply copy the file to the flash drive. You might not be able to read them from the flash drive. You may have to copy them into the device you want to read them on. Possibly, a portable reader app on the flash drive would make it possible to read them from directly from the drive.
Yes regardless of Carbonite and Drive, I have all my PowerPoints (the core of my business) on a flash drive, especially the morning of a big webinar if I am gong to suffer from Windows 10 Disease at the last moment.
First of all ... new sub here. Secondly, this was one of the most useful videos I've seen in quite a while ... you managed to provide a huge amount of outstanding and useful information at a pace that even kept my attention from start to finish. So many content providers could really learn a lot from your format, presentation and content. Thanks much for what you do!! Cheers ...
I knew most of this, but this was great and reminds me what I can do. I have a Kingston Data Traveler Drive made of metal with a keyring hole and is very compact.
You should have mentioned ventoy. With ventoy, you don't need to format the disk over and over, you just need to copy the ISO/WIM/IMG/VHD(x)/EFI files to the USB drive and boot them directly.
That is true, and pretty much works, though you do need to format the drive at least once to install ventoy into it, then copy whatever you need (OS installs, personal files, etc). I've had people just not try ventoy cuz you still have to format at least once. BUT - for some niche or otherwise a bit more specific operating systems, by my testing it doesn't really work flawlessly. I tried android x86 iso on it, and basically it just straight up barely functioned, and installing it directly was a no go since it didn't even recognize other drives besides the usb the iso was on. Otherwise windows just works, most (at least more popular) linux distros work, so I doubt it is any trouble.
Appreciate the note about Ventoy (not ventoy). I'll check it. I've been using WinSetupFromUSB for mmmany years and it's really cool because it allows many ISOs also, but differently.
Update: Hmm, Ventoy seems to not function so well with ISOs that have been modified. So, if you rebuild Windows 7 or 11...this might fail for you - currently. It did for me. I hope that's changed, as Ventoy is a great idea.
Flash drives are still awesome. The Cloud isn't as fast as a flash drive, and you're also not always going to be able to have access to a reliable internet connection that allows you to access the Cloud.
I love USB Flash Drives. Many of my friends keep telling me to stop using them and start using the Cloud. Not sure why they care what I use but I just ignored them. Now I can hit them with the info from this video! Lol. While watching this video I immediately became a fan. Thank you so much!! Looking forward in exploring your other videos. Take care.
Your friends, our friends, and loved ones have been programmed to use the cloud. It is convenient but mental to not have your data backed up and in your possession (IMO). Flash Drives should never be seen as outdated anytime soon.
The cloud is pretty neat but you'd have to be an idiot to rely on it and put everything on there, personally i use it to keep non sensitive stuff that i may need to access when away from home. Probably one advantage cloud has over local storage (other than ease of access) is for local disasters like flooding or your house burning down where all your hardrives and usb sticks may be destroyed, but thats still less of a risk than simply keeping everything on the cloud
Hiren's has saved my family's photos when my siblings accidentally them. I downloaded Hiren onto my USB and easily recovered the files from the parents' laptop. It runs so well even on a slow, old USB.
😃 Thank you Liron Segev! You are a strong and professional communicator sir! You gave us 5 priceless tips under five minutes! Wow- No deadwood in your presentation. Plus you provide great visuals; slides, clips and websites to acquire various apps or downloads. Outstanding! Thank you! Well done!
I don't even use cloud except for dumping my eBooks, projecr files over there. Staying dependent on cloud means staying completely at the mercy of big tech, hackers, solar fares or grid failure by enemy sabotage or lack of maintenance. USB is certainly the best balance between reliable and sizeable storage and portability. No one can replace USB easily.
I've done all those things and more, but there's something nostalgic about seeing people talk about things that can be done with flash drives and I like seeing the word get out about Hiren's, Tails, etc. Reminds me of when I used to do those things on optical media like DVDs and CDs, and then going even further back to doing it with floppy disks. The tools were very different back then (for example, Tails and Hiren's didn't even exist back then), but the spirit of what removable storage can be used for really hasn't changed much since the beginning. :)
About three years ago I found a box in my basement with an Iomega zip drive and about a dozen cartridge/discs. I was tempted to see if I could still plug it in and use it without any special drivers or software. It was next to the box where I store my old DVD burner with the lightscribe label writing feature. Lol.
@@PhilLesh69 lol, I remember the ZIP drive very well. I used the external models and the internal models that would mount inside the case. Between the two, I remember the external one more because it was blue and sat on top in plain view. I remember the special drivers including a special icon for the drive in Windows too. It's been a long time since 100MB was a decent amount of space for a removable disk. I also remember lightscribe labels, but never really used them all that much. I normally just got out the sharpie to label the discs but I did sometimes get printable labels and use them too. Thinking about the crazy word art and lame backgrounds I would put on those things takes me back. lol
Haha, I remember getting one of the first flash drives like 128 mb or less then months later I saw one being used in a Bond or similar move and as Hollywood does making a really big deal about it, like wawa wooeeee Look what we have and you don't. And I was like pfft, lame! I've got a few of these in my vehicle and at home.
I just found all three types of Iomega Zip and Syquest drives and disks in an old leather computer bag in the back of my closet! All unused! Off to eBay!
Please do a video on how to set up a flash drive to do each of the things you stated in this video. For example, should tails be installed on every flash drive? Can hirens be installed on a flash drive with anything else?
Usb drives can get compromised, they can get corrupted by a virus or just using them too long. I have a few that I can no longer use because they have years of usage
@@laurasteyn1939 sure that's also important, but there is also a time when there is no internet connection and you need to edit the important docs before printing it out to your teacher or lecturer or even your boss
I've got about 3 usb sticks with bootable linux distros that are bootable with persistence so I can always boot from them on other computers when I'm out and about or abroad. It's come in handy sometimes
Same here, only I have more!👍 Back when most Linux 32 bit ISO's would fit onto a CD, the 4GB sized ones were perfect for the job. Plus could install Windows 7 or Vista clean by creating media, no longer is 4GB large enough for this task any longer, need 8GB or larger. And by booting into memory, these USB sticks were MUCH faster than running on a PATA (or IDE) HDD. Anyway, want a Linux Mint (or your favorite distro) on the go? A 16GB USB stick is perfect for most & for those who still runs Puppy Linux, 4GB is a lot. This means one can run this on most ANY computer (fast boot & Secure Boot MUST be turned off & CSM enabled if UEFI based). Great thing, no matter who the PC belongs to, even if Windows is infected to the point of not being able to boot, your portable Linux distro will. This includes some rescue media designed to update & scan the hard drive or SSD. Have had only ONE USB drive go bad on me & that was a 16GB off brand model, still lasted 3-4 years. Have several SanDisk 4GB models that came long before SATA-1 drives for the masses, back when these were on promo for $5-6. Some has a useful utility to encrypt the drive, no added tools needed. Could be cleaned for other usage, just save the encryption exe. file (or download from the OEM) & ready to be reused for it's intended purpose again. BTW, can do the same thing with (most) SD/SDHC cards used in cameras, when inserted into a USB adapter. Backup or partition rescue media would easily load onto the 1GB SD cards which were standard for many digital cameras, after upgrading to a larger one.
I know just enough about computers to be "dangerous ". At least that is what I tell my friends. I was at one time fairly knowledgeable, when I was working & on the computer daily, mainly on MS word & Excell, sometimes PowerPoint, mostly Gmail, HATED OUTLOOK, Your videos are always informative. Always look forward to seeing them in my "in box" keep up the great work !!!
Liron I just love your videos man. So much great info with a very easy-to-understand rendering which makes each video really wonderful. Please keep them coming.
I still have my older flash drives too, while in college 15-years-ago I put all my material on my flash drive and can pull it up to this day:) Also, it's how I save all my passwords and usernames:) The flash drive.
@@utubestalker.dotcom You're right, but I thought about several years ago and have 3 drives with that info, and surely all 3 won't go bad at the same time? :) I hope not anyway, other than hand writing them down on paper, so long as no one knows where that paper is there can't be a safer place. Of course, I'm only thinking of another computer of sorts or the cloud.
Unfortunately, I did not know about Hiren's materials. Even so, when I had my most serious crash ever, I had to boot my Windows recovery from the USB drive that nice people encouraged me to make. This kept me from owning an expensive brick. Also, a trick about portable apps is to drag the whole thing onto the computer so it runs faster, then securely delete it later. Something I like with portable apps is that since they are only installed to their own folders, they can be kept on a hard drive if you simply don't want that software's full installation package. It's nice that many open source and freeware developers make portable versions, too.
Hiren's sounds a lot like XtraPC flash-drive. I bought one awhile back to fix my Mother's laptop, I think it boots a Lenox directory. The laptop"s boot drive was erased and wouldn't come on, the flash-drive worked, it allowed me access to the cmd. It still works today
>drag the whole thing onto the computer so it runs faster, then securely delete it later You can't be sure you're "securely deleting" stuff from someone else's computer. Even if it's your own there's no real guarantee you're really overwriting anything either. _"No, but this program says it overwrites three times brah!"_ No. Windows doesn't always listen, the filesystem doesn't listen, the hard drive even remaps (moves) sectors around secretly, there's no guarantee you're really overwriting anything.
Be careful about "finding" them. Sick people leave them laying around to find with a root virus to destroy or snoop your computer and phone home! Don't use it, or run it in a sandbox for a FULL wipe.
To add to what solarsynapse said, there are also devices that look like USB drives that destroy computers. They charge up on the power pins and then send a high voltage shock down the data pins, frying the CPU. There is hardware that protects from this, but it’s rare to find PC with it installed.
same, 10 years ago I found 8GB one in snow after winter and it worked for couple of years before it died, back then it was usuable space, but today 8GB is nothing :D
I worked in an office next door to Lafayette Square (in front of the white house) and used to see usb flash drives laying around all over the place. I even watched uniformed secret service officers stoop down and pick them up and pocket them. My boss and I were having a smoke in front of our building and he picked one up and we took it upstairs and connected it to an old pc we were about to shred the drive on and inspected it. It had canary tokens and all kinds of trojan/keylogging junk on it, and we traced an email connected to one of the tokens to a guy in toronto. We handed it over to the security at the federal appeals court next door because it looked like they were targeting a judge on the appellate court.
Absolutely love hiren, I keep it on my flashdrive that way I can solve most problems on the go, also have e2b which allows me to install oss straight from the drive ❤
I love using portableapps on my flash drive, my favorite use is for using Firefox while on work PC’s. I have my Bitwarden extension and Private Internet Access extension loaded so I can browse fairly privately and not worry about accidentally leaving my accounts logged in after I go home. One of the dumbest things people do on our work PCs IMO is allow chrome to save their password, I can’t tell you how many personal passwords and user names are stored on our work PC but it’s a lot. I try to tell them to use a password manager but they think that’s too difficult 😣
You can also use them for backing up files and storing them away. Likewise you can store a lot of music or video on them that you might no want to have cluttering up your phone but still want to carry around, say to play on your computer at work especially when your workplace doesn't want you to install anything on your work computer.
Don't throw them out or recycle them. I've never trusted or use the cloud I'm old school I like to handle a physical device to back up big files I've downloaded when my on board memory gets closr to capacity or organize my fave curated mp3 playlists, LPS, audio playlists/podcasts or organized pix to show to people. They're getting cheaper and more higher cap like Having a hard drive in your pocket. Great viddie sir!!
2:36 Well, if your machine won't even **power on** (ie. nothing happens when power button is pushed), check that it's plugged in (both ends), the PSU (power supply unit) rocker switch isn't OFF or the breaker hasn't tripped.
Haha, I came to the comments just to mention this and saw you caught it as well. He said "even if it won't turn on".... uh, yeah, don't think a USB boot disk is going to help you with that one, lol
Reminds me of setting up a PC for our boss to do his presentation at a conference. One of my co-workers, a self-proclaimed expert, couldn't get the machine to do anything, and kept announcing lots of obscure things that he should check. (I think that was mostly to impress the boss how much he knew about PCs.) I saw the power cord lying on the stage floor, so I plugged it in and, of course, the PC started up right away. My co-worker asked me in an astonished voice, "What did you do to fix it?" I said someone had given me some useful advice: "When there's a problem, look for horses, not zebras."
One of the nice things about running an alternative operating system off of a flash drive is you can go diskless. By diskless I mean you can literally remove your main PC storage device from the PC and leave it at home in your safe or safety deposit box. Someone steal your laptop? So what they can’t do jack with it. Also it’s a nice way to learn an alternative operating system such as the many distributions of Linux. First came Unix, then Linux, and finally Android. Think of the relationship between them as Grandfather, son, and Grandson. Also you can load a custom version of Linux that’s totally read only. It’s called a Live version. Back in the days of CDs, and DVDs they were called Live-CDs and Live-DVDs. You could launch programs from them but you couldn’t save anything anywhere. Now days you can boot directly from a USB device and use it either way, full boot or Live-USB boot. And don’t get me started on all the games you could possibly play. Get a Linux version of VLC and watch movies until you’re sick of them…
If keeping a flash drive on a keyring it's definitely worth getting one that can plug into both usb-a and usb-c, more and more laptops are becoming usb-c only and you will also be able to plug into most android smartphones too massively increasing the amount of devices you can access your files on. Also usb-c is way faster so you'll probably want to use it over usb-a anyway if its an option.
Usb-c isn't necessarily faster than usb-a, that's just a form factor. What really counts is whether it's USB-2.0 or USB-3.0 or higher. Type A can come in any speed. Type C usually is 3.0 standard or higher, but not always.
Always back up your data regardless of how it is stored. USB drives are great but from my experience they are not as reliable as your actual computer hard drive or an external hd. They do need to be reformatted from time to time and that means you will lose the data on the usb drive. I have always liked them for transferring small amounts of data or storing programs or playlists in mp3/mp4 format.
Exactly the comment I was looking for. This is what I fear because I just had a 256 gb SanDisk USB drive asking me to format it out of nowhere so I lost everything on it because there was no way to access the USB. I'm just glad it didn't have important photos.
well spotted. yes your completely correct. the life time of a magnetic hard drive is around double of a solid state drive like ssd ubs sd cards ect. the advantage of solid state drives is there speed.
Worth adding , for how cheap top end drives are now , don't keep formatting , formatting these are only like a VHS tape , over and over formatting,they'll fail when you really need it , I've got windows 11/10 always backed with a ISO ,GREAT TIPS MAN
What you do on the client side using incognito doesn't reflect what happens on the backend that you are being tracked. Your ISP keeps a permeant record of all your activity as they can see logs of every website you visited. They can see how much data you are using that may throttle your speeds. Your cellphone provider also keeps a permeant record of all data tracked as well all the way from the cell phone tower to the hub. Social media and major service providers carriers work closely with the intelligences agency's that call obtain records without a warrant. What you do online is being tracked. Your mobile phone is always listening and transmitting data regardless if its sitting on your desk with the screen off. There are hundreds of processes running in the background.
Wondering why your videos are low volume? I noticed in some others before this one. Is too bad we can't have everybody's video turn out the same volume to not be too low or too loud. As I watch through different videos I have to change the volume for each.
I also love local storage options such as these, but many entities don't want to access your SD cards or flash drives on their own systems because of viruses.
I remember them being invented. I also remember mainframes like the IBM System 7. That was when programmers were efficient because every single bit was valuable. Now software is mostly bloated garbage.
I'm old enough too remember floppies being everywhere and still being on every computer desk in racks and draws but never actually being used, they were obsolete and completely replaced by cd's when i was a kid but because so many were made they were still everywhere. Made great ninja stars
@@archygrey9093 Me too. In those days anyone with a computer must have had boxes of them. I also remember being able to buy blank ones at at store that sold any computer stuff. Now I don't know if anyone still makes them.
Before there were hard drives it was necessary to boot from a floppy after inserting it into the floppy disk drive. It was DOS. "Disk" Operating System.
Great info, especially the utilities. But . . . I have a medical alert flash drive that I have all of my medical data on. I thought it would be helpful to the medics in the event of an emergency. Well, they would not use it for fear of introducing a virus onto their device. Maybe that's changed these days, I don't know. It could prove this approach to be useless if one runs into the same situation. Anyway, thank you for the great advice! If nothing else, I can still donate them to help those whom are being censored. ✌
It would be safer to have a qr code, barcode or a short web url that links directly to your medical data on the cloud which is encrypted using a key that only authorized emergency responders can access. I just wrote a "back of the napkin business plan" for a lucrative medical technology business venture. Lol.
I thought the same immediately, and what I would do IF I was to carry medical information, is I would carry a computing device as well. For $30, you can get a portable music and video player, that works like a USB via a cable and has its own memory as well as a slot for a Micro SD card. Not a way to reuse you OLD sticks, but a great medical security tool. They can record speech, play txt files, mp3 music, and depending on the device like my Ruizu M8, also mp4 video without being ANY more expensive. However it may be difficult to know which device CAN play video. On the other hand, if you HAVE old USB media players, they typically CAN carry any kind of data, even if they only play music. Same is true for the internal memory of a digital camera, usually a detachable SD card, unless they utilize some very involved formatting. These might be helpful jsut as backup locations for you to preserve any useful information, in case your phone gets stolen for instance. Or, if you're unresponsive and unidentified, the police would get involved and the first thing they'd look is something like camera data, or a tiny 512 MB USB device. Even I personally have equipment ready for scanning things like potentially USB malware designed to permanently destroy a PC.
Considering the amount of critically important and sensitive data hospitals have on their computers this concern is not unwarranted even if they know and trust you, if your own pc is infected then depending on the type of virus you could unwittingly spread it to theirs too. That is actually how the original computer viruses spread before the internet, via floppy disk sharing.
And, don't forget they can still be used as RAM to speed up or add temporary memory to almost any computer that accepts them. (Including but not limited to operating systems, games, some tablets and phones etc.).
Not really. They tried that in the Windows Vista era (Readyboost) but it's rarely helpful on modern computers. The problem is that by modern standards, old USB flash drives are *really slow*, comparable to HDD in IOPS and worse for sequential throughput. Also, the USB connection and the drives themselves tend to be unreliable. So you're better off either upgrading the internal storage or attaching a modern external drive.
Another thing that might be useful, IF FOR SOME REASON you still have an old Thumbstick style Mp3 player that works like a flash drive, you can use it like one :) When I was a teenager in the late 2000's to mid 2010's, I used a 512 MB Mp3 player like a flash drive for extra ANime storage when I'd goto the Library or Internet Cafe. I'm just glad that these days I can afford and pay for my own 25 mbps internet and stream anime and download 150 GB Of games without having to leave my home.
Still hve my sandisk sansa (1GB model got stolen, got a 512MB model as a replacement). Also have a 256MB model. FM Tuner, voice recorder, USB flash drive too (mini USB cable, however can adapt it with mini to USB-C adapters, or go to a shop and get the port swapped for microUSB).
I've been DJing since I was a kid and I can still remember hauling around heavy vinyl records.. then CDJS became club standard and all I had to bring was a CD case. Fast forward to now... I keep 10x the music I use to lugg around in my pocket or dangling around my neck on a flash drive.
@@nemesis2264 yeah but no need to encrypt anything with a pen drive you can carry with yourself or hide somewhere. Clouds are practical, but pen drives and external hard disks won't die easily.
@@nemesis2264 well it also depends on the kind of data. If it's a few invoices of two years ago it's one thing; if you got the cure for cancer, who killed JFK and the location of Jimmy Hoffa's body, then you'd definitely encrypt your files!
The cloud is great for non sensitive files or documents that you might need to access from anywhere or on any device. I could be travelling and lose literally everything including phone, laptop, usb stick ect. But as long as i can access an internet enabled device i will be able to log into my Dropbox account and access any files i need. Sounds silly but having a file with a list of phone numbers can be a lifesaver in this kind of situation, no point borrowing a strangers phone to call someone if your can't remember anyones phone number other than your own or the landline your parents had 15 years ago. However poeple definitely rely way to heavily on cloud storage, I'm a big advocate for storing locally rather than just dumping everything on the cloud like most people seem to do now.
@@brujo_millonario I'd personally be more concerned with encrypting a flash drive, if it gets lost or stolen than any chump can just plug it in and look at it.
golden rule, if you ever find a flash drive on the ground or somewhere, DONT even think of plugging it in. people install viruses/trackers on them that will log what your doing. sometimes people will turn flash drives into devices that can fry your computer. its less likely with safety built into the ports, but don't even risk it. destroy the drive if you find one
@@gordselectronicshobby3853 how is it bill? People have done that, turn flash drives into key logger/virus devices to steal your info if you plug one in to a computer. It doesn’t happen often but it happens. They setup flash drives then release them in random places for people to pick them up and plug them in.
Hello Liron, I've got no idea how USB sticks work & I've watched many tutorials for beginners & I have stacks of new ones I find in dumpsters lying around the house, have you got any links that could help me? - Take care... 👍
Just plug it in the usb port. And it'll pop up in folders. But be careful, you have no idea what those random pendrives contain, could be malware. So probably scan it first.
@@unliving_ball_of_gas - I know where to put the stick, just don't know how to put stuff on them? - I'm not computer savvy & I've got no Family or friends to help
Instead of putting my travel and other documents on a flash drive, I have them on Google drive and in my "Documents" folder on my email account (not Gmail to be safe). If any of my paper documents get lost hopefully I can access one of those accounts. Of course, one could store them on several Google drive kinds of servers and on more than one email accounts.
Thanks for the cool tips. Another use that may come in handy for people with slow computers is to turn your old flash into a memory buffer by utilizing the ReadyBoost cache feature in Windows. Not necessary with SSD drives though.
@@zhetesteur3654 Me too. One slot for SSD on Motherboard, but 12 partitions on 5 external HDDs! Not all games need the speed of an SSD. Even games that say they need an SSD, like Cyberpunk 2077, don't actually need one!
I don't store ANYTHING anywhere but on a device I can hold in my hand or sit on my desk. NEVER EVER use any kind of remote storage. This is the worst possible security risk you can take. I still use flash drives, and also have a super high capacity stand alone hard drive I also store that stuff on for easy access without having to look through a big box full of flash drives.
Instead of downloading someone's potential malware, you can easily make your own bootable flash drive. Windows provides a boot program for launching windows into a blank computer. So the fewer programs you download the better. Every app you install writes to your PC's registry and this is how data corruption occurs, too many programs telling your PC to go in too many different directions. So FYI, do not download untrustworthy programs. If you didn't write it, don't install it unless you absolutely have to.
02:08 - Veracrypt (as I can remember) can only be used on a computer if the user of that computer have admin rights. If not, it would be harder to get to the data. Since portableapps have being mentioned, a 7z archive (encrypted) can be unloced/unpacked by 7zip or peazip that doesn't need to mount the encrypted file to a drive letter (this part that require admin rights). You also mentioned Tails, a spechial purpose Linux distro. If you do a next episode on this I hope you mention Ventoy, so if the usb is of reasonable size like 16GB or more, you can put as many ISO files (as in bootable operating systems) as the usb key have storage space for - then at boot you can choose not just one but many different tools to load up on the same usb stick.
that sound interesting, if there was something like server, just load up the iso's as cd, DVD, or what ever, and at the out put side, you could, open, it as a drive, system recognised and would just treat it like cd, DVD, or what ever, but could also, open it up to access the Iso' contents directly? like a webpage,
I still use mine, all of them, the nice Sandisk ones, the free thumb drives I got from college fairs, I even bought a high quality micro SD with adapter with a few gigs of space a few months ago. I use them now and then to maintain them. One of them had boot software. You never know when you'll need it.
I used to use Hirens a long time ago and forgot about it. After watching your video, I am happy to be reacquainted with it. You got a thumbs up and a subscription asap! 1000%
I remember when I got my first computer and I took computer classes to learn how to use it. The teacher told us to buy a floppy disk to save our work. The floppy disc only had the capacity to load 1.44 MB. When the first flash drive came out I bought a 64 MB and I was so happy about it.
Lol my first computer had a 10Mb HDD and 256kb of RAM, I guess we are both showing our age, I did a course on word processing and think I was in the first year of high school where typing wasn't offered, at about, I think, year 8 (14yo). 5.25" floppy disk was by then the norm, the 3.5" 1.44Mb didn't come out until I was in my 20's! I pity kids of today who really don't live through much in the way of invention, mostly just upgrades to old inventions.
so much has changed in our lifetimes and it's awesome in my opinion.
I’m keeping my mouth shut about the whole age thing. Lol
My first computer had no hard drive but used cassette tape to store programs and data. RAM was 1kb. Yes, that's right, a whole kilobyte.
@@KrazeeKraftZ WOW! first computer was amazing compared to mine, which had 32K (not megabytes) of RAM… NO hard drive and a cassette tape to save your data to. 😝
One thing for sure. No one can put ransomware on a flash drive whenever it is unplugged. My preference is external hard drives to back up my important files like photos and other critical files.
Exactly. My banking accounts information, various subscriptions usernames and passwords, etc, are stored in a flash drive. If/when I need to retrieve them, the drive is read in a non-networked computer.
@@coriscotupi Ah, so you're airlocking it...Smart.
Or to test a new (boot) virus on someones system...
My preference is 2TB Buffalo drives per PC and phone. Easy and safe.
I really cannot understand ppl putting their important files onto a network managed by other ppl. Crazy.
No such thing as In the olden days, USB DRIVES ARE THE BLEEDING EDGE OF TECHNOLOGY.
USB , hard disk , SSD , memory cards are great storage mediums. With their own practical use case.
A cloud is someone else's computer.
Don't let them own you.
Agreed, especially with all the censorship going on right now. They could easily delete all your files at any given time
Correct ✔
@@TheZombiesAreComing Or if their business model is poor, and they go belly up.
Agreed. I didn't agree with them being obsolete. Because of the cloud? some people like having data saved and stored on a small, incredibly portable device. It doesn't get any easier or more compact. No internet connection, no Google sign in. Just raw data organized and ready to go.
Eh.... Who said they were obsolete?
I've worked in IT for over 20 years and when seeing videos like this I hope to find at least one morsel of information that can actually be useful to users. OMG this video is one of those diamonds in the rough. 5 actual things of value that is not just clickbait.
Excellent set of 5 functional options for old flash drives. Cheers Mate!
"I've worked in IT for over 20 years" Which of these things did you not know about? Let's be honest, any use the involves using the drive exactly as intended such as storing files, is literally what the drives are for.
@@james0000 Did you really not understand his comment, or are you misreading it deliberately?
@@Twirlip2 Some of these ideas are new to you?!
@@james0000 You can't possibly be making the same mistake twice, so it must be deliberate. How tiresome.
@@Twirlip2 You are correct. It's tiresome and bothersome dealing with nitwits like you. I'll just presume all of these ideas are new to you as well as to @Whelp, There it is, despite most of them being the exact purpose of the flash drives from the very start. Oh well. "Excellent set of 5 functional options for old flash drives." LOL
I have been using these drives for years to play music in my vehicles, they work better than satellite radio (no commercials and higher quality and no subscription) plus you can put a lot of music way more than you ever could with a CD (at the highest quality setting).
I also use some for portable apps but for those I mostly use a regular portable drive (they are small enough and not expensive anymore unless you get over 2 TB solid state that is).
Same. I'm always surprised that I don't seem to see anyone else doing the same.
Didn’t even think about it! ❤️❤️❤️
Can you please explain how exactly are you playing music in your vehicle via flashdrive?
@@salcanzonieri Ford vehicles have 2 USB ports, I just upload my music in mp3 format to the drive, plug it to the truck and select it as the audio source.
Verizon gives me free Apple Music for life
I hardly ever use cloud files (except at work) and with flash drives memory getting larger and larger, basically I treat them as a small, compact easy-to-carry additional portable hard drives. Thanks for the hints. Some of them are reallu useful. :-)
Once 1TB flash drives come out you can carry a significant part of your digital game collection on your key chain
@@KhanGarth isn't the future of portable storage cool???😀😀😀
@@josephcontreras8930 yeah it’s getting pretty crazy for sure. storage capacity growth appears to be outpacing the average size that games tend to be by a wide margin. So like in my above illustration, before long a console player could bring every digital game they own to play at a friends house on their key ring
@@KhanGarth that would be great
@@KhanGarthKingston made a 1tb flash drive 11 years ago
I only use the flash drives. I don't trust cloud.
Same 🤝
Frl😂 I'll use anything over cloud
Ok
The cloud can stop your storage and delete it at anytime because they want to. Flash drives don’t have opinions
Based
CLOUD = 'Someone' else Computers.... 'ALWAYS' Keep that in mind.
Yep. That's why if you're even gonna use cloud you need to encrypt stuff
yeah. use zip with password for everything you put on cloud.
Linux Don't let the Penguin Fool You!
@@cleansweepit1 ?
The closest thing to true smoke and mirrors I've ever seen
I use USB drives all the time!!! I love them!! I never thought about putting my travel itinerary and stuff on a flash drive. Far out, great idea!
USB drives sure come in handy. I've had to take them places where I can show proof in photos and documents.
Why not just keep it on your phone?
@@-_James_- More fragile I guess?
@@-_James_- I use my phone for that same but I guess that having on a extra USB drive is just a extra level of security in case your phone is unavailable
Don't forget about extra RAM FOR YOUR CPU!
I know Hiren's CD for a long time but was not aware of Hiren's CD PE. Thanks a lot, dude!
I was just surfing around and I found your channel. What a godsend you are! Every single thing that you discuss in every single one of your sites is exactly what i need!!! Thank you so much!! LIKED, SHARED, SUBSCRIBED, AND NOTIFICATION IS ON!!
An advanced option is to create a variety of restore drives with the thumb drives. That can include a variety of repair and optimization utilities that are usually included.
I'd love to know more about that.
A better option is to use Ventoy. Then you can put multiple ISO's on a single thumb drive.
I use flash drives all the time have all kinds of stuff backed up on them. I've never used "cloud" in my life. When you do, you give tech oligarchs that much more control. I've even heard of people who found controversial content removed from their cloud storage. Not sure if that's true but it's pretty bad if it is.
Would you know if I can put my e books on a flash drive.
@@theresajurrus6307 You might be able to. I'm not that up on E books but it's probably just text so likely it wouldn't take up much space. If the book is heavy on illustrations it'll take up more space. You can get some pretty beefy flash drives though. An E book might have some kind of copyright nonsense on it , not sure, but space wise I think you could do it.
@@theresajurrus6307 You can store them on the flash drive. You have to download them to your computer [by opening them with the appropriate app] then simply copy the file to the flash drive. You might not be able to read them from the flash drive. You may have to copy them into the device you want to read them on. Possibly, a portable reader app on the flash drive would make it possible to read them from directly from the drive.
Yes regardless of Carbonite and Drive, I have all my PowerPoints (the core of my business) on a flash drive, especially the morning of a big webinar if I am gong to suffer from Windows 10 Disease at the last moment.
First of all ... new sub here. Secondly, this was one of the most useful videos I've seen in quite a while ... you managed to provide a huge amount of outstanding and useful information at a pace that even kept my attention from start to finish. So many content providers could really learn a lot from your format, presentation and content. Thanks much for what you do!! Cheers ...
and thank YOU for hanging out here!
I knew most of this, but this was great and reminds me what I can do. I have a Kingston Data Traveler Drive made of metal with a keyring hole and is very compact.
Love the Data Traveler drives. I have 3 of em!
Your videos are so informative and quick. You’re an excellent teacher, friend.
You should have mentioned ventoy. With ventoy, you don't need to format the disk over and over, you just need to copy the ISO/WIM/IMG/VHD(x)/EFI files to the USB drive and boot them directly.
Hi from brasil.
could u make a video? like a tutorial about that?
That is true, and pretty much works, though you do need to format the drive at least once to install ventoy into it, then copy whatever you need (OS installs, personal files, etc). I've had people just not try ventoy cuz you still have to format at least once.
BUT - for some niche or otherwise a bit more specific operating systems, by my testing it doesn't really work flawlessly. I tried android x86 iso on it, and basically it just straight up barely functioned, and installing it directly was a no go since it didn't even recognize other drives besides the usb the iso was on. Otherwise windows just works, most (at least more popular) linux distros work, so I doubt it is any trouble.
Appreciate the note about Ventoy (not ventoy). I'll check it. I've been using WinSetupFromUSB for mmmany years and it's really cool because it allows many ISOs also, but differently.
Update: Hmm, Ventoy seems to not function so well with ISOs that have been modified. So, if you rebuild Windows 7 or 11...this might fail for you - currently. It did for me. I hope that's changed, as Ventoy is a great idea.
Rus, Easy2Boot etc, these applications are many
Flash drives are still awesome. The Cloud isn't as fast as a flash drive, and you're also not always going to be able to have access to a reliable internet connection that allows you to access the Cloud.
I love USB Flash Drives. Many of my friends keep telling me to stop using them and start using the Cloud. Not sure why they care what I use but I just ignored them. Now I can hit them with the info from this video! Lol. While watching this video I immediately became a fan. Thank you so much!! Looking forward in exploring your other videos. Take care.
Your friends, our friends, and loved ones have been programmed to use the cloud. It is convenient but mental to not have your data backed up and in your possession (IMO). Flash Drives should never be seen as outdated anytime soon.
The cloud is pretty neat but you'd have to be an idiot to rely on it and put everything on there, personally i use it to keep non sensitive stuff that i may need to access when away from home.
Probably one advantage cloud has over local storage (other than ease of access) is for local disasters like flooding or your house burning down where all your hardrives and usb sticks may be destroyed, but thats still less of a risk than simply keeping everything on the cloud
Hiren's has saved my family's photos when my siblings accidentally them. I downloaded Hiren onto my USB and easily recovered the files from the parents' laptop. It runs so well even on a slow, old USB.
😃 Thank you Liron Segev! You are a strong and professional communicator sir! You gave us 5 priceless tips under five minutes! Wow- No deadwood in your presentation. Plus you provide great visuals; slides, clips and websites to acquire various apps or downloads. Outstanding! Thank you! Well done!
Appreciate you being here 🔥
My words exactly !
@@deedewald1707 thank you for hanging out here 👍
@@Kierispet159 Did you watch the video? 2:05
I don't even use cloud except for dumping my eBooks, projecr files over there.
Staying dependent on cloud means staying completely at the mercy of big tech, hackers, solar fares or grid failure by enemy sabotage or lack of maintenance.
USB is certainly the best balance between reliable and sizeable storage and portability. No one can replace USB easily.
I've done all those things and more, but there's something nostalgic about seeing people talk about things that can be done with flash drives and I like seeing the word get out about Hiren's, Tails, etc. Reminds me of when I used to do those things on optical media like DVDs and CDs, and then going even further back to doing it with floppy disks. The tools were very different back then (for example, Tails and Hiren's didn't even exist back then), but the spirit of what removable storage can be used for really hasn't changed much since the beginning. :)
Q
About three years ago I found a box in my basement with an Iomega zip drive and about a dozen cartridge/discs.
I was tempted to see if I could still plug it in and use it without any special drivers or software. It was next to the box where I store my old DVD burner with the lightscribe label writing feature. Lol.
@@PhilLesh69 lol, I remember the ZIP drive very well. I used the external models and the internal models that would mount inside the case. Between the two, I remember the external one more because it was blue and sat on top in plain view. I remember the special drivers including a special icon for the drive in Windows too. It's been a long time since 100MB was a decent amount of space for a removable disk.
I also remember lightscribe labels, but never really used them all that much. I normally just got out the sharpie to label the discs but I did sometimes get printable labels and use them too. Thinking about the crazy word art and lame backgrounds I would put on those things takes me back. lol
Haha, I remember getting one of the first flash drives like 128 mb or less then months later I saw one being used in a Bond or similar move and as Hollywood does making a really big deal about it, like wawa wooeeee Look what we have and you don't. And I was like pfft, lame! I've got a few of these in my vehicle and at home.
I just found all three types of Iomega Zip and Syquest drives and disks in an old leather computer bag in the back of my closet! All unused! Off to eBay!
Incredible.🤯
I liked flash drives, but I didn't know they're this useful.
Thanks
Please do a video on how to set up a flash drive to do each of the things you stated in this video. For example, should tails be installed on every flash drive? Can hirens be installed on a flash drive with anything else?
Read the instructions on the hirens website and you wont need a video...
@@sahhull 1 there are videos for hirens on UA-cam 2 I made the suggestion so this video creator had ideas for more tutorials to make
No such thing as an old flash drive. I use them for the backup of important docs. Music for the vehicle too.
Uh...why? Impportant docs go on cloud
Usb drives can get compromised, they can get corrupted by a virus or just using them too long. I have a few that I can no longer use because they have years of usage
truth i use them still like crazy
@@laurasteyn1939 sure that's also important, but there is also a time when there is no internet connection and you need to edit the important docs before printing it out to your teacher or lecturer or even your boss
Flash drives wear out so you’re wrong.
I've got about 3 usb sticks with bootable linux distros that are bootable with persistence so I can always boot from them on other computers when I'm out and about or abroad. It's come in handy sometimes
Same here, only I have more!👍
Back when most Linux 32 bit ISO's would fit onto a CD, the 4GB sized ones were perfect for the job. Plus could install Windows 7 or Vista clean by creating media, no longer is 4GB large enough for this task any longer, need 8GB or larger. And by booting into memory, these USB sticks were MUCH faster than running on a PATA (or IDE) HDD.
Anyway, want a Linux Mint (or your favorite distro) on the go? A 16GB USB stick is perfect for most & for those who still runs Puppy Linux, 4GB is a lot. This means one can run this on most ANY computer (fast boot & Secure Boot MUST be turned off & CSM enabled if UEFI based). Great thing, no matter who the PC belongs to, even if Windows is infected to the point of not being able to boot, your portable Linux distro will. This includes some rescue media designed to update & scan the hard drive or SSD.
Have had only ONE USB drive go bad on me & that was a 16GB off brand model, still lasted 3-4 years. Have several SanDisk 4GB models that came long before SATA-1 drives for the masses, back when these were on promo for $5-6. Some has a useful utility to encrypt the drive, no added tools needed. Could be cleaned for other usage, just save the encryption exe. file (or download from the OEM) & ready to be reused for it's intended purpose again.
BTW, can do the same thing with (most) SD/SDHC cards used in cameras, when inserted into a USB adapter. Backup or partition rescue media would easily load onto the 1GB SD cards which were standard for many digital cameras, after upgrading to a larger one.
Yup, right now I'm using a 64 gig usb stick with Ubuntu mate installed.
I have one stick that can boot 16 versions of Puppy Linux, why? Because I could.
Yes I have a few others with linux
i love arch linux
Seemingly every usb stick I own has a distro on it. Kinda frustrating when I want to put another distro on one 🤣
For extra security, protect your USB drive by storing it in one of those inexpensive metal credit card cases.
I know just enough about computers to be "dangerous ". At least that is what I tell my friends. I was at one time fairly knowledgeable, when I was working & on the computer daily, mainly on MS word & Excell, sometimes PowerPoint, mostly Gmail, HATED OUTLOOK, Your videos are always informative. Always look forward to seeing them in my "in box" keep up the great work !!!
I put all of my records and CDs on a single 32 GB flash drive and take it with me everywhere I go. I still have half of its storage left.
I have used portable apps for 15 years now and will never use fixed programs again unless absolutely necessary. Everything goes with me.
Hello, what portable website do you use?
@@henryigwe4560
Sorry,
Do you mean where do I get them from?
@@wlessfanable Yes Sir?
Liron I just love your videos man. So much great info with a very easy-to-understand rendering which makes each video really wonderful. Please keep them coming.
Appreciate you being here 🔥
I still have my older flash drives too, while in college 15-years-ago I put all my material on my flash drive and can pull it up to this day:) Also, it's how I save all my passwords and usernames:) The flash drive.
that's scary. if you lose it or your drive becomes unreadable all of a sudden, you lose all your passwords and usernames
@@utubestalker.dotcom
You're right, but I thought about several years ago and have 3 drives with that info, and surely all 3 won't go bad at the same time? :) I hope not anyway, other than hand writing them down on paper, so long as no one knows where that paper is there can't be a safer place. Of course, I'm only thinking of another computer of sorts or the cloud.
Hey Liron thanks for taking the time to provide the info u do... Much appreciated... people like u r angels even if you r from the RSA
Glad to help
Unfortunately, I did not know about Hiren's materials. Even so, when I had my most serious crash ever, I had to boot my Windows recovery from the USB drive that nice people encouraged me to make. This kept me from owning an expensive brick. Also, a trick about portable apps is to drag the whole thing onto the computer so it runs faster, then securely delete it later. Something I like with portable apps is that since they are only installed to their own folders, they can be kept on a hard drive if you simply don't want that software's full installation package. It's nice that many open source and freeware developers make portable versions, too.
I knew about it from 2002😉
Yea I A agree about the HIREN MADE ME ALOT OF MONEY BUT I ONLY ABLE TO FIX WINDOWS XP IS THERE A NEWER VERSION I GOT 15.1
Hiren's sounds a lot like XtraPC flash-drive. I bought one awhile back to fix my Mother's laptop, I think it boots a Lenox directory. The laptop"s boot drive was erased and wouldn't come on, the flash-drive worked, it allowed me access to the cmd. It still works today
>drag the whole thing onto the computer so it runs faster, then securely delete it later
You can't be sure you're "securely deleting" stuff from someone else's computer. Even if it's your own there's no real guarantee you're really overwriting anything either.
_"No, but this program says it overwrites three times brah!"_ No. Windows doesn't always listen, the filesystem doesn't listen, the hard drive even remaps (moves) sectors around secretly, there's no guarantee you're really overwriting anything.
@@user-ut9ln4vd5mMr extreme
and do not forget that Google has a system connecting ALL the crtv's on the streets and buildings and you are ALWAYS tracked by the big eye
Great video! Their reliability is overlooked. I even found one in the lawn after winter - it worked.
Great point!
Be careful about "finding" them. Sick people leave them laying around to find with a root virus to destroy or snoop your computer and phone home! Don't use it, or run it in a sandbox for a FULL wipe.
To add to what solarsynapse said, there are also devices that look like USB drives that destroy computers. They charge up on the power pins and then send a high voltage shock down the data pins, frying the CPU. There is hardware that protects from this, but it’s rare to find PC with it installed.
same, 10 years ago I found 8GB one in snow after winter and it worked for couple of years before it died, back then it was usuable space, but today 8GB is nothing :D
I worked in an office next door to Lafayette Square (in front of the white house) and used to see usb flash drives laying around all over the place. I even watched uniformed secret service officers stoop down and pick them up and pocket them. My boss and I were having a smoke in front of our building and he picked one up and we took it upstairs and connected it to an old pc we were about to shred the drive on and inspected it. It had canary tokens and all kinds of trojan/keylogging junk on it, and we traced an email connected to one of the tokens to a guy in toronto. We handed it over to the security at the federal appeals court next door because it looked like they were targeting a judge on the appellate court.
Absolutely love hiren, I keep it on my flashdrive that way I can solve most problems on the go, also have e2b which allows me to install oss straight from the drive ❤
I love using portableapps on my flash drive, my favorite use is for using Firefox while on work PC’s. I have my Bitwarden extension and Private Internet Access extension loaded so I can browse fairly privately and not worry about accidentally leaving my accounts logged in after I go home. One of the dumbest things people do on our work PCs IMO is allow chrome to save their password, I can’t tell you how many personal passwords and user names are stored on our work PC but it’s a lot. I try to tell them to use a password manager but they think that’s too difficult 😣
Another great vid Liron … love the enthusiasm!!!
Always!
Marty Schwartz of IT :))) thanks for the great videos!
You can also use them for backing up files and storing them away. Likewise you can store a lot of music or video on them that you might no want to have cluttering up your phone but still want to carry around, say to play on your computer at work especially when your workplace doesn't want you to install anything on your work computer.
I boot to my own os on work computers. If my boss complains then I know they have monitoring software setup on their systems.
@@PhilLesh69 Most places does in order to prevent the employees from messing around on the job.
I had my PC Emergency Tool Disk on 2 1.44 Disks (90's), then CD, now on USB.
One cannot ever be without.
You forgot to mention you could use it for your TV box for apps or fire TV or you could put ROMs on it and make a DIY retro emulator USB stick
This one is the best video about flash drive usage and material ever seen on YT ! Thanks a lot...!!
One of the best you've done, Liron. Many thanks!
What an amazing collection of utilities. Thank you.
Glad you like them!
incredible, thank you, nicely explanined, and to the point, no jargon, love your videos.
Thank you kindly!
Don't throw them out or recycle them. I've never trusted or use the cloud I'm old school I like to handle a physical device to back up big files I've downloaded when my on board memory gets closr to capacity or organize my fave curated mp3 playlists, LPS, audio playlists/podcasts or organized pix to show to people. They're getting cheaper and more higher cap like Having a hard drive in your pocket. Great viddie sir!!
Please do a video on how to set up a flash drive to do each of the things you stated in this video. Thank you.
The websites for the programs all include detailed instructions.
Love your contents! Cheers mate
Can also be used to easily expand your smart TV storage!
Excellent. You also can install several GNU/LINUX distributions to Run on Live USB.
2:36 Well, if your machine won't even **power on** (ie. nothing happens when power button is pushed), check that it's plugged in (both ends), the PSU (power supply unit) rocker switch isn't OFF or the breaker hasn't tripped.
Haha, I came to the comments just to mention this and saw you caught it as well. He said "even if it won't turn on".... uh, yeah, don't think a USB boot disk is going to help you with that one, lol
Reminds me of setting up a PC for our boss to do his presentation at a conference. One of my co-workers, a self-proclaimed expert, couldn't get the machine to do anything, and kept announcing lots of obscure things that he should check. (I think that was mostly to impress the boss how much he knew about PCs.) I saw the power cord lying on the stage floor, so I plugged it in and, of course, the PC started up right away. My co-worker asked me in an astonished voice, "What did you do to fix it?" I said someone had given me some useful advice: "When there's a problem, look for horses, not zebras."
I have to say, I think the "Charity" option is the BEST one. More power to that effort!!
Liron, you are the best. My only problem is that you give me more stuff to add to my ToDo list. Thanks for the great suggestions.
One of the nice things about running an alternative operating system off of a flash drive is you can go diskless. By diskless I mean you can literally remove your main PC storage device from the PC and leave it at home in your safe or safety deposit box.
Someone steal your laptop? So what they can’t do jack with it.
Also it’s a nice way to learn an alternative operating system such as the many distributions of Linux.
First came Unix, then Linux, and finally Android. Think of the relationship between them as Grandfather, son, and Grandson. Also you can load a custom version of Linux that’s totally read only. It’s called a Live version. Back in the days of CDs, and DVDs they were called Live-CDs and Live-DVDs. You could launch programs from them but you couldn’t save anything anywhere. Now days you can boot directly from a USB device and use it either way, full boot or Live-USB boot.
And don’t get me started on all the games you could possibly play. Get a Linux version of VLC and watch movies until you’re sick of them…
If keeping a flash drive on a keyring it's definitely worth getting one that can plug into both usb-a and usb-c, more and more laptops are becoming usb-c only and you will also be able to plug into most android smartphones too massively increasing the amount of devices you can access your files on.
Also usb-c is way faster so you'll probably want to use it over usb-a anyway if its an option.
Usb-c isn't necessarily faster than usb-a, that's just a form factor. What really counts is whether it's USB-2.0 or USB-3.0 or higher. Type A can come in any speed. Type C usually is 3.0 standard or higher, but not always.
I'm glad I finally watched this video after having it sit in one of my watch later playlists for a year. :D
Always back up your data regardless of how it is stored. USB drives are great but from my experience they are not as reliable as your actual computer hard drive or an external hd. They do need to be reformatted from time to time and that means you will lose the data on the usb drive. I have always liked them for transferring small amounts of data or storing programs or playlists in mp3/mp4 format.
Exactly the comment I was looking for. This is what I fear because I just had a 256 gb SanDisk USB drive asking me to format it out of nowhere so I lost everything on it because there was no way to access the USB. I'm just glad it didn't have important photos.
well spotted. yes your completely correct. the life time of a magnetic hard drive is around double of a solid state drive like ssd ubs sd cards ect. the advantage of solid state drives is there speed.
@@jesseclutterbuck6617 backup is a process not a device
Worth adding , for how cheap top end drives are now , don't keep formatting , formatting these are only like a VHS tape , over and over formatting,they'll fail when you really need it , I've got windows 11/10 always backed with a ISO ,GREAT TIPS MAN
What you do on the client side using incognito doesn't reflect what happens on the backend that you are being tracked. Your ISP keeps a permeant record of all your activity as they can see logs of every website you visited. They can see how much data you are using that may throttle your speeds. Your cellphone provider also keeps a permeant record of all data tracked as well all the way from the cell phone tower to the hub. Social media and major service providers carriers work closely with the intelligences agency's that call obtain records without a warrant. What you do online is being tracked. Your mobile phone is always listening and transmitting data regardless if its sitting on your desk with the screen off. There are hundreds of processes running in the background.
Snowden said thing he does with a new is disconnect the microphone. When he needs to make a call he uses a bluetooth headset.
Flash drives I found to be golden ! I,like your suggestions .👍🏻
Wondering why your videos are low volume? I noticed in some others before this one. Is too bad we can't have everybody's video turn out the same volume to not be too low or too loud. As I watch through different videos I have to change the volume for each.
There must be an app for that? 😂🤣
i've noticed that too, like everything is not set for the same output at all
I also love local storage options such as these, but many entities don't want to access your SD cards or flash drives on their own systems because of viruses.
I am so old I used to use floppies. I might sometimes have needed a lot of them too, depending on what was to go on them.
I remember them being invented. I also remember mainframes like the IBM System 7. That was when programmers were efficient because every single bit was valuable. Now software is mostly bloated garbage.
@@solarsynapse Bloated garbage with access to certain permissions attached to your devices.
I'm old enough too remember floppies being everywhere and still being on every computer desk in racks and draws but never actually being used, they were obsolete and completely replaced by cd's when i was a kid but because so many were made they were still everywhere.
Made great ninja stars
@@archygrey9093 Me too. In those days anyone with a computer must have had boxes of them. I also remember being able to buy blank ones at at store that sold any computer stuff. Now I don't know if anyone still makes them.
Before there were hard drives it was necessary to boot from a floppy after inserting it into the floppy disk drive. It was DOS. "Disk" Operating System.
WOW, Thank you very much for that information. I have many new and unused flashdrives and now I have uses for at least 5 of them. Thank You again,
Great info, especially the utilities. But . . . I have a medical alert flash drive that I have all of my medical data on. I thought it would be helpful to the medics in the event of an emergency. Well, they would not use it for fear of introducing a virus onto their device. Maybe that's changed these days, I don't know. It could prove this approach to be useless if one runs into the same situation.
Anyway, thank you for the great advice! If nothing else, I can still donate them to help those whom are being censored. ✌
It would be safer to have a qr code, barcode or a short web url that links directly to your medical data on the cloud which is encrypted using a key that only authorized emergency responders can access.
I just wrote a "back of the napkin business plan" for a lucrative medical technology business venture. Lol.
it's weird how your ✌sticks up over the Read more by 1 pixel
I thought the same immediately, and what I would do IF I was to carry medical information, is I would carry a computing device as well. For $30, you can get a portable music and video player, that works like a USB via a cable and has its own memory as well as a slot for a Micro SD card. Not a way to reuse you OLD sticks, but a great medical security tool. They can record speech, play txt files, mp3 music, and depending on the device like my Ruizu M8, also mp4 video without being ANY more expensive. However it may be difficult to know which device CAN play video.
On the other hand, if you HAVE old USB media players, they typically CAN carry any kind of data, even if they only play music. Same is true for the internal memory of a digital camera, usually a detachable SD card, unless they utilize some very involved formatting. These might be helpful jsut as backup locations for you to preserve any useful information, in case your phone gets stolen for instance. Or, if you're unresponsive and unidentified, the police would get involved and the first thing they'd look is something like camera data, or a tiny 512 MB USB device. Even I personally have equipment ready for scanning things like potentially USB malware designed to permanently destroy a PC.
Another possibility is to store the data an old Android phone (configured without a password). The battery might go bad after a while though.
Considering the amount of critically important and sensitive data hospitals have on their computers this concern is not unwarranted even if they know and trust you, if your own pc is infected then depending on the type of virus you could unwittingly spread it to theirs too.
That is actually how the original computer viruses spread before the internet, via floppy disk sharing.
Great tips, excellent delivery. Well done!
And, don't forget they can still be used as RAM to speed up or add temporary memory to almost any computer that accepts them. (Including but not limited to operating systems, games, some tablets and phones etc.).
Wow how can i use 1 of my usb flashdrives as ram for my computer please?
Not really. They tried that in the Windows Vista era (Readyboost) but it's rarely helpful on modern computers. The problem is that by modern standards, old USB flash drives are *really slow*, comparable to HDD in IOPS and worse for sequential throughput. Also, the USB connection and the drives themselves tend to be unreliable. So you're better off either upgrading the internal storage or attaching a modern external drive.
Hirens been saving my bacon on many occasions since 2010 though I think i did start with a bootable CD in those days. Great vid , great ideas.
Hiren for the win!!!
Another thing that might be useful, IF FOR SOME REASON you still have an old Thumbstick style Mp3 player that works like a flash drive, you can use it like one :)
When I was a teenager in the late 2000's to mid 2010's, I used a 512 MB Mp3 player like a flash drive for extra ANime storage when I'd goto the Library or Internet Cafe.
I'm just glad that these days I can afford and pay for my own 25 mbps internet and stream anime and download 150 GB Of games without having to leave my home.
I still use my MP3 player as an MP3 player.
Still hve my sandisk sansa (1GB model got stolen, got a 512MB model as a replacement). Also have a 256MB model. FM Tuner, voice recorder, USB flash drive too (mini USB cable, however can adapt it with mini to USB-C adapters, or go to a shop and get the port swapped for microUSB).
Thank you so much for all your hard work and Info😀😀😀😀
Most hotel safes can be opened with the code “000000”.
Also still a great way for novices to move files between computers rather than having a network or when networking is not easily possible
AKA "Sneaker wear network."
We did this with 3.5 plastic floppies. Then we did this with CDRoms. Then we did this with DVDS.
@@briandsatterfield "Sneakernet"
Could not do much with a paper. 5-3/4 soft floppy floppy. They held only 360k !
I've been DJing since I was a kid and I can still remember hauling around heavy vinyl records.. then CDJS became club standard and all I had to bring was a CD case. Fast forward to now... I keep 10x the music I use to lugg around in my pocket or dangling around my neck on a flash drive.
Hirens Boot CD saved me many times 😀 Thanx to you i will now put it in a USB 👍
all 5 things are awesome. just for that Slapping the SUBSCRIBE button 👋
Appreciate you being here 🔥
The travel docs idea is brilliant. It makes perfect sense.
The disadvantage of a cloud is, you really never know if someone else (someone unauthorized) will read your files.
The "cloud" is just somebdy else's computer!
@@nemesis2264 yeah but no need to encrypt anything with a pen drive you can carry with yourself or hide somewhere. Clouds are practical, but pen drives and external hard disks won't die easily.
@@nemesis2264 well it also depends on the kind of data. If it's a few invoices of two years ago it's one thing; if you got the cure for cancer, who killed JFK and the location of Jimmy Hoffa's body, then you'd definitely encrypt your files!
The cloud is great for non sensitive files or documents that you might need to access from anywhere or on any device.
I could be travelling and lose literally everything including phone, laptop, usb stick ect. But as long as i can access an internet enabled device i will be able to log into my Dropbox account and access any files i need.
Sounds silly but having a file with a list of phone numbers can be a lifesaver in this kind of situation, no point borrowing a strangers phone to call someone if your can't remember anyones phone number other than your own or the landline your parents had 15 years ago.
However poeple definitely rely way to heavily on cloud storage, I'm a big advocate for storing locally rather than just dumping everything on the cloud like most people seem to do now.
@@brujo_millonario I'd personally be more concerned with encrypting a flash drive, if it gets lost or stolen than any chump can just plug it in and look at it.
Wow, that last one of setting material to NK got me. What a wonderful charity.
golden rule, if you ever find a flash drive on the ground or somewhere, DONT even think of plugging it in. people install viruses/trackers on them that will log what your doing. sometimes people will turn flash drives into devices that can fry your computer. its less likely with safety built into the ports, but don't even risk it. destroy the drive if you find one
@@gordselectronicshobby3853 how is it bill? People have done that, turn flash drives into key logger/virus devices to steal your info if you plug one in to a computer. It doesn’t happen often but it happens. They setup flash drives then release them in random places for people to pick them up and plug them in.
You seriously need to learn proper English.
Just boot into a Linux live usb/cd with the internet disabled, and you can open the mystery usb and wipe it.
@@hotjanuary You seriously need to learn proper English.
@@hotjanuary most people can’t do that, and flash drives are so cheap why would you want to use some phantom flash drive?
Wow I didn't know that Hirens boot cd still existed!
I used that when we actually used bootable CDs and floppies!
Hello Liron, I've got no idea how USB sticks work & I've watched many tutorials for beginners & I have stacks of new ones I find in dumpsters lying around the house, have you got any links that could help me? - Take care... 👍
They plug into USB ports and work just like disks. For something like a utility disk you have to make it bootable.
@@writerpatrick If this guy doesn't know how pendrives work, then he has no idea how discs works.
Just plug it in the usb port. And it'll pop up in folders.
But be careful, you have no idea what those random pendrives contain, could be malware. So probably scan it first.
@@unliving_ball_of_gas - I know where to put the stick, just don't know how to put stuff on them? - I'm not computer savvy & I've got no Family or friends to help
@@unliving_ball_of_gas - buzz off
I've been using Portable Apps for over 15 years on my job, and love it.
Instead of putting my travel and other documents on a flash drive, I have them on Google drive and in my "Documents" folder on my email account (not Gmail to be safe). If any of my paper documents get lost hopefully I can access one of those accounts. Of course, one could store them on several Google drive kinds of servers and on more than one email accounts.
I do that too. I have them on me for those times when you need to access them in an emergency or when you don't know if there will be internet access.
Or send a copy to a friend or relative via email.
This is a two year old video which i found just now but still so relevant. Thanks and subscribed. 🙏
Glad it was helpful!
Thanks for the cool tips. Another use that may come in handy for people with slow computers is to turn your old flash into a memory buffer by utilizing the ReadyBoost cache feature in Windows. Not necessary with SSD drives though.
Uhhh who doesn't have any SSD lol. They cost the same as a flash drive now.
@@renegade_patriot i still use hdd
@@zhetesteur3654 Me too. One slot for SSD on Motherboard, but 12 partitions on 5 external HDDs! Not all games need the speed of an SSD. Even games that say they need an SSD, like Cyberpunk 2077, don't actually need one!
I was skeptical like most 5 thing videos, but you have some great ideas, very informative
glad to help!
I don't store ANYTHING anywhere but on a device I can hold in my hand or sit on my desk. NEVER EVER use any kind of remote storage. This is the worst possible security risk you can take. I still use flash drives, and also have a super high capacity stand alone hard drive I also store that stuff on for easy access without having to look through a big box full of flash drives.
Great tips, thanks Liron. Will definitely try
You are a wealth of knowledge Liron. Great suggestions there.
Great video, thanks for sharing!!🙏
Haha that’s funny. Many of us DJs still swear by those dongles. I have about 7 in rotation right now 😂
Great video .. thank you.
Instead of downloading someone's potential malware, you can easily make your own bootable flash drive. Windows provides a boot program for launching windows into a blank computer. So the fewer programs you download the better. Every app you install writes to your PC's registry and this is how data corruption occurs, too many programs telling your PC to go in too many different directions. So FYI, do not download untrustworthy programs. If you didn't write it, don't install it unless you absolutely have to.
oh stop it, really? with that logic you shouldn't be on youtube, it wasn't written by you.
@@ampstudios do you even know what you are talking about? How often has UA-cam dropped a virus on you while browsing? Actual malware not cookies?
The real problem sounds like it's Windows. Ditch it for a nice *nix, even bsd...
@@user-ut9ln4vd5m lol, that's a different conversation there.
I like having a drive with reference books, and how to books as well as a few handy dandy vids. And some pictures.
02:08 - Veracrypt (as I can remember) can only be used on a computer if the user of that computer have admin rights. If not, it would be harder to get to the data. Since portableapps have being mentioned, a 7z archive (encrypted) can be unloced/unpacked by 7zip or peazip that doesn't need to mount the encrypted file to a drive letter (this part that require admin rights).
You also mentioned Tails, a spechial purpose Linux distro. If you do a next episode on this I hope you mention Ventoy, so if the usb is of reasonable size like 16GB or more, you can put as many ISO files (as in bootable operating systems) as the usb key have storage space for - then at boot you can choose not just one but many different tools to load up on the same usb stick.
that sound interesting, if there was something like server, just load up the iso's as cd, DVD, or what ever, and at the out put side, you could, open, it as a drive, system recognised and would just treat it like cd, DVD, or what ever, but could also, open it up to access the Iso' contents directly? like a webpage,
Admin rights could be over written . Using CMD. By taking ownership
has* admin rights.
requires*
special*
I still use mine, all of them, the nice Sandisk ones, the free thumb drives I got from college fairs, I even bought a high quality micro SD with adapter with a few gigs of space a few months ago. I use them now and then to maintain them. One of them had boot software. You never know when you'll need it.
Cloud Services = Bad Idea.
Disagree but you do you.
I used to use Hirens a long time ago and forgot about it. After watching your video, I am happy to be reacquainted with it. You got a thumbs up and a subscription asap! 1000%