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USB Flash Drive For Your Wallet

A Credit Card or a Business Card?

There is no lack of imagination in the creative circles of the flash drive designers. The shapes of the drives range from the simple rectangles, keys, pens, and bracelets to animals, bottles, severed thumbs and sex toys. Thus, it is a surprise that the simple looking card shape is difficult to categorize.

Due to the obvious limitation of not possessing a magnetic strip or any other identifying information regularly found on a typical credit card, we initially named it a business card. Logically, one can imprint the company information on the card and add data that may be helpful in communicating the company’s products and services. It’s a common sense replacement for the business card.

We don’t always use logic in the same way; some see a plastic rectangle resembling the shape and feel of the credit card, and call it as such – a credit card drive.

It’s all about the design

Call it what you like, a credit card or a business card; it all boils down to several simple designs.

I tend to prefer the flip type design above others. The card on the photos has a flip connector. It’s easy to connect into a USB port due to a sufficiently long USB plug that is hinged closely to the edge. It’s also easy to store in the wallet due to the extra slim profile.

There are generally 3 different types of the USB card drive designs. The rotating connector, the sliding connector, and the flip connector type.

  • The Rotating connector is our Card V2 drive made of plastic. The USB connector rotates out for plug-in and rotates back in for storage.
  • The Sliding connector is our Metal Card drive. The USB connector slides out for plug-in and slides back in for storage. It’s our only card that is available in aluminum or stainless steel.
  • The Flip connector is our Card V1 drive made of plastic. The USB connector flips out for plug-in and inserted into the cavity into the card for storage.
Long USB connector of the Card V1

Comparison against other card styles

The flip connector style has certain advantages over the other connector types.

Advantages of the Flip style connector card

  1. The card is slightly thinner. The reason it can be thinner is the small cavity within the card that stores the USB connector. The card is thin with the exception of a slightly thicker connector storage area. This is an advantage when you want to store the card in the trifold wallet. It fits just as easily as a credit card.
  2. As already mentioned, the USB connector is longer than on the other styles, thus is an advantage when it needs to be plugged into the USB port.

Disadvantages of the Flip style connector card

  1. Since the USB connector on the card is stored in the cavity, it is slightly harder to detach it from the card. There is only about a half of an inch of leverage on the back of the card to flip the connector out.
The ridged piece of the connector is visible on the back. About one half of an inch; it’s the minimum needed to flip the connector out of the card.

Conclusion

It really does not matter what you call it – a USB credit card flash drive or a USB business card flash drive. What is important is the high portability of the drive due to its slim shape, the ease of use with slim USB connectors, and very large imprint area for your logos and text.

I’m leaning towards the flip style card because of its longer connector and slimmer profile. One point gets deducted for the difficulty in flipping the USB connector from the card. Highly recommended: 4/5 points.

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