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Flash storage has many obvious advantages:

  • zero random access latency
  • portability and robustness
  • highest speed possible
  • most diverse form factors and sizes possible (ranging from MicroSD to RAID SSD)

But flash storage's weakness is data retention, and flash storage with higher density (e.g. multi-layer cell technology, 128 GB on a MicroSD card, thus physically very small sectors) because of the way flash storage works: storing electrical charges using transistors.

These extremely small transistors in flash storage lose their electrical charge over time, which is recoverable to some degree thanks to error correction code of each sector that the storage controller of the flash storage handles on the next read of the sector by refreshing the electrical charge. Some flash storage (and I guess pretty much all SSD's, but rarely SD cards) also do that automatically when idle (plugged in but not in use).

But I already have occasionally lost data years ago because I relied a little too much on flash storage and created backups too little aggressively.

Also, flash storage is the most vulnerable in case of power surges and faulty adapters (e.g. SD-to-USB adapters, USB hubs), where failed write accesses could lead to file system header corruption.

Flash storage has the best portability, is a very practical way of file transportation and maybe for redundant backups, but should better not be solely relied upon.

Also read:

Flash storage has many obvious advantages: * zero random access latency * portability and robustness * highest speed possible * most diverse form factors and sizes possible (ranging from MicroSD to RAID SSD) But flash storage's weakness is data retention, and flash storage with higher density (e.g. *multi-layer cell* technology, 128 GB on a MicroSD card, thus physically very small sectors) because of the way flash storage works: storing electrical charges using transistors. These extremely small transistors in flash storage lose their electrical charge over time, which is recoverable to some degree thanks to error correction code of each sector that the storage controller of the flash storage handles on the next read of the sector by refreshing the electrical charge. Some flash storage (and I guess pretty much all SSD's, but rarely SD cards) also do that automatically when idle (plugged in but not in use). But I already have occasionally lost data years ago because I relied a little too much on flash storage and created backups too little aggressively. Also, flash storage is the most vulnerable in case of power surges and faulty adapters (e.g. SD-to-USB adapters, USB hubs), where failed write accesses could lead to file system header corruption. ---- Flash storage has the best portability, is a very practical way of file transportation and maybe for **redundant** backups, but should better not be **solely** relied upon. Also read: [Optical media is heavily underrated — little known advantages.](https://poal.co/s/TellPoal/148944)

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[–] • 0 pt

I've not had a single flash drive survive more than 3 years of use, and many have failed in less than 6 months.

I have flash drives and SD cards from my childhood (older than 10 years) that still work, and a few (especially by the brand Hama, which I can't trust accordingly) where files went corrupt after a few months.

[–] • 1 pt

Yeah IDK why my failure rate with flash drive seems higher than the norm. But I've met people who have had even worse luck with them so my take away is that they are wildly variable.

SD cards however have been pretty solid for me. Regardless I treat them the same, ie. they are for temporary or non-critical storage only.

FWIW I've had some luck bringing bad flash drives back to life with a program called SD Card Formatter. The data is gone of course, but in perhaps 1/4 of the cases the drive is usable again.

[–] • 0 pt

File system reformatting can only make the device completely useable again if there is no actual hardware damage.

[–] • 1 pt

I guess my point is that on occasion a flash drive will appear to go bad and you won't be able to format it using the usual method BUT tools exist that may let you overcome that. This happens when the drive becomes so corrupted for whatever reason that Windows is no longer able to recognize it as a drive. But yes as you point out in this case the circuitry itself is fine.

[–] • 0 pt

If you're using them a lot, lots of R-W cycles, you're probably killing them. Flash drives have a very limited write cycle life. My employer found that out when they tried to use no-name cheapies in data collection devices that wrote once a minute. Average life was a couple of months.