Benchmarks:PNY Micro Sleek 16GB
===============================
:author:  Aaron Ball
:email:   nullspoon@oper.io
:revdate: July 13, 2017



I bought a pair of USB2 PNY Micro Sleek USB sticks from my local tech shop
today. I did quite a bit of research before purchasing them.

While doing research on lifespan and actual read/write speeds, I discovered
it's fairly difficult to find real benchmarks for any given usb stick on the
internet. I can't speculate as to why, but I'll do my best to contribute a few
benchmarks for mine.

I'm going to rant for a few sentences here. Despite the dramatic increase in
quantity of storage in recent years, the quality of the underlying "solid"
storage and intermediate components have not increased at the same rate. For
example, the USB 2 spec allows for transfer rates of around 480 Mb/s (roughly
60 MB/s). If you've ever tested, you found that most USB 2 sticks only get
around 6 \- 10 MB/s at best. Solid devices supporting the USB3 spec are even
more disappointing. To the credit of the external HDD manufacturers though,
external rotating drives are generally very fast by comparison (typically
greater than 100 MB/s read/write)

Please manufacturers, make better portable storage.

Despite all that though, here is my benchmark.


image:files/pny_micro_sleek_16gb.jpg[height=350]


Write
-----

Write 1MB Block, 4096 Count (4GB of zeros)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    [root@null ~]# dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdb bs=1M count=4096

    4096+0 records in
    4096+0 records out
    4294967296 bytes (4.3 GB) copied, 495.355 s, 8.7 MB/s


Write 1GB Block, 2 Count (2GB of zeros)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    [root@null ~]# dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdb bs=1G count=2
    2+0 records in
    2+0 records out
    2147483648 bytes (2.1 GB) copied, 248.904 s, 8.6 MB/s


Writing a Real-world File
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You thought the previous write tests were bad? It took 208 seconds to copy a
Fedora iso to the usb stick. Note that this iso file is coming from a ram disk
that averages 3 GB/s read speeds.

    [root@null ~]# dd if=/mnt/Fedora-Live-Xfce-i686-22-3.iso of=/dev/sdb

    1697792+0 records in
    1697792+0 records out
    869269504 bytes (869 MB) copied, 208.453 s, 4.2 MB/s



Read
----

NOTE: For these reads, we'll be writing the data to a ram disk to reduce the
      possibility that the destination storage would be a bottleneck.

Read 1MB Block, 4096 Count (4GB stream)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    [root@null ~]# dd if=/dev/sdb of=/mnt/dd.out bs=1M count=4096

    4096+0 records in
    4096+0 records out
    4294967296 bytes (4.3 GB) copied, 153.179 s, 28.0 MB/s


Read 1GB Block, 2 Count (2GB stream)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    [root@null ~]# dd if=/dev/sdb of=/mnt/dd.out bs=1G count=2
    2+0 records in
    2+0 records out
    2147483648 bytes (2.1 GB) copied, 77.3436 s, 27.8 MB/s



Summary
-------

Well, it seems these USB sticks are very "ho-hum". They average about 9 MB/s
when writing zeros, 4.6 MB/s when writing real data, and 28 MB/s when reading.
Keep in mind that the spec for USB2 allows for 60 MB/s. 4.6 MB/s is 7.6 percent
of the spec's allowed maximum speed.

My next test is to see how these hold up under six months to a year of use.


[role="datelastedit"]
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