ValiDrive

[Fuzzball]

Hi Steve,

A question re: ValiDrive. I downloaded v0.6.3 this morning. Seems to work OK.

In the process of characterizing the inserted USB drive, can you also characterize the USB port into which it is plugged? For instance, let the user know if it's USB 2/3/etc?

 

[PHolder]

As ever, Steve does not regularly appear here, and provides NO support here for apps under development. The only reliable place to interact with him is on his dev newsgroup, which you can learn more about at https://www.grc.com/discussions.htm . In that newsgroup you can learn about the GitLab instance he maintains where you can join to report bugs, and open tickets to make suggestions (although those would normally be discussed first in the newsgroup.)

 

[AlanD]

FYI ValiDrive version 1.0 has now been released so I think it unlikely that Steve will make any more changes.

 

[xplora1a]

I know that Steve likes his windows based things, but there has been a Open Source project on github from a couple of years ago to do exactly this https://github.com/AltraMayor/f3
And yes there is a another reason in that the work on ValidDrive will contribute to SpinRite so there is some use in it.

And one more thing is that it contains f3fix which will rewrite the thumb drive to report the actual amount of storage so you can use it safely.

 

[AzDayton]

Hi Steve. Long time Security Now fan. Thanks for all you do.

I was just drafting up an email for my organization to warn them about the Fraudulent Flashdrive Epidemic. When I do this, I try to put myself into the mindset of the user so I can "dumb it down" for the non-techs.

During this process, and in reading the ValidDrive page, I noticed that it doesn't mention one behaviour in these drives that I found in a drive I had. That is that, as long as it had memory to use, it actually did write the lastest file(s) to the drive, and they could be read back successfully.

Through trial-and-error I found that the last 30GB or so stored were retrievable on a supposedly 128GB drive. That's actually a lot of video (when it's not HD), so if I hadn't been doing some speed testing, I wouldn't have known for quite some time, since I really only revew the most recent stuff to make sure it was saved properly.

This was about a year ago, and I figured I just got a bad drive. But I kept the drive, and when ValidDrive came out, I tested it, and it really only had 32GB. (I suspect that the file system didn't need much because they were big files.)

The reason I mention this is that it shows a more insidious mind at work. Many users really only look at the last few files they've stored, and just keep adding them a few at a time. So using this nasty trick, one could use this drive for years without knowing it's trashing your older files in FIFO-style order. (Maybe FIFT - First In, First Trashed?)

Anyway, thought I'd mention it. Thanks again for all you do to make ME look good at work!

- Dayton

 

[PHolder]

behaviour in these drives that I found in a drive I had

Do you still have that drive, and can you please test it with ValiDrive (and report back here) if you do.

 

[hoochtech]

Thank you Steve!
I am a commercial sUAS (Drone) pilot, my workhorse drone will fly for 32 minutes and record 4K video at 1GB per minute
2 in 10 SD cards would show <recording> for 30 minutes - when reading the cards back around 15GB of video, uggh.
the 2 problem cards show 32GB
actual storage 16GB.
searching purchase records now.

Great App!

 

[rfrazier]

I am a commercial sUAS (Drone) pilot

@hoochtech Just a thought, you might want to consider "high endurance" or "pro grade" or "extreme" memory cards. They should have a longer lifespan when used for video recording. I'm a big fan of Samsung and Sandisk flash memory.

May your bits be stable and your interfaces be fast. Ron