Testing

     For testing I'll be using ClubOC's water cooled rig that started with Swiftech's Quiet Power P180 water cooled chassis. We then we added the EVGA 680i motherboard, an Intel C2D E6700, Mushkin Extreme Performance XP2-8500 DDR2, and a pair of EVGA GeForce 7600GT video cards. Last we added 3x Seagate 7200.10 SATA Hard Drives running in RAID 0.

     For benchmarking hard drive performance I use Hard Drive Tach. HD Tach has proven very reliable for us over the years and I like to stick with what works. For comparison I'll be putting the OCZ ATV Turbo up against 3 other Flash Drives, the OCZ Rally 2Gb, the PQI i810 1Gb, and the Visiontek Extreme 2 Go 1Gb. First up, the OCZ Rally 2Gb Flash Drive.

OCZ  Rally 2Gb

     The OCZ Rally drives have always been my favorites because of 2 major points, speed and the slim size of the drive. The Rally drives is extremely quick at a read and write speed of around 23 to 24 MB/s.  

PQI i810 1Gb

     The PQI i810 drives are also nice if you like micro drives the size of a fingernail. However, speed takes a major hit with an average of 19.4 MB/s read and only 6.1 MB/s write. 

Visiontek Extreme 2 Go 1Gb

     My old Visontek Extreme 2 Go drive is living proof of durability and longevity. I use this drive on a daily basis and have done so for years now. I've also ran this drive through the washer and dryer several times and it just keeps on working. Short of smashing it with a hammer, this drive just won't quit. Unfortunately, it's one of the slowest drives I've ever owned with an average read speed of only 8.1 MB/s and write of only 6.8 MB/s.

OCZ ATV Turbo

     In the performance department, the OCZ ATV Turbo comes out on top with an average read speed of 32.8 MB/s and an average write speed of 24.5 MB/s. Very impressive!

     To recap, here are the read and write averages from each flash drive. The OCZ ATV Turbo is the clear winner!  

The Washer & Dryer Test

     I don't know about you, but one of the worst feelings is when you've got about a gigabyte worth of important documents and files on your flash drive and you hear it banging around in the dryer with 5 minutes left on a 45 minute dry time. So in order to test just how rugged the ATV Turbo is, I ran it through the washer and dryer a few times. After each cycle, I checked the ATV Turbo to ensure it still worked. Even after 3 full cycles, the ATV Turbo worked flawlessly.

Conclusion

     Not only does the OCZ ATV Turbo have what it takes in the performance department, it also has a huge advantage of being designed to withstand the rugged outdoor lifestyle. This rugged design makes the OCZ ATV Turbo ideal for use with computers such as tough notebooks or just to carry along to jobsites. The rugged design of the ATV Turbo also gives me piece of mind that if I do run it through the washer and dryer that it will withstand my carelessness. Coming in at around $73 for 4Gb of storage, the ATV Turbo is priced extremely well for what it's designed to do. The OCZ ATV Turbo is yet another exceptional and innovative product by a top notch company! Club Overclocker Recommended!

Note: Club Overclocker is now using a new rating system based on a score of 1 to 5.
Please go to our rating system page for more information.

Performance:	5 out of 5
Innovation:	5 out of 5
Quality:	5 out of 5
Stability:	5 out of 5
Aesthetics:	5 out of 5
Software/Drivers Pack:	N/A
Overclocking:	N/A
Value:	4 out of 5
Project Skill Level (5 being most difficult)	1 out of 5