We got another custom shaped drive order through the office today. These drives were custom made for CBTNuggets.com and is the shape of their site logo. In case you did not know, cbtnuggets.com is one the top websites for learning IT and obtaining a certification at home or at the office. They offer video courses that cover Microsoft, Cicso, Oracle, Linux, CompTIA and more. I’ve been browsing their site, and they’ve really got some interesting courses, such as the “Certified Ethical Hacker” lessons.

The drive itself looks great, as you can see from the photos. Their logo lends itself well to be made into a flash drive, because like most standard USB drives, it is shaped like a rectangular prism. The outside of the drive is made of a durable rubberized material that can survive drops and is unscathed by light scratches. All in all, I think these came out great and we hope CBT likes them as much as we do.

Auntie Anne’s, the pretzel deities if you’ve never heard of them ordered from us and you know what that means, pretzel party for the office! Along with the imprinted DE white drives they ordered we got 10-20 pretzels, just ’cause. I must say both where really awesome. We took some pictures of the drives and I managed to concoct a new signature item: carton-o-usb .

It was very surprising to me that the pretzel made it through the whole photo shoot.

’till next time.

Some of the best looking prints are on white backgrounds so its a big surprise we get few orders for custom colored swivels on the SWM USB Drive. El Dorado Restoration, however, wanted to get a white swivel for their order and as expected they came out very well.

If you want to see more pictures visit the SWM style page on our site or search for SWM

We have been getting a lot of orders for our wooden drives in the paste couple months so we’ve decided to show off some of those orders. This style is our WDR1 Wooden USB it has a couple magnets in the cap to secure itself closed. Most of our wooden models are branded using our burn in process but we can also print them.

This order in particular was meant to showcase old west Americana for an artist. The print and the stained wood made a great match with the artistic style he has.

I thought these where pretty cool. The different blues with the white swivels really came out well. I had some fun with the blue paper background too.

If you want to check out more of these you can visit the SWM swivel USB style page. They are my favorite style, have a 16GB one myself.

We got a cool batch of drives made up for an organization who wanted to get a Lego shaped USB. They where made from our rubberized material. We can mold drives from any materials so technically these could have been exact Lego copies with the addition of a USB. If anyone wants some hard plastic Lego drives let us know, I’m overly eager to build another fort. Or for that matter if you would like a custom shape made from any type of material, please contact us as well.

This guide will explain the steps to install Ubuntu Linux 10.04 Desktop Edition to a flash drive. There are three options to explore: Live USB, Persistent Live USB, and direct install to USB. We will cover the necessary steps to accomplish each type of install.

Ubuntu Custom Printed USB Drives

Option 1: Boot Ubuntu as a Live CD from a USB Flash Drive

Use this option to install Ubuntu as a Live Install, which allows you to boot from the USB flash drive in Ubuntu, experience the Linux environment but will not retain any changes or settings after you shut down. This is a great way to get a feel for the OS, test some of it’s capabilities as well as typical hardware compatibility.

What you will need:

Ubuntu Desktop Edition

Universal USB Installer

Running Windows XP/Vista/7

Fat32 Formatted USB 2.0 Flash Drive, at least 1GB

PC with a Bios that can boot from USB

Now with all of the necessary components in place, we can begin to setup our Ubuntu Live USB Drive.

1. Run the Universal USB Installer by Pendrivelinux.com that you downloaded earlier.

2. Choose Ubuntu 9.10/10.04.1 Desktop i386

3. Select the Ubuntu Live CD that you downloaded earlier

4. Choose your Flash Drive

5. In this instance, we are going leave the persistence option unchecked.

This can take anywhere from 15 minutes to 30 minutes depending on the speed of your system. At one point the progress bar will freeze until it is done, and this is the lengthiest wait of the process.

Once complete, you can reboot your computer with the USB flash drive in the USB port, press F12 for the Boot Menu and choose the removable media to boot from and you are in.

As this is a Live USB, any changes you make to the Ubuntu environment will not persist through a reboot. This is because running in this mode, Ubuntu uses available RAM in place of Swap and Hard Disk space. This option also contains the install files needed to install Ubuntu directly to your desktop if you should so desire.

Option 2: Boot Ubuntu as a Live CD with Persistence from a USB Flash Drive

This option will install Ubuntu Linux onto your flash drive with an area for persistent storage. You will be able to restart the computer, boot back into the Linux environment and all settings or changes made previously will persist.

NOTE: This option is particularly hard on Flash Memory, as there can be quite a bit of reading and writing to the Flash Memory.

What you will need:

Ubuntu Desktop Edition ISO

Universal USB Installer

Running Windows XP/Vista/7

Fat32 Formatted USB 2.0 Flash Drive, at least 2GB

PC with a Bios that can boot from USB

Now with all of the necessary components in place, we can begin to setup our Ubuntu Live USB Drive.

1. Run the Universal USB Installer by Pendrivelinux.com that you downloaded earlier.

2. Choose Ubuntu 9.10/10.04.1 Desktop i386

3. Select the Ubuntu Live CD that you downloaded earlier

4. Choose your Flash Drive

5. Select the Persistence Option of 1GB Casper-RW

This can take anywhere from 15 minutes to 30 minutes depending on the speed of your system. At one point the progress bar will freeze until it is done, and this is the lengthiest wait of the process.

Once complete, you can reboot your computer with the USB flash drive in the USB port, press F12 for the Boot Menu and choose the removable media to boot from and you are in.

As this is a Live USB with Persistence, any changes you make to the Ubuntu environment will keep through a reboot. This option also contains the install files needed to install Ubuntu directly to your desktop if you should so desire.

Option 3: Install Ubuntu directly to a USB flash Drive

This option works through installing Ubuntu to the flash drive as a complete installation. It does not retain the installation files to install on another system. This will allow you to use Ubuntu exactly as if it were installed alone on the hard disk. You can boot from it with any computer that can boot from a USB flash drive.

Note: This method requires that you disable your hard drive in BIOS to prevent overwriting your current operating system and force the install onto the USB drive.

What you will need:

Ubuntu Desktop Edition ISO

USB 2.0 Flash Drive, at least 4GB

PC with a BIOS that can boot from USB

Blank CD

A Computer with the ability to Burn CD/DVD

Now with all of the necessary components in place, we can begin the process.

1. First, you will need to burn your Ubuntu ISO to CD using a program like ImgBurn.

2. Boot your computer and press F2 to enter the system BIOS. Within here you will want to disable your Hard Drive. If this is not an option in your BIOS, I would suggest shutting down your computer and unplugging the power and data cables from your hard drive before proceeding. NOTE: If you choose not to disable your hard drive, you run the risk of installing Ubuntu on top of your current OS and can lose valuable information.

3. After you have disabled your hard drive, place the Ubuntu Live CD into your computer and boot from this.

4. At the initial boot screen, choose to try Ubuntu, not install.

5. Once Ubuntu loads, plug in the desired flash drive into the computer.

6. Now, double click on the Install Ubuntu icon that appears on the desktop.

7. The first 3 screens are language, time zone, and keyboard layout.

8. Now Ubuntu will notify you that there is a disk mounted, and asks to unmount it. This is your flash drive. Give it permission to unmount.

9. This is the prepare disk space screen. I chose to leave mine at default and let the installer handle the partitions needed by Linux.

10. Now you will see the login and user information screen.

11. Now you are ready to install, click install.

12. At one point during the installation, you may notice a skip button appear on the bottom left. This is to skip the auto update, and finally the language packs. I chose to skip language packs update.

13. This may take a while, mine took atbout 35 minutes to complete. When it is done, eject the disk and shut down the computer. Plug your hard drive back in if necessary, or boot your computer into bios and re-enable it. Reboot your computer and press F12 to enter the boot menu, choose the flash drive and boot into Ubuntu.

Thank you for joining us for this How To Guide. Check back often for new posts.

Recently there have been quite a few requests for our new key styles of custom USB drives. These styles have the look and feel of house keys, while offering a sturdy and reliable way to carry your data. This particular order of Key style flash drives really shows what a company can do with their logo. Matching the logo and lanyard colors makes these drives look truly customized.

Cincom Key Style USB with Lanyard

Not only were they able to print the logo and company name, but also the mission of the company around the lanyard. Cincom Systems, Inc. is a company that specializes in reducing the costs of operations through intelligent document automation.

We just completed this order for Mechtronics using both the white color SWM style printable metal swivel flash drive along with our clear plastic case packaging option. You can choose from a variety of color choices (including custom colors) for this popular flash drive. As well, you also have several choices for a packaging option should you need one.

We think that they turned out pretty spectacular. What do you think?

Hello again folks.

Today I am going to talk about something that makes our sector of the promotional industry different from every other. Unlike pens, hi-liters, rulers, letter openers, and other throw-away items, USB drives are always on the move. Where the former have had the same pricing since the dawn of time, USB pricing is always fluctuating. NAND Flash Memory chips and USB Controllers, (the guts of a USB drive) are a commodity available in many grades and subject to the same set of rules as wheat, corn, even gold. Chips are cut from silicon which is a fluctuating commodity in and of itself. They are also born of various chemical compounds, both natural and synthetic. Like any natural and refined resource, there will be times when essential components are scarce. Whether this is a legitimate lack of supply, or generated we will never know, but nevertheless it affects us, the consumer, in the end. And, just like the big oil companies, the big players in flash memory manufacturing, (Samsung, Toshiba, Hynix, Micron) control the market.

Now, granted our friends in the “cheapie” side of promotional items have their fluctuation problems too, but when was the last big jump PLASTIC took? I can remember the great “glow-in-the-dark” ink price hike of ’89 that drove HiLiter prices so high that office managers everywhere were rationing them out like gold coins. Just kidding, folks. Can you sense the sarcasm? My point is, the only change you will see on that side of the industry is good old inflation. Not so in our neck of the woods. Welcome to the land of USB.

The Ugly Truth

Well, as I write this today, we are in the throes of yet another NAND Flash Memory price increase. Once again, I have to reach out to my potential customers and explain how the price I quoted them not three days ago, (sometimes it’s a daily occurrence) can no longer be honored. Even though we only saw a small increase today (about 3%), it is never easy to tell a customer that prices have gone up. I find myself sounding like a broken record.

You see, when I started in this business, things went the opposite way. Back in ’06 prices were ridiculously high for USB drives, being a relatively new form of media storage. A 64Mb drive would cost upwards of $15.00 a pop for orders of 100 units or more, and a 1gb drive….FUGHEDABOUDIT! As time passed into 2007 and 2008, and as technology and storage capacity needs increased, we saw prices start to fall. The smaller capacities were becoming obsolete in the retail sector and the promotional USB business was really starting to grow. By the end of 2008, Flash Memory prices were at an all time low and the big manufacturers were pumping out flash chips in record numbers. By the beginning of 2009, the price of a 64Mb flash drive was about $4.00 for a 100 unit order, customized with a logo imprint, data preloading, shipping, the works. Needless to say, this was quite a busy time for us and as a salesman I was finding it quite easy to fulfill my monthly quota. Then something happened…

2nd quarter, 2009. News on the wire came whispering about a big deal in the works. A deal that could turn our industry on its head. News was also beginning to trickle in about BIG-TIME losses by the big three flash memory manufacturers. The “good days”, it seemed, were going to come to an end. In a time where the economy is covered in gooey bandages and slimy with topical antibiotics, things were going to get that much harder.

By the end of June of this year, we were already seeing minute increases of about 3-5% on a bi-weekly basis. Although it is not a pleasant call to make, it is not hard to justify a $.20 per unit increase in a fluctuating, commodity-based market. So, we made do and things in the business were still looking bright. Then, the big hit.

In the first week of July, the news hit that Apple had made a substantial purchase of NAND Flash Memory for the new 16Gb I-phone they would be releasing. The numbers were staggering. A purchase of nearly $500,000,000.00 in flash memory hit the industry like a ton of bricks. Toshiba was the big winner here, but it did not take long for Samsung and Hynix to follow suit in what would be, literally, and overnight price increase of almost 30% for the promotional USB industry.

Now, try and call your customer on Monday morning to tell them that you can longer honor a price on the Purchase Order they had faxed over the weekend. Just tell them, sorry, but I have to charge you an extra $1.25 PER UNIT and there is nothing I can do about it. When we are talking about these kinds of significant numbers, people tend to get a little annoyed. Many sales were stalled or lost, and many customers left to run the risks of purchasing down-graded flash and refurbished garbage in order to stay within budget. And so we forged ahead and as the dust settled, we were able to stabilize, and angry customers slowly calmed into the realization that this was “just the way it is”. Things were good for about two weeks and then, as sure as a rain cloud brings thunder, the prices started to increase again.

By the beginning of August, the “5% creep” began again and we started seeing articles about how flash memory manufacturers were reporting tremendous losses for 2008. So, what do you do when you are a multi-billion dollar company providing much-needed technology to the masses and bleeding money like a stuck pig? You do what you should have done a year ago: Put a strangle-hold on a market that demands high quality products and can only get it from yourself and a select few others. You stop manufacturing flash memory chips that are in much lower demand than the 50,000,000 chips that Apple pre-paid for for their next record-setting year. Set the market at whatever price you want. Create an increasing demand by hoarding inventory and releasing much needed products on the market slowly. Scorn the very industry that created demand for flash memory before the advent of the i-phone and back when the i-pod was an unaffordable gadget.

Yes, people, I am bitter. The promotional USB industry has been pushed aside like a red-headed stepchild by the flash memory manufacturers. How easily large corporations forget the sectors that helped them through hard times. flash memory has many applications besides USB and SD cards. They are used in today’s most popular devices: MP3 players, I-pods, I-phones, Smart Phones, and the like. As these devices became more affordable to the general public, the demand for higher capacity flash memory grew. Suddenly, the promotional USB sector was not the big sell anymore. And so, as it goes, we have fallen to the wayside and are subject to the bullying of price gouging, or whatever you want to call it.

In conclusion, I guess my point is this: Price fluctuations in the custom/promotional USB industry is NOT a ploy to increase profits. At least, not by the manufacturers and resellers of USB products. Computer memory of any kind is most definitely a commodity and subject to all of the same rules of supply and demand that wheat, corn, and gold are. So, if you are in the bidding process with several companies and you receive a call saying: ” Bob, I sincerely apologize, but we can no longer honor last week’s quote”, do not be angry. Do not be alarmed. No one is trying to pull the wool over your eyes, or even worse (insert imaginative expletive here). This is just the way things are in our world and stability is a luxury we see very seldom. This article should in no way sway you in your decision to purchase USB as a promotional tool. No matter the price, customized USB drives’ value far outweighs that of any other medium. If you break it down over time, they are still the best value and most reliable form of branding around.

Until next time……as always, thanks for reading my rant.