Has your phone replaced your USB stick?

[ZDroid1]

With usb being universal and bluetooth in modern smartphones with lots of memory, who needs those dumb sticks?

 

[UncleMike]

I do. I'm not about to connect my Droid to some unknown computer that may be riddled with who-knows-what viruses and/or malware.

 

[PhoenixFx]

Bluetooth is way too slow if you want to transfer anything larger than few megabytes (and not all computers, especially desktops have BT). For USB, you have to carry a cable or else use it over Wi-fi or something (need to configure first and may not be available at all the places). Which IMO is a bigger hassle than carrying a tiny USB stick attached to your key ring.

 

[Demache]

I do. I'm not about to connect my Droid to some unknown computer that may be riddled with who-knows-what viruses and/or malware.

Your Droid should be pretty safe from Windows viruses. Considering they wouldn't run on it. And if you have USB Dev mode off, it couldn't do anything through ADB commands. It still has the possibility of infecting other machines you connect your Droid to by putting an autostart program on the drive. But that can happen with any kind of flash drive.

I just use flash drives, since they are still more convenient to carry around than my phone AND a USB cable. But I keep a cable in my car, just in case.

And Bluetooth is just way to slow for large files.

 

[brews]

Dropbox has replaced my usb stick. Anything in the folder syncs with all my other computers. I think I saw an android app for it, but I still haven't purchased an android tablet.

 

[UncleMike]

Your Droid should be pretty safe from Windows viruses. Considering they wouldn't run on it. And if you have USB Dev mode off, it couldn't do anything through ADB commands. It still has the possibility of infecting other machines you connect your Droid to by putting an autostart program on the drive. But that can happen with any kind of flash drive...

I agree that the Droid hardware and OS would be safe from a Windows virus, but the files on the SD card could be wiped from existence by some malicious application. Call me overly cautious, but I'll only be plugging my Droid into computers that I trust.

 

[bluenova]

Where's the poll? Yes.

 

[bluenova]

I agree that the Droid hardware and OS would be safe from a Windows virus, but the files on the SD card could be wiped from existence by some malicious application. Call me overly cautious, but I'll only be plugging my Droid into computers that I trust.

Not really relevent though as the same could be said for your USB stick.

 

[UncleMike]

Not really relevent though as the same could be said for your USB stick.

Yes, the same could be said for my USB stick, if I didn't have one with a hardware write-protect switch on it (which I don't). I did have one at one time, but it died, and the only replacements I found with such a feature were extremely overpriced.

In my current circumstances though, my USB stick is used primarily for me to have certain utility and/or diagnostic programs with me in case I need them at a customer's site. But everything on my USB stick can be easily replaced from the backup I keep on my PC. With its ever-changing contents, I can't say the same for the microSD card in my phone.

As Froyo becomes available for an increasing number of devices, so does Apps2SD, giving the wiping of a microSD card the potential to directly impact the operability of the phone.

Ignoring all that though, I think a USB stick is still more conveniently carried in pocket than the USB cable required to use my phone as a USB-stick replacement.