LaCie PetiteKey (16GB)

The LaCie PetiteKey is the smaller sibling of the LaCie iamaKey, LaCie's clever USB drive that looks like a key and attaches easily to a keychain. It's a design that made flash drive designers and shoppers alike slap themselves up the side of the head for not thinking of designing a keychain-sized USB drive like a key. LaCie's key-shaped drives are skeuomorphism at its quirky best, and with the PetiteKey, LaCie has reduced the physical size of the drive while doubling the available capacity, available in (8GB, 16GB, and 32GB).

Design
The key shape and slim design make for a USB flash drive that is as pocketable as it gets. It doesn't just fit nicely on a keychain, it also blends in with the rest of your keys. You may find yourself occasionally pulling it out in an awkward attempt to open your front door. The PetitekKey may not brush off hard impact and extremes in temperature like the armored LaCie RuggedKey (16GB) , but it is still moisture and scratch resistant enough to stand up to daily life.

Our review unit came in 16GB capacity, but that capacity translates into 14.4GB of free space out of the package. LaCie also offers 8GB and 32GB capacities, which are available for $14.99 and $39.99 respectively.

The PetiteKey is constructed from stamped aluminum, and it's in the construction that the drive has problems. Issue number one, the "key" is made by sandwiching the drive between two sheets of stamped aluminum. The two layers aren't securely fastened, and I could see some looseness between them as soon as I pulled the key from its package. Second, while it's not obvious in the photos, there are also two small protruding tabs, one on either side of the USB connector, that poke out 0.5 millimeter from the otherwise smooth key. These tabs look as if they may be there to help protect the connector, but the way they jut out left me nervous to slip it in my pocket, because the edges are rather sharp. They also shouldn't be necessary?the Verbatim Store N' Go Clip-it also exposes the contacts, but doesn't have any similar tabs.

The contacts themselves don't seem to connect as directly as they should when plugging in to a USB port. Occasionally, I had to reposition the drive to get the plug to make contact and register as a drive. Finally, the key shaped design may crowd or block other USB ports.

With an price of $22.99, the 16GB PetiteKey sells for $1.43 per gigabyte, which is pretty reasonable?anything more expensive generally requires additional features to justify the higher price. For example, the Editors' Choice Kingston DataTraveler Locker+ G2 (16GB) sells for $1.56 per GB, but adds professional-grade hardware-based encryption. The similarly quirky Verbatim Store 'N' Go Clip-it sells in a three pack of 4GB drives for $1.83 per GB. LaCie's beefed up version of the drive, the RuggedKey, sells more than a $2.50 per GB at the same capacity, but it offers USB 3.0 in addition to a more durable design.

Features & Performance
LaCie offers more than just a clever design. Included with the drive is an equivalent 16GB of secure cloud storage, courtesy of Wuala. This 16GB of storage is free for 12 months, and can be used for either backing up your 16GB drive, or supplementing it for a total of 32GB when connected. Accessing this online storage requires downloading the free Wuala desktop or mobile apps, and entering the promo code found in the PetiteKey packaging. Install the app on both your PC and smartphone and you'll be able to access your files anywhere.

The drive also comes with LaCie's Private-Public software, which lets you set up a password protected partition, protected further with 256-bit AES encryption. Thanks to FAT32 formatting, the PetiteKey is compatible with both Windows and Mac operating systems. Both Wuala secure cloud storage and LaCie Private-Public encryption are compatible with both Windows and Mac OS X. LaCie also covers the drive with a two-year warranty.

In timed data transfer tests, the LaCie PetiteKey offered a read speed 14 MBps, and 6 MBps write speed. For a basic USB 2.0 drive, which is middling, but not half bad--the Verbatim Store N' Go Clip-it had similar speeds (15 MBps read, 6 MBps write), as did the SanDisk Ultra 32GB Flash Drive , which has slightly faster read speeds (21MBps read, 6MBps write). The Editors' Choice Kingston DataTraveler Locker+ G2 was notably faster (21MBps read, 12MBps write), but for the best performance, look for a drive offering USB 3.0.

COMPARISON TABLE
Compare the LaCie PetiteKey (16GB) with several other flash drives side by side.

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