FAQs

From your first inquiry, you’ll be assigned to a dedicated account manager, who will be there to ensure your order is processed quickly and efficiently. Should you have a query throughout the production process, they’ll be there to help too.

As a new customer we do ask for upfront payment before dispatch, however, as a repeat customer we can open up a 30-day credit account, subject to approval.

Our design team will create visual proofs of the artwork and logo you’ve chosen, to ensure you are happy with the design before production. We’re happy to make any amendments to your designs, and can even send out dummy drives upon request too.

If you would like to place your order, please contact your account manager. We do not currently have an online store for USB Makers.

However, we do have certain USB styles available to order online on our sister site www.usb4photographers.com.

Once you have received your invoice, you can pay using a SagePay link at the bottom of your invoice, you can make a bank / wire transfer or by giving your allocated account manager a call with your card details.

For more information get in touch

At USB Makers, we realise how important it is to understand precisely what you’re ordering, particularly when you’re ordering in bulk.

Whenever you choose to begin a no-obligation quote with us, you can attach a logo file and a member of our expert design team will create a brand mock-up of your design on the USB you’ve selected.

All you need to do is attach the file to your enquiry, and you’ll receive a mock-up design file alongside your quote.

Find out more here.

We can offer Screen Printing, Epoxy Dome Resin Printing, Pad Printing, Digital UV Print, Foil Printing and Laser Engraving.

Please note that not all methods are available on certain products. Please get in touch with your Account Manager for more information.

We can offer foil printing on certain products. Please get in touch with your Account Manager for more information.

Please send us your Logo/Artwork as either an AI, EPS or high-resolution PDF file. We can also work with hi-res PNGs and JPEGs

Please send your Account Manager your data using either WeTransfer or Dropbox.

At the present time, this is not something we offer. However, we are looking into this in the future as an optional extra.

Our lowest minimum order quality on select USB drives and power banks starts from just 10 units. Our most widely available Standard Service starts from fifty pieces, and all custom drives and power banks are available at 100 pieces.

Find out more here.

Yes, upon request we can send out a fully branded sample of your chosen USB style.

Please note, these are dummy samples and therefore are non-functional as they are designed to show you how each model looks and feels.

This often helps those who are still unsure as to the style they’re looking for.

Unfortunately, not all of our styles are available in single units. If you would like to take a look at the products we can offer as single units, please head over to our sister site www.usb4photographers.com.

We’re able to offer free delivery worldwide on all orders we produce. Although our head office is based in the UK, we work in close collaboration with our delivery partner DHL to offer speedy delivery no matter where you are in the world. We offer free international delivery to more than 220 countries with DHL’s Express Service, this means we’re also able to offer same-day delivery for UK orders for an additional fee.

Unfortunately, we are not able to send Power Banks Worldwide. Please get in touch with your Account Manager to see if we are able to send them to a specific country.

Power Banks fall under the category of dangerous goods and certain countries will not accept delivery of them.

Depending on your requirements we offer an Express Service for a range of USB stick, gift box and power bank designs, including full branding.
Typically, we offer dispatch of between 3-5 working days, but we’re also able to offer four power bank styles, twelve USB styles with memory capacity ranging from 128mb to 64Gb, and thirteen packaging options with full colour, pantone colouring or laser engraving (wood only) with next day delivery, subject to location.
Find out more here.

If you’ve received a like-for-like quote for the same USB style, quantity, capacity and turnaround time and a competitor is offering a better price, we guarantee to match or even beat genuine quotes. All you need to do is send over the quote and your dedicated account manager will be happy to help.

A USB flash drive is a small memory drive that is used as a compact hard drive, which allows you to safely store and transport computer data between devices. Although there are different size ranges in terms of data storage, they are capable of holding large amounts of information and are small enough to carry in your pocket, on your keys or even in your wallet or purse.

On a laptop, you’ll find the USB port on the side of the machine (they may be on the back of some older machines).

If you’re using a desktop computer, in this case it’ll be somewhere close to the CPU, which may be on the monitor or the system tower.

Find out more.

Once you’ve inserted your USB into the port, you should see the clickable icon in Finder on Mac or Explorer in Windows.

From here it’s simply a case of dragging and dropping files into the USB, or vice-versa.

The biggest advantage of USB drives is their size and portability. They are far smaller than external hard drives, and are more robust with no internal moving parts which are easy to break. A USB also doesn’t require configuration to connect, which external hard drives need to operate correctly. USB ports are now standard across most devices, which now often won’t include CD/DVD trays as they once did, and flash drives can have data stored, transferred, and deleted over and over, this can’t be said of CD/DVD’s. Floppy disks are only capable of storing just over 1MB of data in most cases, so it’s easy to see why this technology has become largely obsolete when compared to the USB.

Our USB memory sizes range from as small as 128Mb up to 64Gb. We have over seventy USB styles to choose from, and we can print your USB in up to four pantone colours, offer full-colour printing or even laser engraved to match your company brand.
Find out more here.

There is no exact number of uses or years that USB’s will last. Some manufacturers claim a product can last up to a decade – but this is a figure estimated on how the average consumer will use a flash drive. The real test of how long a USB will last is the write cycles. Each memory chip will only facilitate so many write cycles before they wear down. That said, it’s generally accepted that most chips will handle between 10,000 and 100,000 cycles. Find out more here.

We use only the very best components in our USB drives to ensure they can run efficiently and securely across many years.
More generally, every USB contains the following crucial components:
● Connector – to connect the USB to a compatible device.
● Mass Storage Controller – this can be accessed by the host system, such as a laptop, and enables information transfer.
● NAND Flash Memory Chip – the NAND chip is a non-volatile data storage, which means that data can be saved without a power source, and acts as the support system in the drive to keep everything working as it should.
● Crystal Oscillator – This component manages the information flow within the device’s circuitry. The crystal oscillator uses a 12 MHz clock signal to control device output (all devices use a clock system) to create a memory structure.
● Cover – as you’d imagine the hard-outer shell of the device protects the complex circuitry within.
Find out more here.

Typically, the best means to protect your devices and the USB itself, against the threat of viruses is to follow some basic security protocols. These include internet firewalls, virus scanners and other tools. You should also ensure you don’t plug your USB into devices you’re unsure about, and may wish to run a virus scanner on the contents of your USB before accessing or attempting to move any data.

NAND flash memory is divided into three broader categories:
● Single-Level Cell – Single-Level cell memory stores pieces of data into each cell, which results in faster transfer, lower power use and higher cell performance.
● Multi-Level Cell – MLC memory stores two pieces of data in each cell. This results in more storage per bit. Although this is slower, sees higher power usage and decreased cell performance than SLC, it is significantly cheaper to produce.
● Triple-Level Cell – Triple-level cell memory stores three bits in each cell. This significantly increases power consumption, slows transfer speeds and increases the rate of error. The big advantage over the other two cell types is TLC memory utilises a smaller chip, requires less power and is by far the cheapest to produce.

If you’ve just bought a new flash drive, or you’ve noticed that your current flash is reading and writing data very slowly, then there could be one of a number of things causing this:

●        Bad sectors.
●        Unstable power supplies.
●        Transferring large files.
●        The USB port is outdated and therefore not compatible with a newer drive.
●        USB is almost full, therefore limiting transfer speeds.

Find out here.

USB drive memory capacity is never 100% of the stated capacity. Most USB drive’s capacity ranges from 95-98% usable memory. (i.e.- a 1GB drive holds roughly 950MB)

*All statistics are estimates and will vary depending on the exact file size and/or combination with other files.
 
Find out more here.

One of the most common questions we’re asked is when you’re given prompts to say your flash drive is full, even when you know it isn’t.

Before you delete any files, it’s worth double checking:

●        Over Provisioning.
●        Hidden Files.
●        User Error.

Find out here.