They get tinier… – /dev/urandom

This is the memory device shown from both sides. Dimensions? 35mm long, 7mm deep, and 20mm wide at the widest point

This is what it looks like when the (protective) soft rubber coating is off. 27mm long, 15mm wide and 5mm deep. Quite a reduction from last step.

And finally - the reason it was broken: the electronics, and the memory chip. Yup, literally broken. And the dimensions of this thingie? 25.5mm long, 11mm wide and just short of 2mm thick

One of the things I’m wondering about is what the two golden contacts at the opposite end of the USB is for. It seems strange to place ’em there, but who knows?

In total, the active parts of this USB memory device 561mm³, and can contain 16GB of data. If we scale this up, we get 14260GB, or approx. 14TB of data per liter of volume. Using 3.5″ hard disk drives as the standard, they are approx. 100×143.75x25mm, or 359375mm³. The biggest 3.5″ today is 2TB or so, which means they measure in at approx. 5.5TB per liter of space – or less than half of the data densitity of flash drives…

Now, do the math with a Micro SD card, which can hold up to 16GB, and measure in at 15x11x1mm, or 165mm³ – or just short of 100TB per liter of space…