I have lots of them, I use them all the time. You can put files or pics or what ever you want on them from your computer to save or to transfer from one place to another, I use them to move certain files from one of my computers to another. I also have one I carry that has all my portable apps on it so if I go somewhere and need to use a pc, I just stick my flash drive in and I have my firefox on it set up just like I want it, and lots of other applications even antivirus programs are made for portable use. They are some what fragile so you have to take care of them, I have a nice padded wallet made just for them I bought to keep them together and protected. as to your question about burning pictures to cd for her to view on her player there are a lot of variables there, if you use the right type of cd if she has a player that will play that type of cd if her player will play picture files, in some cases yes it can work.

Hi DA, On the back of the package it says this. Interface: USB 2.0 (Also compatable with USB 1.1 Ports) Operating System: Windows Vista, XP, 2000 Macintosh 9x and higher Linux kernel 2.6 x and higher Additional Functions: Password Security ( Supported on Windows operating systems only) Doesn't that Verbatim come with a U3 application already installed. I don't see it anywhere on the package. it should put an icon on your System Tray/Notification Area. Yes it does put an icon on my System Tray/Notification Area. When finished just double click on the U3 icon and a small window will appear in the lower right quadrant. Select Eject. When I double click on the Icon a box pops up and says this. Select the device that you want to unplug or eject, and then click Stop. When Windows notifies you that it is safe to do so unplug the device from your computer. Under Hardware Devices: USB Mass Storage Device I highlight USB Mass Storage Device and then click Stop and another box pops up and says,Confirm devices to be stopped. Choose OK to continue. Windows will attemp to stop the following devices, after the devices are stopped they may be removed safely. I highlight Verbatim Store'n'Go and click on OK. I hear a little pop noise and everything in that box including the one that I highlighted (Verbatim) disappears and so does the icon. That's when I know to pull out the USB Drive. That pop noise as I call it is a normal windows sound not a problem with the computer. Kind of like when I turn my printer on Windows makes a noise to let me know it has connected. That's about it, I hope that I explained it well enough for you to understand. Have a great day. "Smiles" thirdfrt!!!

I may be wrong, but I think you can only use external drives as main drives if they're SCSI or SATA. If you're dealing with USB devices, they're too slow. Some programs will not install on external drives. I may be misreading Ravencajun's last sentence. If you're looking for an external drive, you want to make sure you get something that is a portable drive. It would probably include all the cables. For a laptop replacement drive, you don't need the cables. What is probably the easiest way to upgrade a laptop hard drive is to get one of these EZupgrade enclosures with a drive. The nice thing about the enclosure is that it will work for either SATA or ATA. It includes software so that you can basically do the image and restore in one step, then just swap drives. Since your laptop is 5 years old and had a 6 gb drive to start, it's probably ATA/IDE/EIDE rather than SATA. You could get something like this with the EZ upgrade for less than $100. You'd put the new drive in the enclosure, run the software to clone the drive, turn everything off, pull the current drive, put in the new one and if all goes well, you can just start right up.

Not up on the easy transfer cable, you might want to investigate the transfer speed... but think you will find it slower than a regular network connection ... Inexpensive network switch and a couple of cat5 patch cables maybe lots quicker. Quick look at newegg I saw a network switch for $9.99 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833166034 Plain old usb wifi network adapters in ad-hoc mode run 11mbs and newegg and others usually have name brand ones for a wireless connection at $20 each. Sometimes close outs for less.