ADATA Elite S102 Pro 64GB USB 3.0 Flash Drive Review

TweakTown's Rating: 82%

The Bottom Line

With its strong price point, the ADATA S102 Pro is a great solution for those wanting a reliable drive for moving data backed by a lifetime warranty.

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Over the past few years, we have seen many flash come through the lab. While we typically request high performance solutions, this time around we take a look at a low-cost solution from ADATA.

The S102 Pro is part of the Elite line-up of flash solutions from ADATA. This drive carries capacity options ranging from 8GB to 256GB and features marketing performance of 100 MB/s read and 50 MB/s write for the 128GB solution, while the highest capacity option, the 256GB model, is capable of 200 MB/s read and 120 MB/s write. Compatibility includes Windows operating systems from XP to 8.1 along with Mac OS 9+ support.

MSRP of the ADATA S102 Pro in the 64GB capacity is listed at $32.99 with a lifetime warranty.

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Packaging for the S102 Pro houses the drive in a plastic retainer. Branding and marketing information display capacity and compatibility.

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The S102 carries the standard flash drive form factor, but adds elegance to it with its aluminium design. All branding information is printed along the bottom edge of the drive.

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This drive as seen above is a capped design, but carries a retainer at the back so you can secure the cap during use.

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Above, you can see we have the blue coloring denoting its USB 3.0 compatibility, while looking at this end you can see it carries a slim profile so it won't block adjacent ports during use.

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The ADATA S102 Pro is factory formatted with the FAT32 file system. Useable capacity after formatting is 58.1 GB.

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In our Windows 8.1 testing, the S102 came in at 45 MB/s read and 37 MB/s write. Certainly not the quickest drive we have tested.

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Within OS X 10.10, we found the S102 Pro to do slightly better with read coming in at 41 MB/s followed by write speeds at 49 MB/s.

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Price to Performance puts the S102 Pro towards the middle of the pack at 75.4%. Even with this drive's mediocre performance, with the MSRP being competitive, it certainly helped its case. While the S102 Pro certainly isn't the quickest flash drive we have tested over the last few years, it does offer a decent amount of value when you put the MSRP and decent performance together. Build quality seemed to be rather good; the aluminium design adds both durability and aesthetics to the solution.

Performance of the drive in our testing showed performance around 45 MB/s read and 37 MB/s write in Windows 8.1, while OS X offered slightly more at 41 MB/s read and 49 MB/s. Price to Performance sat the S102 Pro down right in the middle of the pack at 75% thanks to the drive's very competitive MSRP.

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