USB Flash Drive - Design and Implementation

Design and Implementation

On a USB flash drive, one end is fitted with a single Standard-A USB plug. Inside the plastic casing is a small printed circuit board, which has some power circuitry and a small number of surface-mounted integrated circuits (ICs). Typically, one of these ICs provides an interface between the USB connector and the onboard memory, while the other is the flash memory.

Drives typically use the USB mass storage device class to communicate with the host.


Internals of a typical USB flash drive

1 USB Standard, Male A-plug
2 USB mass storage controller device
3 Test points
4 Flash memory chip
5 Crystal oscillator
6 LED (Optional)
7 Write-protect switch (Optional)
8 Space for second flash memory chip

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