Question on failing memory sticks...

[reflex33]

Most memory sticks these days say you can write to them around 1 million times, but what happens when they start to fail? Will you just not be able to write to it (meaning I can still retrieve my data) or is the whole thing dead and my data would be gone?

 

[djnes]

Usually when they start to fail, they can be formatted, and data written to them, but as soon as it's disconnected and reconnected, it prompts you to be reformatted again. Or, it will just refuse to accept a format and be usable. If it does fail, that data on the stick is most likely lost, without some sort of repair device or software.

I've seen freeware out there that is able to recover data from flash memory cards with some degree of success.