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I just bought a 12 GB Pendrive. When I tested it, It was only 2 GB (Yeah, I just got cheated).

But then I ask: Is it possible to create a 12 GB Pendrive (specially with 1 chip) ?? If noy, why ??

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Where'd you buy this, a friend? – ekaj Apr 10 '12 at 1:26

closed as not a real question by sblair, Tom Wijsman, Dave M, techie007, Nifle Apr 10 '12 at 11:53

It's difficult to tell what is being asked here. This question is ambiguous, vague, incomplete, overly broad, or rhetorical and cannot be reasonably answered in its current form. For help clarifying this question so that it can be reopened, see the FAQ.

2 Answers

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Sure it is. But it's not practical since it would require three 4GB chips instead of one 8GB or 16GB chip.

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But in only 1 chip, is it posssible ? – COCACOLA_SAUDE Apr 10 '12 at 1:05
I suppose you could have a 16GB chip with only 12GB marked as usable, but there wouldn't be much point. – Keith Thompson Apr 10 '12 at 1:06
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@COCACOLA_SAUDE: They don't make 12GB chips. – Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams Apr 10 '12 at 1:09
@Ignacio: Those are RAM chips, and the chosen answer for that question references the tie between memory address sizes and the CPU. That's completely irrelevant for storage devices. – Lèse majesté Apr 10 '12 at 1:19
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@Ignacio: Is that why 12GB microSD cards exist? And if that were the case, how exactly does a 3-bit MLC NAND chip work? – Lèse majesté Apr 10 '12 at 1:35
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They have just adjusted the controller and/or partition to return those values; in some occasnions reformatting gives you the effective limit, in other cases writing past the limit just makes it wrap around from the start again. So, if you would write 3 GB on a 2 GB, you would be overwriting 1 GB of the first 2 GB that you've written.

Long story short:They indeed tampered with it, trust is an important consideration when buying...

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