SanDisk obviously thinks that good things come in bloody tiny packages if the company’s new USB flash drive range – the Cruzer Blade series – is anything to go by.

The Cruzer Blade – great name and good value. If you don’t lose the tiny yoke.

How small is it? Well, it’s about the size of a paper clip and weighs about the same as a penny.

The ‘thumblet’ drive is only available in the US and Canada for the minute, with prices ranging from of 2GB to 16GB and prices going from US$14.99 to US$77.99. Hopefully though we’ll see them on this side of the Atlantic soon enough.

Believe it or not, the Cruzer Blade isn’t actually the smallet USB on the market. As The Register points out, Traxdata claims to have the world’s smallest thumb drive (the MICRO USB), while the Pico USB flash drive is hardly a behemoth either considering is the size of a finger nail, fits in a thimble and has a ring for key-ring attachment as well.

Personally, maybe it’s just years of being used to ‘bulkier’ models but I don’t like these tiny options. Easy to lose, not particularly sturdy and awkward to use if attached to a key-ring with more than one key on it, a stronger, two-inch-ish model wins out for me every time.