My LEGO Flash Drive

During my freshman year, I was fortunate enough to get a free flash drive from my roommate, who already had several. It was a nice 1 GB drive that worked quite well for quick transfers. Unfortunately, the outer casing was cracked, causing the cap to be quite loose and the inner workings of the drive to separate from the casing as I was removing it from my desktop computer one day. After my initial dismay at my drive separating in such a way, I realized nothing was permanently broken and I became intrigued with the circuitry of the drive, taking these pictures:

I think the large black rectangle in the second picture is the actual memory unit. Just behind it is the LED that blinks when the drive is transferring data.

After that, I put the drive back together and made do with a precariously broken case for a few weeks, until I got home and had plenty of crafting materials and time. As long as the circuit board that makes the drive work is kept safe from dust and shorts, you can protect it inside pretty much anything. This video gives some excellent ideas, though most are rather unwieldy. At the suggestion of one of my floormates, I decided to make a new case for it--out of LEGOs!

As a small child before I got into video games, LEGOs were my thing. I would eagerly await my next allowance that would allow me to buy some new set, and they were standard gifts for my birthdays and Christmas. I've since sold most of them (largely to buy video games; this was before I had a job), but I still have some in storage in my room. After getting them out and blowing off copious (disgusting) amounts of dust, I got to work and made the following:

A nice, solid, black case for my beloved flash drive. Thanks to some LEGO Technic fasteners, the new cap would stay on quite securely. Next it was time to hot-glue it...

...and then add some transparent bricks so I could still see the LED.

So at last, my flash drive has this extremely schnazzy case. Not exactly pocket-sized (or shaped--those sharp corners would hurt), but sturdy and dustproof.