How to Transfer Data Using a Flash Drive

Flash drives have become the portable data storage devices of choice for students, independent technology consultants, remote workers and other mobile professionals. Increased storage capacities have made these flash drives capable of carrying high-capacity files such as videos, music clips and photos in addition to word processing documents, spreadsheets, PDFs and other files. Transferring data to any workstation using a flash drive or vice versa involves just a few steps.

Difficulty:

Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need

• Computer Flash drive

1. Plug your flash drive into any USB port of your laptop, or plug it into a USB hub port or a USB extension cable attached to your desktop. A flash drive takes the place of Removable Disk on the available drive of your computer.

2. Transfer data to your flash drive. Select documents such as Word documents, PDF files, spreadsheets or PowerPoint presentations saved in different folders on your desktop or laptop. Drag selected folders or files by holding the left mouse button on them, and drop them directly onto your flash drive.

3. Copy and paste files. Another way to transfer data files is to select files on the desktop and right-click on them. Scroll down through the options menu to "Copy," and then right-click in the flash drive and this time choose "Paste." You can follow the same process to transfer data files from the flash drive to the computer.

4. Save data files directly in your flash drive. Open a file saved on your computer, go to the file option at the top of the menu bar and scroll down to the "Save As" option. The computer directory with all the drives and macro folders will open up. Double-click on "Computer" and then double-click on the flash drive. Save the file directly in the flash drive.

5. Use your flash drive as a portable data storage device. Carry all important files and then transfer data loaded or saved on your flash drive to another workstation elsewhere.

Tips & Warnings

• After finishing your data transferring tasks, never pull out the flash drive directly from the USB port of your computer. Always click the "Safely Remove Hardware" button from the task bar and click "Stop" on the pop-up window that opens up. However, if another pop-up window asks about confirming the hardware device to be stopped, select the relevant flash drive as the device that you want removed from the options menu and choose "OK" to continue. Remove the flash drive only after a message prompts you to do so.