For anyone looking for a USB drive that does more than just store your files, there's no better place to start looking than this designer crafted flash drive from Cartier. If you are into carrying around computer peripherals that carry as much in status as they do in actual memory, but you don't want to be quite as glittery as the Philips-Swarovski drives featuring real Swarovski crystals, this is a good place to look.

Cartier is probably the first upscale jeweller to create their own USB drive. There is no word on their memory supplier, so unlike the Philips-Swarovski drives, this endeavor has been launched by Cartier themselves. The drive will fit in as part of the Pasha de Cartier collection, which was first released in 1989, with watches created by the famed designer Gérald Genta, who has designed many acclaimed and expensive timepieces. The Pasha collection has since grown to include many other items, including pens and fragrances.

In fact, with the addition of this drive to your office supplies, you could basically outfit your whole office as well as your personal accessories (watch, cufflinks, etc.) completely in Pasha de Cartier. No word on whether they intend to expand their technology lineups into monitors, mice, or whole computer systems. Anyone with access to Cartier headquartes should check the branding on their systems, and send me any "interesting" photographs. Then maybe my next post will be made using a stainless steel Cartier mouse and a jewel encrusted Cartier keyboard.

As a part of this fashionable line, the flash drive takes most of its design inspiration from the Pasha watches. This includes numbers surrounding the cap of the device counting in tens up to 60. This is meant to invoke the numbers around the bezel of a watch, but of course is completely non-functional on a USB drive. The body of the drive is made of brushed palladium, and attached to it is a silk drawstring. The drawstring alone is most likely worth more than most other USB drives. To finish it all off, the lovely Cartier logo is engraved into the side of the body.

The actual storage capacity of this drive is 1GB, which puts it in the normal range of flash drives, unlike the rest of the feature list. With USB drives now commonly reaching the 5-8 GB range, the capacity actually seems quite below standards. Of course, for most of the clientele looking at purchasing this item, the actual capacity is probably low on the list of important stats. The list price upon release is expected to be in the $500 to 600 range, which is a small price to pay for the perfect accessory to your Pasha de Cartier watch, and an absolute bargain compared to the $5,000 to 40,000 you will have to pay for their luxury timepieces.