Western Digital External Hard Drive

Monday, February 15, 2010

Western Digital WDMLZ2500TN 250GB 5400 USB 2.0 My Passport Elite 2.5-Inch External Hard Drive (Bronze)

From Western Digital

Price:	~~$137.99~~

Accessories
- Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition FULL VERSION with SP2
- Quicken Deluxe 2010
- Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007
- Kaspersky Antivirus 2010 1-User
- Adobe Photoshop Elements 8

Features
- Box Contents - My Passport Elite 250GB Hard Drive, USB 2.0 Cable, Drawstring Carrying Bag, Quick Install Guide, 5-Year Warranty
- 250GB Hard Drive
- USB 2.0 and 1.1 Interface
- Powered by the USB bus
- Up to 480Mb/sec Bus Transfer Rate with USB 2.0

Product Description
A luxurious soft-touch finish makes these drives easy to grip, comfortable to hold, and beautiful to show off to your friends. Combine that with mega-capacity that fits in your pocket, plus a whole host of powerful features and you'll understand why man call these little drives Elite.

Customer Reviews

A great external hard drive.
Date: 2009-07-01 | Rating: 5
I love the colour of this little device--coppery. I also like that it needs no external power, and it's got lots of space (about double my laptop's internal hard drive). However, there are a few problems. 1. Make sure to format your hard drive before putting anything on it! I was somehow able to put a few things on it, disconnected it, then when I plugged it back in, had to re-format (and thus erase) everything on it. A little 1-2-3 booklet included with the hard drive would have solved this. 2. Sometimes the hard drive doesn't like to be disconnected. This means that certain programs (iTunes, Firefox, ...Finder) will on occasion continue to 'draw' information from the drive, making you pull your hair out, waiting for the hard drive to be 'done'. All in all, though, a great price for a great little device.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Western Digital WDXUL1600BBNN Hard Drive, 160GB Essential USB 2.0

From Western Digital

Price:	~~$159.99~~

Similar Items
No Similar Items.

Accessories
No Accessories.

Features
- 160 GB external hard drive (7200 RPM)
- Connects via USB 2.0
- Whisper-quiet WD Caviar feature
- Front-mounted, easy-to-reach power button
- Hot-swap capability allows easy connection of a new peripheral without powering off the computer

Product Description
Just the essentials - high-speed, easy-to-use, reliable add-on storage. Simply plug in your 7200 RPM WD Essential external USB 2.0 hard drive and you've got plenty of room to back up and save your valuable data, music, photos and movies.

Friday, February 12, 2010

Western Digital Elements 640 GB USB 2.0 Desktop External Hard Drive WDE1UBK6400N (Black)

From Western Digital

Price:	~~$99.99~~

Accessories
- Case Logic Compact Portable Hard Drive Case (Black)
- Case Logic HDC-1 Medium EVA External Hard Drive Case (Black)
- AmazonBasics IEEE 1394 4-Pin/6-Pin FireWire Cable (6 Feet / 1.8 Meters) [Amazon Frustration-Free Packaging]
- AmazonBasics USB 2.0 A-Male to Mini-B Cable (6 Feet / 1.8 Meters) [Amazon Frustration-Free Packaging]
- AmazonBasics USB 2.0 A-Male to B-Male Cable (6 Feet / 1.8 Meters) [Amazon Frustration-Free Packaging]

Features
- Fast, reliable storage
- Plug and play
- Compact design
- Aluminum enclosure
- Backing up photos, music, video, or any files

Product Description
WD Elements Black USB 2.0 external hard drive is an easy, reliable way to add more storage to your PC or Macintosh®. Simply plug it in to a USB port and start saving or backing up your photos, music video and files. It's preformatted for immediate use. The compact, durable metal case provides extra data protection.

Customer Reviews

Inspires confidence, priced right
Date: 2009-01-21 | Rating: 5
The Western Digital Elements is, by far, the most robust external hard disk I've ever owned. And, when I say solid, I mean almost 3 lbs. solid (I didn't put it on a scale but it feels that way), 100% metal casing, likely to survive a building collapsing on top of it. Given that I bought it for backups, not for travel, I actually like it this way. It's probably helpful to enumerate the features I feel are worth being aware of before one buys it (and I shall answer any additional questions if you drop a comment, to the extent that I can): # Heavy, solid build, almost bullet-proof enclosure. # 8"x4"x1" rectangular prism (these are not exact measurements but I'm confident it's close. # USB port for data transfer, cable included. # External power supply. # Silent run - you can't hear it spinning unless you place it close to your ear. # Cool - after one night of uninterrupted operation it was barely warmer than room temperature. # Not a speed demon but I backed up 50GB in something like 20-30 minutes. # Formated as FAT32. # Comes with no software but it was instantly recognized by both Vista and my PS3 (more about that later) # There is no manual to speak of - and no manual is needed. # One year warranty. # 30-day free tech support during the warranty period where the clock starts running after the first call to WD. # Lacks the (to me annoying) carnival lights that some other drives have these days - only one blue LED, on the back, blinks when read/writes are performed. # Competitive in price with the Western Digital Elements 1 TB USB 2.0 External Hard Drive WDE1UBK10000N (Black) which I happen to own. I can't think of anything bad to say about the WD Elements. I went for the 1TB size because I wanted to back up several smaller computers on it and my 320GB PS3. For a stress test and if you are going to use it with XP or Vista you may want to reformat the disk as NTFS - Microsoft will be spinning your disk for many, many hours and, if you bought a dud, chances are it will stop working during the 10-12 hours format process. Or, you can check the 'fast format' option and the formatting will be done in less than one minute. After the overnight test was passed, I partitioned the disk into 4 using Vista (no problem whatsoever) and I formated 3 of them as NTFS and one as FAT32 (get FAT32FORMAT off the Net because Microsoft's utility does not work on a 300GB partition). Backups ran flawlessly with Microsoft's backup interface and backing up the PS3 was incident-free too - it instantly recognized the FAT32 partition and I have a nice PS3 backup now. I highly recommend this drive as a backup device that does not travel a lot. If you wish to save a few dollars and don't have much use for an extra 300GB, go with this one. Otherwise, get the 1TB version.

Easy installation, great support!
Date: 2009-06-18 | Rating: 5
I am impressed with this drive's build - it's solid and appears to be a very nice product. Installation on WinXP didn't go as smoothly as expected but this had nothing to do with the drive. On installation the wizard repeatedly gave me an error message: "There was a problem installing this hardware. An error occurred during the installation of the device. One of the filter drivers installed for this device is invalid." I sent an e-mail to Western Digital support and they replied in less than three hours with a link to a Microsoft Knowledge Base article that indicated a corrupt registry entry. After editing the specified area of the registry the drive installed with no problems. I was impressed with WD's speedy response and correct diagnosis of the problem! The FAT32 formatting was not an issue; I used the NTFS quick format and re-formatted the drive in less than 30 seconds. The 7200 RPM drive motor makes for quick transfers, much quicker than my old Seagate 5200 RPM external drive. Since this drive will be used mainly for backups and will not see frequent use, I am also pleased with the automatic spin-down feature that puts the drive to sleep when not in use. After spin-down the drive spins up immediately when accessed with no discernible delay. The only negative I have about this drive is having the access light on the back where it is not visible during normal use. This is only a minor issue, however, and overall I am very pleased with this drive. What displeases me greatly is Amazon's new pricing policy. When I ordered the drive the price was $99.99. There was a delay in shipment because the drive was temporarily out of stock; when the drive was re-posted the price had been reduced to $88.00. When I contacted them, Amazon adamantly refused to charge the price when shipped from new stock and billed me for the full $99.99. As a consequence, other vendors will be receiving my business in the future and I will not be purchasing from Amazon again.

hard drives
Date: 2009-04-06 | Rating: 5
I have purchased 3 and one was defective. I got a fast response when I notified the company. I got a fast refund and have not had any problems with the other 2.

Good, Sound Hard Drive
Date: 2009-09-27 | Rating: 5
First let me say, if you're looking for a hard drive that looks durable, this is a great choice for you. I was looking for an external drive with a good price and a lot of storage. While typically I go for portable hard drives, this one caught my eye, and I must say I'm happy with the purchase. It's whisper quiet (I don't think I've heard a sound from it yet). Quick install, and good data transfer time. If I ever fill this one up, I'll probably buy another to match.

xternal hard drive
Date: 2009-04-20 | Rating: 5
I'm no techie, but whenever you receive a product that you have ordered and you get what you expected, and it works, it is a good thing. I believe the price was good for the amount of memory (around $80).

Thursday, February 11, 2010

WD Passport Portable WDXMS2500 - Hard drive - 250 GB - external - 2.5" - Hi-Speed USB - 5400 rpm - buffer: 2 MB - glossy black

From Western Digital

Price:

Accessories
No Accessories.

Product Description
Pack up your office files and take them home. Carry thousands of songs or pictures. The WD Passport drive is simple to use, light and easy to carry, and require no power adapter - it is powered directly through the USB cable.

Customer Reviews

Compact, lightweight, convenient, and dependable.
Date: 2008-02-16 | Rating: 5
The glossy casing is prone to scratches, but they're not too incredibly visible (except under the right light). The drive has worked perfectly on every computer I've plugged it into, though some users will need to purchase a Y usb cable that can pull power from 2 USB ports if their computer doesn't supply enough power to the drive. The product is very lightweight, compact, and convenient to transport. It can take a second or two to spin up sometimes, but nothing too tragic. The included backup software was simple and easy to use, although it is a trial version that requires you pay to upgrade to the full version. And you already know it's aesthetically awesome.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Western Digital My Passport Essential 160 GB USB 2.0 Portable Hard Drive (Intense Blue)

From Western Digital

Price:	~~$99.99~~

Accessories
- Case Logic Compact Portable Hard Drive Case (Black)
- Rebit Backup Software for Single PC- RSCD35000POS
- Eye-Fi Share 2 GB Wi-Fi SD Flash Memory Card EYE-FI-2GB (OLD VERSION)
- My Passport Essential WDME1600 - Hard drive - 160 GB - external - Hi-Speed USB - midnight black
- 500GB HURRICANE USB2.0 3.5IN WITH PUSHBUTTON BACKUP

Features
- Box Contents - My Passport Essential 160GB Portable USB Hard Drive, USB 2.0 cable, Quick Install guide
- 160GB Hard Drive Capacity
- Installation is a snap because you don't really install this drive; you just plug it in and it's ready to use.
- USB bus powered No separate power supply is needed
- This ultra-portable drive fits easily in your pocket or purse, weighs only a few ounces, and holds tons of valuable data

Product Description
This elegant portable drive is simple to use, light and easy to carry, and require no power adapter - it is powered directly through the USB cable and works with Windows and Mac. Synchronize files between home and office and encrypt everything on the drive for added security. You can carry your music, video, and photos in style with WD's My Passport Essential Portable Drive.

Customer Reviews

Compact, sleek and works great
Date: 2008-05-16 | Rating: 5
Works with my PCs and Macbook. (Make sure you are using the correct USB plug on your Mac laptop. Not all of the USB outlets in Mac laptops have sufficient power to drive an external drive. Read the manual to find which is which). No review for the included software. Since most of my experience with softwares that comes with products like camera, external drives are rarely satisfactory, software was not installed in the first place. Pros: - Lowest price I found for a 2.5" external drive - No need for a power brick. It is powered by the USB 2. - So quiet, Just like an Ipod. - Small enough to fit in your pocket. 0.59" (H) x 5" (L) x 3" (W) - Comes with the USB cable Cons: - Shiny Black finish is easy to scratch - No case included

Nice drive
Date: 2008-05-22 | Rating: 5
I have this drive for about half-a year now. It is recognized both by Windows XP and Mac OS X (Leopard). I did not use any software to do backups, just grab the files myself and drag them to the drive, or use a script (.bat file). Operation is exceptionally simple: you connect it - it is recognized by the computer, you use it, and then use disconnect/eject command (I am guilty of not always doing this, but no problems so far) and disconnect it. The drive comes in a soft case, does not have and require any power supply, works via USB cable, and no problems whatsoever so far. I am thinking about buying another one, maybe slightly bigger (there is a 320G version).

Very impressive Drive!
Date: 2008-10-23 | Rating: 5
Quick summery, Works as advertised, easy to format to ntfs usable drive space on 500 is 465 the same as the previous My Book, it needs no external (additional power). The heat generated is not really noticeable at all. potential negative: little white flashing light, there is no more disc noise than an IPOD. The only warning I would give is the lack of a case, it really needs protection and should (in my opinion) only be transported or even stored in a case. However this can't be held against the drive as far as its performance. A little more commentary on reliability, and Price value. I have purchased half a dozen passport drives in the last 90 days all but one are 320. So as a measure of reliability all of these drives have so far worked very well. They have not become louder or slower they are like they were in the beginning. I use some as dedicated backups and some for consolidation and centralization. As far as durability I have taken one with me on a few trips the first one I acquired. It functions without any noticeable difference as well. Commentary about Price difference to follow. No drive is 100% reliable few are in the high 90's for that long. This is of course my opinion, but when compared to the prior My Book 500 GB models of which a few each with power supplies etc. It is so great to not have to deal with big heavy drives with power supplies. When comparing that difference I believe this is certainly worth the price. A final word on the drive. Not in recent memory have I seen the price for something like the passport drives be so different (in percent) due to color. If there is any difference in any of the WD passport models in color or stainless steel etc please let me know. If it is just aesthetics then as far as I am concerned who cares. Buy the color of your choice but if you are choosing based on price make sure to be aware that color or metal instead of plastic can make a huge difference. In the case of the 320 and 250 passport there seemed to be not just a very big price difference, often 15-35 percent, and this price would change based upon new models etc.

Excellent value for the money and portable to boot
Date: 2008-09-15 | Rating: 5
For the price, you can't beat the capacity and portability of these Western Digital My Passport Essential Portable Hard Drives. Western Digital has a long history of producing dependable drives.ss The housings are well designed and, with a bit of care, you can dissemble them should the need or desire arise. The drives themselves are workhorses. They are not the fastest, but they are more than adequate for most purposes. I generally don't comment on other reviews of the same product, but there seem to be a number of misconceptions about this product thst should be clarified. First, these portable hard drives are for usse only with USB 2.0 ports. Period. Machines three years old and older may not have USB 2.0 ports. Second, hard drives are electro-mechanical devices. Hard drives do fail unexpectedly whether they are a day or year or more old. Hard drive failure is not predictable. So it you plan on using this or any hard drive to back up your precious family photos, financial records or doctoral thesis, make sure you have a second or third backup! A couple of minor criticisms of the product. The supplied USB cable is on the short side. On the other hand, how long a cable do you need with a portable drive? In any event, USB cables are readily available and relatively inexpensive. A bigger and more important criticism is that Western Digital does not provide a cable with a second USB connector for use on those computers where a single USB port doesn't provide enough power. Finally, WD doesn't include a carrying case. Small things, to be sure, that wouldn't cost Western Digital a lot of money to include, but they don't. You won't find any competent network administrator who doesn't have multiple backups and the reason for this is that hard drives do fail! So if you entrust your valuable data to a single hard drive, you are making a big mistake. Always have at least two and preferably three backups that you update frequently. And don't assume that your backups are reliable. Test recovering data from them from time to time. You might be able to recover some or all the data from a failed hard drive, but it can be a very expensive or troublesome process. Just remember: if it's worth backing up, it's worth backing up at least twice. That's what the IT pros do - and it's what you should do with your valuable data as well. Sorry for the digression, but I just wanted to correct the misimpressions that some people have left about these drives. The Western Digital My Passport Essentials are solid, inexpensive, portable and very useful hard drives. Jerry

Very easy to use with Mac
Date: 2008-06-13 | Rating: 5
I bought this hard drive for Media Storage (Mac + Win) and also as a backup disc for Time Machine. The good news is that it comes in FAT32 format, which OS X can read/write. The bad news is that Time Machine requires the backup disc to be in HFS+ format (FAT32 or NTFS won't work). However, this is easy enough to fix. I launched Disk Utility in OS X and partitioned the drive into 240 GB as FAT32 (or as MS-DOS format, as Disk Util calls it), and 80 GB as HFS+. Took less than 5 minutes for the whole thing. So now, I've got one partition for time machine, and another for my media. Fine Print : 1. In partitioning the drive, it formats the drive first. So any free utils that come with the hard disk are erased. Not an issue for me as I didn't intend to use any of the free software. But anyone trying this should be aware of it. 2. For anyone thinking about doing the same thing, note that FAT32 does allow both Windows and OSX to read/write without the need for a 3rd party software. But the downside of FAT32 is that it doesn't allow a file size larger than 4 GB. This isn't an issue for me (I don't expect to come across many files that are larger than 4 GB each). To avoid this issue, you could create one partition in NTFS (instead of FAT32). Once you do this, you'll need a 3rd party software so that OS X can read and write to the NTFS partition. I've heard good things about MacFuse (though I haven't tried it myself). Other thoughts... - Nice and compact - Fairly silent - Pretty short USB cable (can be irritating for some. I prefer this to having a long cable dangling around). - Wish it came with a soft case/cover (that's what I'm looking to pick up next).

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

WD Passport Elite External 500GB USB 2.0 Bronze Color Portable Hard Drive With Case - WDMLZ5000CN / WDMLC5000CN

From Western Digital

Price:

Accessories
- Clickfree Automatic Backup Hard Drive Transformer USB 2.0 Cable CAB101
- Rebit RSCD 350000 Software CD For Storage Backup
- Multi-pc User CD
- Rebit Backup Software for Multiple PCs (6) RSCD350000MPOS
- Rebit Backup Software for Single PC- RSCD35000POS

Features
- Western Digital My Passport Elite 500 GB USB 2.0 2.5-inch External Hard Drive General Features:
- Soft touch bronze finish 500 GB capacity USB 2.0 interface Up to 480 Mbps data transfer
- Capacity gauge Automatic backup software Synchronized and secure software (Windows only)
- Works with game consoles USB Powered Easy to install RoHS compliant Ideal For:
- Carrying important files and e-mail between work and home or on the road

Product Description
Carry thousands of songs, videos or pictures and back up important files with the Western Digital My Passport Elite External Hard Drive. It features a 500 GB capacity, USB 2.0 interface and and comes in a soft touch bronze finish that is easy to grip and comfortable to hold! The My Passport Elite includes Google software so you can search your drive, manage your photos, and simplify Web searches and automatic backup software so you can easily backup photos, videos, email and documents! You can also synchronized and secure your data anywhere you go with the My Passport Elite. Simply plug the drive to any computer to edit files, read email and view photos. Then you can sync all the changes you've made back to your home or office computer. It's that easy! Plus, your data is protected with 128-bit security encryption!This Western Digital My Passport Elite External Hard Drive is powered directly from your computer's USB port so there's no need for a separate power adapter!

Customer Reviews

too slow to be of any real use
Date: 2009-12-07 | Rating: 1
I got this elite drive on Black Friday from BestBuy. I tried to backup my laptop's C-drive. After 2 days of trying it only backed up 2.2GB. So annoying that I do not think it can be of any use for backing up. Will be returning soon.

speed makes it worthless
Date: 2009-01-06 | Rating: 1
I might have received a defective one but if not, this drive is so slow it's useless. After over 8 hours of trying to transfer 400GB it still wasn't done!! (a lot of memory but that's just unacceptable). It's going back.

Monday, February 8, 2010

My Passport Essential WDMER5000 - Hard drive - 500 GB - external - Hi-Speed USB - real red

From Western Digital

Price:	~~$199.99~~

Accessories
- Norton Antivirus 2010 1-User
- Adobe Photoshop Elements 8
- Roxio Creator 2010
- Clickfree Automatic Backup Hard Drive Transformer USB 2.0 Cable CAB101
- Western Digital WD TV HD Media Player

Features
- Box Contents - My Passport Essential 500GB Portable USB Hard Drive, USB 2.0 cable, Quick Install guide
- 500GB Hard Drive Capacity
- Installation is a snap because you don't really install this drive; you just plug it in and it's ready to use.
- Powered by the USB bus. No separate power supply is needed
- This ultra-portable drive fits easily in your pocket or purse, weighs only a few ounces, and holds tons of valuable data

Product Description
Pack up your office files and take them home, carry thousands of songs or pictures, and synchronize files between home and office and encrypt everything on the drive for added security. These elegant portable drives are simple to use, light and easy to carry, and require no power adapter - they are powered directly through the USB cable.

Customer Reviews

Compact, sleek and works great
Date: 2008-05-16 | Rating: 5
Works with my PCs and Macbook. (Make sure you are using the correct USB plug on your Mac laptop. Not all of the USB outlets in Mac laptops have sufficient power to drive an external drive. Read the manual to find which is which). No review for the included software. Since most of my experience with softwares that comes with products like camera, external drives are rarely satisfactory, software was not installed in the first place. Pros: - Lowest price I found for a 2.5" external drive - No need for a power brick. It is powered by the USB 2. - So quiet, Just like an Ipod. - Small enough to fit in your pocket. 0.59" (H) x 5" (L) x 3" (W) - Comes with the USB cable Cons: - Shiny Black finish is easy to scratch - No case included

Nice drive
Date: 2008-05-22 | Rating: 5
I have this drive for about half-a year now. It is recognized both by Windows XP and Mac OS X (Leopard). I did not use any software to do backups, just grab the files myself and drag them to the drive, or use a script (.bat file). Operation is exceptionally simple: you connect it - it is recognized by the computer, you use it, and then use disconnect/eject command (I am guilty of not always doing this, but no problems so far) and disconnect it. The drive comes in a soft case, does not have and require any power supply, works via USB cable, and no problems whatsoever so far. I am thinking about buying another one, maybe slightly bigger (there is a 320G version).

Very impressive Drive!
Date: 2008-10-23 | Rating: 5
Quick summery, Works as advertised, easy to format to ntfs usable drive space on 500 is 465 the same as the previous My Book, it needs no external (additional power). The heat generated is not really noticeable at all. potential negative: little white flashing light, there is no more disc noise than an IPOD. The only warning I would give is the lack of a case, it really needs protection and should (in my opinion) only be transported or even stored in a case. However this can't be held against the drive as far as its performance. A little more commentary on reliability, and Price value. I have purchased half a dozen passport drives in the last 90 days all but one are 320. So as a measure of reliability all of these drives have so far worked very well. They have not become louder or slower they are like they were in the beginning. I use some as dedicated backups and some for consolidation and centralization. As far as durability I have taken one with me on a few trips the first one I acquired. It functions without any noticeable difference as well. Commentary about Price difference to follow. No drive is 100% reliable few are in the high 90's for that long. This is of course my opinion, but when compared to the prior My Book 500 GB models of which a few each with power supplies etc. It is so great to not have to deal with big heavy drives with power supplies. When comparing that difference I believe this is certainly worth the price. A final word on the drive. Not in recent memory have I seen the price for something like the passport drives be so different (in percent) due to color. If there is any difference in any of the WD passport models in color or stainless steel etc please let me know. If it is just aesthetics then as far as I am concerned who cares. Buy the color of your choice but if you are choosing based on price make sure to be aware that color or metal instead of plastic can make a huge difference. In the case of the 320 and 250 passport there seemed to be not just a very big price difference, often 15-35 percent, and this price would change based upon new models etc.

Excellent value for the money and portable to boot
Date: 2008-09-15 | Rating: 5
For the price, you can't beat the capacity and portability of these Western Digital My Passport Essential Portable Hard Drives. Western Digital has a long history of producing dependable drives.ss The housings are well designed and, with a bit of care, you can dissemble them should the need or desire arise. The drives themselves are workhorses. They are not the fastest, but they are more than adequate for most purposes. I generally don't comment on other reviews of the same product, but there seem to be a number of misconceptions about this product thst should be clarified. First, these portable hard drives are for usse only with USB 2.0 ports. Period. Machines three years old and older may not have USB 2.0 ports. Second, hard drives are electro-mechanical devices. Hard drives do fail unexpectedly whether they are a day or year or more old. Hard drive failure is not predictable. So it you plan on using this or any hard drive to back up your precious family photos, financial records or doctoral thesis, make sure you have a second or third backup! A couple of minor criticisms of the product. The supplied USB cable is on the short side. On the other hand, how long a cable do you need with a portable drive? In any event, USB cables are readily available and relatively inexpensive. A bigger and more important criticism is that Western Digital does not provide a cable with a second USB connector for use on those computers where a single USB port doesn't provide enough power. Finally, WD doesn't include a carrying case. Small things, to be sure, that wouldn't cost Western Digital a lot of money to include, but they don't. You won't find any competent network administrator who doesn't have multiple backups and the reason for this is that hard drives do fail! So if you entrust your valuable data to a single hard drive, you are making a big mistake. Always have at least two and preferably three backups that you update frequently. And don't assume that your backups are reliable. Test recovering data from them from time to time. You might be able to recover some or all the data from a failed hard drive, but it can be a very expensive or troublesome process. Just remember: if it's worth backing up, it's worth backing up at least twice. That's what the IT pros do - and it's what you should do with your valuable data as well. Sorry for the digression, but I just wanted to correct the misimpressions that some people have left about these drives. The Western Digital My Passport Essentials are solid, inexpensive, portable and very useful hard drives. Jerry

Very easy to use with Mac
Date: 2008-06-13 | Rating: 5
I bought this hard drive for Media Storage (Mac + Win) and also as a backup disc for Time Machine. The good news is that it comes in FAT32 format, which OS X can read/write. The bad news is that Time Machine requires the backup disc to be in HFS+ format (FAT32 or NTFS won't work). However, this is easy enough to fix. I launched Disk Utility in OS X and partitioned the drive into 240 GB as FAT32 (or as MS-DOS format, as Disk Util calls it), and 80 GB as HFS+. Took less than 5 minutes for the whole thing. So now, I've got one partition for time machine, and another for my media. Fine Print : 1. In partitioning the drive, it formats the drive first. So any free utils that come with the hard disk are erased. Not an issue for me as I didn't intend to use any of the free software. But anyone trying this should be aware of it. 2. For anyone thinking about doing the same thing, note that FAT32 does allow both Windows and OSX to read/write without the need for a 3rd party software. But the downside of FAT32 is that it doesn't allow a file size larger than 4 GB. This isn't an issue for me (I don't expect to come across many files that are larger than 4 GB each). To avoid this issue, you could create one partition in NTFS (instead of FAT32). Once you do this, you'll need a 3rd party software so that OS X can read and write to the NTFS partition. I've heard good things about MacFuse (though I haven't tried it myself). Other thoughts... - Nice and compact - Fairly silent - Pretty short USB cable (can be irritating for some. I prefer this to having a long cable dangling around). - Wish it came with a soft case/cover (that's what I'm looking to pick up next).

Western Digital External Hard Drive

Monday, February 15, 2010

Western Digital WDMLZ2500TN 250GB 5400 USB 2.0 My Passport Elite 2.5-Inch External Hard Drive (Bronze)

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Western Digital WDXUL1600BBNN Hard Drive, 160GB Essential USB 2.0

Friday, February 12, 2010

Western Digital Elements 640 GB USB 2.0 Desktop External Hard Drive WDE1UBK6400N (Black)

Thursday, February 11, 2010

WD Passport Portable WDXMS2500 - Hard drive - 250 GB - external - 2.5" - Hi-Speed USB - 5400 rpm - buffer: 2 MB - glossy black

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Western Digital My Passport Essential 160 GB USB 2.0 Portable Hard Drive (Intense Blue)

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

WD Passport Elite External 500GB USB 2.0 Bronze Color Portable Hard Drive With Case - WDMLZ5000CN / WDMLC5000CN

Monday, February 8, 2010

My Passport Essential WDMER5000 - Hard drive - 500 GB - external - Hi-Speed USB - real red

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