Western Digital My Passport Essential SE 1 TB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive (Midnight Black)
by Western Digital
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Our Price: $246.99 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $129.99 (click here) Category: CE See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Western Digital My Passport Essential SE 1 TB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive (Midnight Black)
Customer Review: 5 Stars. Why all the negative hype?
Summary: 5 Stars
First of all: this is an excellent 1TB hard drive, that will give you what you want: lots of external and portable data storage.
I bought this not to back up my computer, but to back up music and bitmap images from many external drives. Now I have all in one place.
The software, well you cannot bypass it. It comes, after installing, in 'my computer' as a cd drive icon. I have not used it (apart from the password I need to fill out), but it looks very good if you would like to back up your computer; it gives a visual of all the files, ordered in type (music, images etc) and you see on the left your computer, on the right all the files that are backed up. Cannot be easier?
OK, then there are people who say they only want a hard drive, and nothing more. Well, that is how I use this one; I just copy and paste the files I want to relocate in one location on my 1TB drive, and that's it! The software shows it under 'other files', but I don't need to use that software to drag and drop. I also like the icon underneath the toolbar, where you can see how much % is used, and also if the heat is still okay for the device. Something the Apple Time Capsule might try to fix! So what is the problem here?
Then the USB cable. Well it is new and different, and it will be the standard I believe, for more reliable and faster data transmission. Whatever, it works, and just don't loose it! It could be a bit longer, though.
The 'reaction time' when I click on a file or folder is very fast, another plus.
So all summed up: I wanted a portable, small, light, 1TB external drive with no fuss for copy and pasting of files. The WD Passport SE does exactly that and unlike the wireless Time Capsule nightmare, it probably won't overheat and disfunction after 18 months!
Customer Review: Finally improved
Summary: 5 Stars
After reading all the awful reviews on here I was really nervous about ordering one however I WANT IT TO BE KNOWN- Western Digital must have fixed all the problems because my harddrive is awesome. I bet the software is annoying but I never install any software that comes with anything, I hate it all equally. The software didn't automatically boot/install/run anything. The micro USB- this is truly where they must have made the most improvements because the cable I received is solid. It's probably the best cable I own (usually I try to buy the super cheap one's on amazon that have zero quality control, nor good tolerances). There is a very confident snap-like final push when you connect the cable to the drive itself. I don't want my word choice of "snap" to give wrong impressions it still feels fluid and like it should. Very happy with it. Realize the cable is still a short 18" but that's what I wanted. I can't really comment on speed or performance other than I think it's a little faster than my older 320GB passport. I don't put these under much stress, once I write my files to them, little more is done to them. Photographer = lots of static storage. I bought this specifically to lighten my travels for a coming deployment and I'm stoked. The fact that it's well sealed means less dust to worry about too (bonus). I don't think heat will be much of a problem. My specific computer will surely burn out from the heat way before this thing is ever likely too. I'm recommending this drive to everyone now: wife, brothers, dad, colleagues etc. I literally just plugged it in, it automatically recognized everything and I started dragging Gigs of data over to it. Done and Done
Hope this helps update everyone.
Customer Review: Excellent hard drive, no problems
Summary: 5 Stars
After reading so many negative reviews I thought of buying some other hard drive, but since my last experience with WD was an excellent one, I decided to give it a chance. To my surprise, I did not encounter any of the problems that other reviewers had.
First, the WD software: Originally it appeared as a bunch of folders, just as it did when I bought my 500GB passport two years ago. And just like it did last time, I opened Time Machine preferences and set it as the hard drive to be used for backup. Time Machine just erased everything on the disk, automatically reformatted it and started the backup. The WD software files and nowhere to be seen.
Second, the space. A few people who reviewed the product complained that 70GB of space were not available to them (presumably occupied by WD software). No such thing happened to me either. Out of 1TB I have 999GB available, which is just fine.
Third, cable. To be honest, the cable in this 1TB passport is in tighter than in my previous hard drive. When you get it out you can see that there are tiny hooks, which hold on to the hard drive, so I really don't see where the problem is. Clearly, the cable is not cemented into the hard drive, but for general use it is more than enough, and, in my opinion, it is an improvement in comparison to WD's earlier model. Plus, the cable is twice longer than I expected.
Finally, I just want to say how gorgeous it is! The design is beautiful and seems very sturdy. This is already 4th WD passport that I am buying (two of them were as presents), and their reliability is impressive. My previous WD fell thousands of times, and is all taped together. Still works though!
Customer Review: WARNING has unremovable software designed by cretins
Summary: 1 Stars
Avoid this like the plague. WD have decided that just selling disk drives was too boring so they started adding 'intelligent' utilities. Problem is that this is what I buy a Mac or a PC for, not what I buy a disk drive for. If I am going to use a backup utility I am going to use one that does not lock me into one disk drive vendor. The WD bundled software is half baked and does not have a removal tool. Apparently one is 'in the works'.
This is totally unacceptable, giving me the task of erasing the garbageware is bad enough. Not even comprehending that most people do not want it is pure arrogance. Somewhere in WD there is an over-promoted manager who told his boss how selling an intelligent drive will increase margins. Only they forgot the one small detail that writing software is hard, really hard. And writing O/S level code is hardest of all because you have to take into account so many details.
I am very particular about security, I do not run code from random sources, I have no idea where the WD code comes from or how well it will work in practice. I wait for other people to find the bugs - particularly when the functionality is not something I want or need.
I used a U3 drive from Sandisk in the day. The advantages were unimpressive and the drive could not be read on Vista. So the drive was rendered utterly useless for me as I run Vista on many of my machines. Never again. The WD software comes with a manual that does not even read under Mac Preview.
I have had two passports before this one, but before I buy another they are going to have to put a sticker on the box saying 'no software loaded'.
Customer Review: A giant step backwards
Summary: 1 Stars
Bought this and returned it the following day.
I thought this would be a good upgrade to my previous WD Passport models which were generally fool-proof and reliable. This is NOT the same quality as previous models and it is most certainly NOT Essential, by any definition.
The increased capacity is what I was interested in, but WD ruined the product by requiring you to use its built-in so-called "SmartWare". The software is clunky, annoying, and isn't even a good substitute for something simple like "Windows Explorer" or even "My Computer". There is no option - you can't get rid of it.
And, yes, WD has issued an update that supposedly deactivates the "SmartWare" software, but it never worked on the unit I purchased. Even after performing the firmware and software installations, the unit acted exactly the same as before. Not a user-friendly solution, WD.
The new Passports no longer use the same USB-to-mini-USB cable used in previous Passports. Instead, WD went to a micro-USB cable and a relatively short one at that (0.5 meters). If you are using this for a desktop setup, you will most likely have to buy a longer USB-to-micro-USB cable. Looking at the form-factor of the new Passport, there really does not seem to be a reason to have changed to the micro-USB cable. Yes, you can buy a longer cable, but this is just another annoyance with this product. I'd rather wait until a Bluetooth or WiFi version comes out!
WD, you really blew it with this poorly executed software. I will stick with my older Passport drives until their capacity becomes too small or the drive fails.