Western Digital My Book Pro Edition 500GB Review

[.Neo]

After making quite a few rounds through Amsterdam looking for the "perfect" external HDD, I finally decided to go for the Western Digital My Book Pro Edition. Here's a brief review of my findings so far:

Summary

Brand: Western Digital My Book Pro Edition

Triple Interface: FireWire 400, FireWire 800 and USB 2.0

Capacity: 500GB

Warranty: 3-Year limited warranty

Costs: ?184,95

According to the packaging and manual the My Book Pro Edition is designed for Mac OS X 10.3+ and any PC running Windows Vista/XP/2000. There is no mentioning of Linux.Kit Contentsb>

• My Book Pro Edition external hard drive 500GB
  
• FireWire 800 cable
  
• FireWire 400 cable
  
• USB 2.0 certified cable
  
• 1x AC adapter with power cord for usage in The Netherlands and other Western European countries
  
• 1x AC adapter with power cord for usage in the UK
  
• Software CD
  
• Quick Install Guide
  

The HDD is wrapped up in a nice silver (from what I can tell plastic) casing, with the form facto- like the name suggests -i> of a book. At the front it has two bright blue rings that show you the drive's remaining capacity and disk activity. Because the drive is preformatted and contains software and utilities, the first section of thCapacity Gaugei> (inner ring) is illuminated upon installation.

You can place the My Book in an upright position and on it's side.Installation on a Macintoshb>

When using the My Book for the first time on your Mac you can immediately choose between FireWire 400/800 and USB 2.0. This isn't the case on Windows, but I'll get back to that later. Upon login the drive mounts to the desktop and/or "Computer".

In order to use the power/(un)mount button properly you'll have to install some drivers located in a folder on the drive. These are also included on the Software CD. The installation takes no time at all and you'll have to restart once. No additional applications and services are installed, just a few invisible drivers. After that you can also choose to install some backup software, but I decided not to.

Right now the My Book is ready for usage and can be formatted to a more Mac-friendly filesystem like Journaled HFS+ using Disk Utility.Installation on a Windows-based PCb>

Windows users must first connect the drive using the USB cable to install FireWire device drivers. Without doing so you won't be able to use My Book's FireWire 400/800 interface.

With autorun enabled the drivers are installed automatically from the drive. Otherwise you'll have to start the installation manually. When finished you'll be prompted to install the EMC Retrospect Express backup software. You can go ahead and install the software or quit.

Right now you can choose to shut down your PC and reconnect the drive using the FireWire 400/800 cord or continue using it through USB 2.0.Everyday usageb>

Using Mac OS X thCapacity Gaugei> or inner ring will live update upon disk usage. In Windows on the other hand it will only update on system or drive restart. For Windows users this might be a slight disappointment.

FireWire 800 will give you transfer rates up to 800 Mb/s, FireWire 400 rates up to 400 Mb/s and USB 2.0 up to 480 MB/s. The drive is also backward-compatible with USB 1.1 but this will only give you speeds up to 1,5 Mb/s, which isn't really recommended.

I connected the My Book using both FireWire 400 and USB 2.0. From what I can tell the former will give you more stable transfer rates and won't affect system performance as much as USB 2.0 does.

Sound levelsbCooler:bFaintu>. It's safe to say that the majority of computer coolers make more noise than the one inside the driveHDD:b> The ticking sound of the HDD itself inegligibleu>.My opinionb>

Overal I'm extremely happy with my new My Book Pro Edition. The casing is very well designed and has a sleek and professional look to it. The bright bluCapacity Gaugei> and Power/Activity LEDs are a welcome addition.

The only downside I experienced so far is that it isn't possible to shut down the drive using it's power button while my Mac is already off. So basically you have to hit the My Book's power button first and shut down your Mac after that. Otherwise it will stay in stand-by mode until you startup your computer again.

Edited July 23, 2007 by .Neo

[houlty]

nice review... but i didn't see a section on noise, which is a big concern for me...

i've read some oher reviews of the my books, and people siad they were fairly loud and irritating, so can you give your opinion...

cheers,

houlty.

[pyehac]

I just got my WD mybook 500gb external HD from newegg, and to tell you the truth, my 120mm fan in my qpack is flooding my room with noise, and I have 2 mybooks (1 500gb and 1 250gb)

[sundayx Veteran]

Man the WD externals are pretty slick looking, especially the new laptop portable drive... too bad they cost quite a lot.

[.Neo]

nice review... but i didn't see a section on noise, which is a big concern for me...

i've read some oher reviews of the my books, and people siad they were fairly loud and irritating, so can you give your opinion...

Added it to the review. :)

Edited July 10, 2007 by .Neo

[houlty]

hmm, tempting....... i'm in need of more storage for my iMac (which is a fairly quiet piece of kit, and why i want something else of a quiet nature).

Thanks for the info, i may go a get one now!

maybe....

thanks.

[m1h4]

Nice review! The only recommendation I have is to mention the length of the cables. Everything else is great.

[Matrix XII]

I'd get a Seagate FreeAgent Pro instead... The WD Mybooks are really big and clunky looking imo

[.Neo]

Nice review! The only recommendation I have is to mention the length of the cables. Everything else is great.

There's no mentioning of their length in the manual and personally I don't really feel like measuring them myself. :p

I'd get a Seagate FreeAgent Pro instead... The WD Mybooks are really big and clunky looking imo

What the FreeAgent Pro lacks in width it gains in hight and depth compared to the WD MyBook Pro.

[zeroday]

Nice review :)

I have a 320GB Premium edition, and I love it :D

[Premgenius]

Thats odd for my PC the WD power down when I switch my machine off.

[.Neo]

Thats odd for my PC the WD power down when I switch my machine off.

I'm not sure if it's because of Mac OS X or the fact I'm using FireWire to connect with the My Book.

What interface do you use, USB or FireWire?

[AltecXP]

Nice review :)

I have a 320GB Premium edition, and I love it :D

Same

[jnolas2]

I'm not sure if it's because of Mac OS X or the fact I'm using FireWire to connect with the My Book.

What interface do you use, USB or FireWire?

I have a WD My Book Premium 250 GB using OS X and firewire and it turns off when the computer shuts down here as well.

[.Neo]

I have a WD My Book Premium 250 GB using OS X and firewire and it turns off when the computer shuts down here as well.

Weird. Over here it just stays on and goes to stand-by after a while. :wacko: Not sure if I should contact WD about it? :/

Edit:

I think it might has to do with my eMac. I sort of remember when connecting my old iPod 4g through FireWire it just kept on charging even after the eMac was turned off.

Edited July 13, 2007 by .Neo

[houlty]

your review better be right :unsure:, i just bought one :laugh:

[.Neo]

your review better be right :unsure:, i just bought one :laugh:

haha I hope so as well, for your sake. :shifty: Just curious: Did you get the exact same one, or a different edition?

[houlty]

same one i think. 500gb pro edition

[.Neo]

Cool. (Y) How do you like it so far?

[Galley]

Don't forget kids, the Pro Edition gives you FireWire 800 support, a silver case color that matches Mac Pro equipment, and a 3-year warranty, which the other My Book drives do not have. :cool:

[.Neo]

Don't forget kids, the Pro Edition gives you FireWire 800 support, a silver case color that matches Mac Pro equipment, and a 3-year warranty, which the other My Book drives do not have. :cool:

Way ahead of you. It's all on the first page. ;)

[houlty]

Cool. (Y) How do you like it so far?

i dont have it yet :(. it should arrive tomorrow / tuesday because i ordered off t'internet from amazon.co.uk.

[Redestium]

I have one but for the life of me can't find a Vista compatible button manager software from WD (to turn the drive on and off by pressing the front button), which makes it less convenient to use. If anybody knows of a solution please let me know.

[Colin-uk Veteran]

Thats odd for my PC the WD power down when I switch my machine off.

Same here.

I have a 320GB essential. Only difference really is you dont get a space gauge and its black with a green light instead of silver with a blue one. I dont really remember if it has a firewire port lol, but I use USB anyway :)

I would have loved to get a 500gb pro edition but i didnt have the money at the time.

Apparently the cooling vent design that goes around the 3 edges spells something in morse code, but ive never bothered to try and work it out :p

[IncidentFlux]

Western Digital My Book™ Pro Edition™ II

Quick & Dirty Review

Bought My Book ProEdition II drive - 1 Terabyte model, two days ago from Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

Pros

1. Sleek looking.

2. 1 Terabyte - Raid 0 or 1 (Performance or redundancy).

3. Three year limited warranty.

4. Hard Drives are user serviceable and can be cold swapped; Western Digital provides official instructions on that.

5. USB 2.0 (Burst mode).

6. FireWire 400 / 800 (IEEE 1394a / IEEE 1394b).

7. Outer rubber band edge helps stability and reduces vibration.

Cons

1. No JBOD option – RAID 0 doubles your failure chances and RAID 1 reduces total space to just 500 GB.

2. No eSATA interface – For a drive this capacity it’s very important, if overall throughput matters.

3. Power supply external.

4. Noise – After testing connecting both FireWire 400 (I don’t have FW 800) and USB 2.0 simultaneously and individually I can confirm that connecting via FireWire switches the drive’s fans to mini hair dryer mode, very annoying indeed. I was copying data via USB 2.0 from both my internal hard drives and two optical drives for the past two days and not once, did it switch to super turbine mode. Maybe they can tweak the firmware to run the fan at lower speeds than full blast. However I think this challenge can be overcome by just relocating the drive to maybe underneath the desk or even replacing the internal fan but voiding your 3 year warranty in the process.

Conclusion

The only major con with this model would be its fan noise when used with?FireWire.?One?thing?I?did?like?was?the?WD?Button?Manager,?not?only?does it show free space on the drive, but?also safely?ejects?the?drive?and?shuts?it?down?after?ejection.?On?the?down?side?it was?using 15, 044 K memory according Windows task manager just sitting there.

To be honest I’d love to have a (perfect) drive with eSata, USB 2.0, FireWire 400 / 800 and NAS capable Gigabit Ethernet connections, RAID with option to JBOD multiple drives, all in a quite case with an internal power supply but at the moment there aren’t any. Considering my current usage pattern I’m satisfied at the moment, this unit serves my purpose for now, as a music and video jukebox. Noisy hair dryer mode hasn’t kicked in yet possibly because of USB 2.0 usage. ?Looking back I would've gone for the 'FreeAgent™ Pro 750-GB USB 2.0, eSATA, FireWire External Hard Drive'. Eventhough it doesn't support RAID, its a better overall package to cover future needs.

Edited July 19, 2007 by RADicaLMMS