Western Digital has been hard at work upgrading their well established series of portable and external hard drives to the newest technologies available. The hard drive company has decided to upgrade three of their lines, My Book Essential, My Passport Essential and My Passport Essential SE to USB 3.0, and they have added a 3 TB version to the My Book Essential line, reports The Register.
The addition of USB 3.0 support is huge for external drive users as the older USB 2.0 drives would struggle to compete with the speed of an internal drive. Now, with transfer rates of 150 MB/sec, using an external drive will be more efficient than before. Previously, My Book Essential's largest capacity was 2 TB, however WD has now bumped that up to 3 TB. My Passport Essential has storage up to 500GB, and the 50% larger My Passport Essential SE holds up to 1TB, with all the power going through the USB cable.
Pricing on these drives has been announced, and surprisingly they aren't too costly compared to what is currently available from Western Digital.
...The USB 2.0 1TB My Passport Essential SE costs £150 direct from WD, but USB 3.0 version's Euro price, €200, converts to £173.
The improved drives, as well as the 3 TB My Book Essential should be available soon from Western Digital's store.
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