The Western Digital MyBook Essential Edition is a pared-down version of the MyBook Premium Edition that we reviewed. Available in sizes from 80GB to 500GB, this external hard drive features the same exterior design as the Premium Edition. It also uses the same 7,200rpm hard disk drive, so we expect the performance to be on a par with that of the Premium Edition. The Essential Edition drive has only a USB 2.0 connection (the Premium Edition can also connect via FireWire) and doesn't come with the EMC Dantz Retrospect software that ships on the Premium Edition. Also, the capacity meter on the "spine" of the drive glows green instead of blue.
Intro:
This Western Digital My Book Essential Edition External Hard Drive is a 160GB, external hard disk drive.Compared to other external hard drives on the market, it is midpriced at around $170.This drive connects to a system though a USB 2.0 port.This is a 7200 rpm drive and comes with an 8MB buffer.
Noteworthy Features:
None noted, given available product data.
Weaker Features:
None noted, given available product data.
Suitability:
An external hard drive, suited for convenient plug-and-play with most desktop or notebook computers.
Value:
In general, this hard drive has good features for the money.On the other hand, you would typically pay around 30% less to get a external hard drive with a comparable data transfer rate.
8 out of 10 - Excellent Fast, Elegant, Simple = Awesome
I love this drive! I know, I know, it's just your average WD drive in a gussied up case, ...
I love this drive! I know, I know, it's just your average WD drive in a gussied up case, but it's really a wonderful drive for anyone looking for good price and good design without all the extras that bump up the cost. I should start with the obvious, which is the design. It is a nice looking drive that feels pretty solid, though it is hardly "shock resistant", and it will break if you drop it on your carpet while running (trust me). This is no fault of the drive however, as all externals are anything but indestructible, and are equally susceptible to "user error."
The design is black plastic, and designed to look like a book on your shelf (hence the name "my book"), and, unlike your average external, won't look funky when paired or stacked with other mybooks, or even next to *gasp* real books on a desk. I also like the green circle of light in the center that acts as an activity light as well as a manual power on/off button. That's right, it's not a backup button, but I'll get to that later. You won't really have to use the button though, as it turns itself on and off when your computer turns on and off.
One more thing about the design is the fact that this drive is fanless, which I love. Fanless drives are plenty cool, cheaper to make and *should* cost you less to buy, are quieter, and most importantly to me, makes your drive dependant on one less thing to function, so there's one less thing to break. This seems to be the wave of the future in external drives, so it's nice to see a cheaper drive with a unique design that doesn't need a fan to stay cool. Three of the six sides have a plethora of slits in them for cooling, and apparently spell something in mores code, though I don't know what at this time.
On to performance (can you tell I like the design, three paragraphs later!). You know this drive is cool in a number of ways, but how does it perform? This drive is 160GB, spinning at 7200RPMs with an 8MB cache. This too is becoming the standard for externals, but is not the standard just yet. If the description does not say what the RPMS or cache is, it is likely only a 4200RPM or 5400RPM drive with a 2MB cache to save money. The real question is, "so what?" Well, honestly, this drive will perform noticeably better than drives with lower specs, but the average user may not care because the difference is not huge. However, the price of those drives is not that much different, so you might as well try to find a drive with 7200RPMs with an 8MB cache.
My Book is super easy to setup and use, even easier than an iPod. There is no included CD for installation, and no software or drivers to worry about; you just plug it in and it's ready for work. The drive comes formatted as a FAT32 drive, but can just be formatted to NTFS if that is your preference, though you will lose the included Google software (toolbar, desktop, picasa, all free downloads anyway). I wanted to find a drive with firewire, as my Dell i9300 supports it and firewire drives have faster read/write speeds, but honestly, the transfer speeds on this thing are pretty darn fast. I was able to transfer all of my documents (15 gigs with all the music) in a reasonable amount of time. It's plenty fast for me, but if you need something a little faster you will have to pay a premium for a drive with firewire support. I also love to game, so I went ahead and installed a bunch of games on the drive to see how they would perform. The loading times were a little slower than when they were installed directly onto my laptop, but once loaded the framerates were just as fast (as everything is loaded into RAM), and the difference was negligible in some games. I tried Battle for Middle Earth, Knights of the Old Republic, GTA 3, and Quake 4, none of which had a framerate drop as a result of running off the external compared to off the laptop directly. Now I don't have to clog up my small laptop drive with my game library or demos.
The drive is hardly perfect, however. As mentioned in the cons section, there is no network support. Network support is a handy feature for those with a wireless network, as you can leave the drive plugged into your wireless router and any computer on the network can access it wirelessly. This means easy access to your files and you don't have to move the drive, but this feature would drive the cost of production up way too much for my blood, and only higher priced drives or off brands offer this. Even the "premium edition" my books do not offer it, and they cost a lot more (like 80 bucks for the same size drive). Why do they cost more? Because they include firewire support and backup software. That's really it. Of course, that means that backup software is surprisingly absent from the "essential edition", but all you need is Microsoft's free "Sync Toy" and you can backup everything very easily and keep your files synchronized. It's a very useful tool they don't advertise, and I use it to keep my flash drives in sync as well. I suggest drag and dropping the files onto your drive first, and syncing the folders later, as sync toy is free, but not uber fast.
All in all, this drive is a good deal for the money. I don't want to pay for network support, and have no need for backup software, so more expensive hard drives are not worth the extra money to me. At about $0.81 per GB (at $129.99), the price is reasonable for the size, the performance is more than acceptable, and the unique and appealing design make this a worthy drive to house your files. But, if you really need firewire, network support, or included backup software, you will want to look elsewhere.
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by scargums (see profile) -
April 22, 2006
40 out of 40 users found this user opinion helpful.
8 out of 10 - Excellent Fast, sturdy, and quiet.
Like the quiet. I am very sensitive to noise. Very fast file transfer. Cost me $50 after store rebate.
Like the quiet. I am very sensitive to noise. Very fast file transfer. Cost me $50 after store rebate.
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by Llynnly (see profile) -
July 6, 2006
10 out of 10 users found this user opinion helpful.
9 out of 10 - Spectacular Fast and inexpensive
I purchased my HD from Newegg.com, ordered it on a Monday it arrived on Thursday, total price including shipping ...
I purchased my HD from Newegg.com, ordered it on a Monday it arrived on Thursday, total price including shipping and taxes was $96.64. It was easy to set up and start to use, my HP with XP Pro recognized it and I started transferring files quickly. I got it to mainly back up audio tapes I had copied to my computer. Some of the files are between 500-700 MB, using the USB 2.0 they can take around 3 minutes. That may seem like a long time to some but it's OK for me.
I did read some negative things about this drive on Amazon after I got it. For a few people theirs died after 6 to 12 months, so if that were to happen then I'd have to lower my score from the 9 I'm giving it. The only negative has to do with the warranty. When I registered it with WD I noticed it said I had 276 days left on the warranty. It seems WD starts the clock from the date of manufacture. If you want it to go to the date of purchase you have to send them a scanned copy or JPEG of your sales receipt.
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by chafer444 (see profile) -
April 29, 2007
5 out of 5 users found this user opinion helpful.
8 out of 10 - Excellent a great non-portable external usb hard drive
With it's large size and external AC adapter, this drive isn't exactly portable, although you can move it ...
With it's large size and external AC adapter, this drive isn't exactly portable, although you can move it around. The write speed can be faster, but it is sufficient for me and probably the typical user. Other then that, I would recommend buying this quiet and attractive hard drive if you're looking for some extra storage space.
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by kevink523 (see profile) -
February 16, 2007
5 out of 5 users found this user opinion helpful.
6 out of 10 - Good SSSSLLLLOOOOWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!
I have had my computer running non-stop for the past two and a half days since I bought this item ...
I have had my computer running non-stop for the past two and a half days since I bought this item because I'm trying to back up my files before I format and install a new OS. In an attempt to save a little money, I opted for a USB external hard drive versus Firewire. I've read that USB 2.0 is "close" to the speed of Firewire, but am finding that evaluation to be way off base. For example I began copying my Applications folder (I work on a Mac G5, dual processor 4GB RAM) this morning. The projected time to move this one file -- ten hours. By the time I finish moving all of my essential files, Mac will come out with a new operating system and the move will be moot! Bottom line, if you need to save some dough and your time isn't that valuable this is the item for you. If you can shell out the extra cash and get a Firewire drive, DO IT!
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by sleepydad (see profile) -
December 13, 2006
5 out of 5 users found this user opinion helpful.
9 out of 10 - Spectacular Just got it and love it!
Before going back to school this semester I realized that my 80 GB hard drive on my Sony Vaio Laptop ...
Before going back to school this semester I realized that my 80 GB hard drive on my Sony Vaio Laptop might not cut it. Shopping around I went to best buy and found this bad boy on their website on sale from 129.99 to 89.99. For a 160 Gigs its worth it. Got it home plugged it in and it worked. Totally awesome, I backed up my entire computer with it which was a totaly of 37.9 GB of crap, I'm also using it to store all my Media such as videos and music. It's pretty easy to use and the product support manual online is awesome. It helped me reformat it to NTFS. I love this thing it looks pretty cool and works very well. I recommend it to anyone.
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by MJM573 (see profile) -
August 25, 2006
5 out of 5 users found this user opinion helpful.
2 out of 10 - Terrible In my mind...worthless.
I really think that this series of removable drives is crap. I bought mine and backed up all of my ...
I really think that this series of removable drives is crap. I bought mine and backed up all of my files and everything and it seemed to be working fine. But the next day after I turned on my computer again it didn't turn on, not even when I tried to push the power button. Imagine how happy I was...NOT! I tried other outlets, but they produced the same result. So , now my 30+ gigs of music is gone thanks to this unreliable product. THANKS WESTERN DIGITAL!
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by mclarenf1cms (see profile) -
September 6, 2006
0 out of 10 users found this user opinion helpful.
4 out of 10 - Mediocre Relatively inexpensive, but still not worth the money.
Typically I swear by WD drives, however this model disappoints. Frequent hangs and slow performance make this a regretable purchase.
Typically I swear by WD drives, however this model disappoints. Frequent hangs and slow performance make this a regretable purchase.
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by mattyr70 (see profile) -
March 16, 2007
9 out of 10 - Spectacular Easy to use, Fairly Cheap
I began looking at external hard drives as a way to back up my music collection, which is on the ...
I began looking at external hard drives as a way to back up my music collection, which is on the order of 50 gigs. Although I really don't need the 160GB capacity, it was an excellent value compared to other options at BestBuy.
My primary concern beyond price was ease of use, which is where this product really shines. I have a Dell Dimension Desktop 8400, nothing fancy, but within 45 seconds out of the box, I had my files transfering over to the new drive.
Since it's just a backup, I wasn't very concerned with transfer speed, but I was able to move the first 25 gigs of my collection over in about 40 minutes.
Highly recommended for its foolproof use, great value, and good performance.
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by rkinslow19 (see profile) -
December 12, 2006
9 out of 10 - Spectacular sweet piece of equipment
i bought this to replace my 40gb lacie portable drive. It's very quiet and quick, while it doesn't ...
i bought this to replace my 40gb lacie portable drive. It's very quiet and quick, while it doesn't have a backup software pre installed I wouldn't let that deter you from the purchase.
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by another 1 bites the dust (see profile) -
August 18, 2006
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