Product ReviewsWestern Digital My Book Essential 500GB 3.5" Desktop External Hard Drive
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With 10 User Reviews
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 Rating: Review Date: 10/30/11  |
Cons: software that comes with it is horrible and confuses "newbs"
Pros: Sturdy external hard drive |
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Rating: Review Date: 09/13/11 |
Cons: None so far
Pros: Huge capacity, Looks Great, fast, compact design, price Comment:
Easy to use(plug and play all the way) Quick spin up time and reads/writes as would be expected with a usb connected harddrive. No complaints and at this price (49.99) can't go wrong. |
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Rating: Review Date: 09/04/11 |
Cons: instructions are just too plain ,but can u read a comic book?
Pros: on sale was 48.99$ wow what a scoop!can not even hear it running,thats all u need ,lots gbs,looks good,works good Comment:
can not go wrong with this hd,too cheap to complain! |
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Rating: Review Date: 09/01/11 |
Cons: a little bulkier than expected and requires an external power supply.
Pros: Very easy to set up, stylish and very quiet. Comment:
Performs exactly as advertised. Very easy to update firmware and remove the WD Smartware. Great value for the price. |
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Rating: Review Date: 08/22/11 |
Cons: Backup software that crashes every time it starts.
Pros: Silent.Lots of space. Comment:
This is a good drive that does what it's supposed to do. The WD Smart Ware is useless except if you want to backup your whole hard drive and it's always crashing when it starts on my Win 64bits system. |
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Rating: Review Date: 03/27/10 |
Cons: Useless backup softwarecheap built enclosureVirtual CD embeded in firmware
Pros: none none what so ever Comment:
Do not buy this drive !!I've been buying WD drives for over 10 years now and have had no big problems in the past.But WD realy drop ped the ball on this one.It is hard to understand how a company can put on the market something like this. I am really frustrated and angry.Two things one I noticed right away was both the power socket and the USB socket did not align with the case.The next is the fact that I paid for a 500GB hard disk not one that has already installed close to 700mb of pure useless software called Smartware that WD makes very dificult if not impossible to fully remove.False advertising of drive capacity and yes I do know that a formated drive is always smaller that is not my point.Smartware is a very limited "backup" program a user as very little input on what gets backed up.This program Smartware also creates a virtual drive (VCD)therefore stealing a drive letter for those running multiple disks plus multiple external drives such as this one it can become a problem.This useless software also runs in the background and slows down your PC even windows backup is better than this GARBAGE.If you want an external drive to back up to and you choose what gets backed up by simple drag and drop this drive is not for you.Even if you format or partition the drive the VCD will always show up.Western Digital please don't tell me what I need and don't make me pay for 500GB and give me 700mb of garbage and then to add to it all you put the VCD embeded in the drive firmware making it impossible to remove.To be fair they do supply a way to make it hidden but not to fully remove.Please do not buy this drive please just google "WD my book essential smartware " for other horror stories. By the way this also applies to the 1TB AND 1.5TB modelsShame on you Western Digital don't treat your customers like morons. |
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Rating: Review Date: 03/18/10 |
Cons: Runs a little warm
Pros: Decent storage spaceSlim design Comment:
Purchased this for my mom to bring to work. They don't have enough storage space on their network so she can use this. So far I have not heard any complaints. |
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Rating: Review Date: 03/13/10 |
Cons: Requires External Power, Power Adapter takes up 3 Plugs on my power bar. No Cooling Fan.
Pros: Only Requires 1 USB Port, Nice design, Small foot print. Comment:
I ordered 2 of these online on Sunday, they arrived Friday.Just took one out of the box and it was making rattling noises, I took a closer look, and there is a loose screw in the thing! Not the fault of NCIX obviously, but WD. Good thing I didn't power it on! Now to try and get it out (I have no idea how to open this) and hope this thing even works.For now I'll give it a rating of Satisfactory. |
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Rating: Review Date: 02/11/10 |
Cons: None n/A
Pros: Good quality / Drive Comment:
Good quality Hard drive from Western digital. It does the job well, not noisy at all, and it is compact. Sometimes drive takes a while to wake up. |
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Rating: Review Date: 12/28/09 |
Cons: Feels a little cheap with the plastic casing
Pros: ReliableNice looks Comment:
I have had this drive for a while now and it performs as it should. Sometimes it the drive will power one with the computer if it is plugged in via USB and sometimes it won't but all you need to do then is just hit the power button. Overall a quality product from WD. |
The hard drive is of good quality, though the included software is absolutely trash.An experienced user would fmt the hd as soon as they get it, but I suggest non-experienced users to do so as well.