Western Digital has refreshed its line of My Passport Essential hard drives with smaller, smarter, and safer storage solutions. The new hard drives come with WD SmartWare software which features built-in automatic backup, password protection, and 256-bit hardware encryption. From it you can back up, retrieve, and secure your files.
The software comes built-in and resides on a separate partition on the hard drive, but the auto-backup can be disabled. The software appear to be very intuitive and include some nice touches like a search function and real-time backup status reporting.
When you plug the drive in it appears as two devices. The first is a standard external hard disk and the second as a 450MB CD drive containing the SmartWare software installer. This dual configuration usefully prevents you from erasing the bundled SmartWare software by mistake.
My Passport Essential hard drives are part of the Western Digital’s Passport family, which also includes the My Passport Essential SE and My Passport for Mac, and are offered in capacities ranging from 320 GB to 640GB. They are available in 4 colors – Midnight Black, Cool Silver, Pacific Blue and Real Red.
There’s only one socket – a mini-USB port that delivers data and power, making this an incredibly tidy way of increasing the amount of storage for your netbook. With a spindle speed of 5400 rpm and a data transfer rate of 480Mbps it delivers an acceptable performance for netbook users. In practice, portable drives for mobile users don’t have to provide maximum performance, but they need to be light, small, and flexible.
The new My Passport Essential hard drives are more than 20 percent smaller than the previous generation My Passport and you can easily carry them in a pant or shirt pocket.
All in all the new hard drives keep user’s personal content safe in one place, while the sleek design and premium finishes infuse a sense of personal style.
Main Features of Western Digital My Passport Essential Ultra-Portable USB 2.0 Hard Drive
- USB powered – No AC adapter required
- Password protection capability and 256-bit encryption
- Lightweight & compact design
- Ready to plug-and-play with Windows PC’s
- Planet-friendly packaging derived from recycled materials to minimize waste
Western Digital My Passport Essential Ultra-Portable USB 2.0 Hard Drive Specification
- System Requirements: Windows XP, Vista or 7; Mac OS X Tiger, Leopard or Snow Leopard
- Form Factor: 2.5″
- Drive Connectivity: USB 2.0
- Rotation Speed: 5400 RPM
- Serial Bus Transfer Rate: 480 Mb/s(Max)
- Drive Capacities : 320/500/640 GB
- Drive Formatting : NTFS formatted for use with PC (requires reformatting for use with Mac)
- Software: WD SmartWare
- Security: Password protection and encryption
- Power Requirement: Powered directly from the USB port
- Color Option: Midnight Black, Pacific Blue, Cool Silver and Real Red
- Docking station (optional)
- Dimensions: 4.3″(H) x 3.2″(W) x 0.6″(D)
- Product Weight: 6.3 oz
- Warranty: 2-year limited warranty
WD SmartWare Software Features
- Visual backup displays that show content in categories and shows the progress of backup
- Automatic, continuous data backup will instantly make a second copy whenever you add or change a file
- Retrieve valuable data to its original location whether it’s lost data or the file has been overwritten
- Customizable data backup that allows user to set drive security, run diagnostics, manage the power settings, and more from the WD SmartWare control center
Package Contents
- Western Digital My Passport Essential Ultra-portable hard drive
- USB cable
- Software: WD SmartWare
- Quick Install Guide
Pros
- Smaller, sleeker design
- inexpensive – great features for the money
- Good backup software
- no noise
- heat well managed
Cons
- Cannot explore backups
General Thoughts
Western Digital is truly all-in-one back-up system. Instead of buying an external hard disk and going to the trouble of setting up a third-party application such as Acronis True Image, you simply plug in the My Passport Essential drive, run the software once, and forget all about it until you need it. The smaller and sleeker design of WD’s redesigned My Passport drives, combined with the intuitive visual backup experience of WD SmartWare software, makes this drive a smart and secure, travel-friendly storage choice (Dale Pistilli, vice president of marketing). We agree with this statement and definitely think the new Western Digital My Passport Essential hard drives are great option if you are looking to confidently backup and expand your netbook’s strorage capacity.
Western Digital My Passport Essential Ultra-Portable USB 2.0 Hard Drive Price Review
320GB Hard Drives
Western Digital My Passport Essential 320 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA3200ASL-NESN (Cool Silver)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 320 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA3200ARD-NESN (Real Red)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 320 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA3200ABL-NESN (Pacific Blue)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 320 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA3200ABK-NESN (Midnight Black)
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320GB Hard Drive + Neoprene Carrying Case
Western Digital My Passport Essential 320 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive (Silver) + Neoprene Carrying Case
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 320 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive (Red) + Neoprene Carrying Case
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 320 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive (Blue) + Neoprene Carrying Case
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 320 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive (Midnight Black) + Neoprene Carrying Case
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500GB Hard Drives
Western Digital My Passport Essential 500 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA5000ASL-NESN (Cool Silver)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 500 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA5000ARD-NESN (Real Red)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 500 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA5000ABL-NESN (Pacific Blue)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 500 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA5000ABK-NESN (Midnight Black)
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640GB Hard Drives
Western Digital My Passport Essential 640 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA6400ASL-NESN (Cool Silver)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 640 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA6400ABL-NESN (Pacific Blue)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 640 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA6400ARD-NESN (Real Red)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential 640 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBAAA6400ABK-NESN (Midnight Black)
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750GB Hard Drives
Western Digital My Passport Essential SE 750 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBABM7500ABK-NESN (Midnight Black)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential SE 750 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBABM7500ASL-NESN (Cool Silver)
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1TB Hard Drives
Western Digital My Passport Essential SE 1TB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive WDBABM0010BBK-NESN (Midnight Black)
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Hard Drive Carrying Case
Western Digital Hard Carrying Case for My Passport Portable Drives WDBABJ0000NBK-NRSN – Black
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Western Digital Neoprene Carrying Case for My Passport Portable Drives WEBABH0000NBK-NRSN – Black
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Case Logic VHS-101 Portable Hard Drive Case (Black)
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Western Digital My Passport Essential Ultra-Portable USB 2.0 Hard Drive Video Review
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