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Back to My Book Premium ES Edition External 500GB Hard Drive

WD My Book Premium ES Edition External 500GB Hard Drive
Price Range
$143.00 - $227.25

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Overall Rating
1 Star Review

Reviewed by: Helix

Updated:03-13-08

Duration of ownership:10 Months

Strengths:

Weaknesses:

Overall Evaluation: This WD drive died after 10 months of using it for backup with thousand of files and pictures. The WD foreign call center diagnosed the problem over the phone and said it was the AC adapter that failed. They sent a new one, but that was not the solution since the disk still did not spin and the drive was totally dead. The cost to recover the files is estimated to run from $900 to $1,500 (per one of WD's data recovery service providers). While this drive is still under warranty (which means I send the dead drive back and WD sends me a new one), why would I want another inferior product? So I will pay to recover my data, throw the WD drive out and buy a new external hard drive that has a much lower failure rate. Not a pretty story and from what I am reading here, not a recommendable product.
Overall Rating
4 Star Review

Reviewed by: prushant

Updated:11-15-07

Duration of ownership:6 Weeks

Strengths: Dual Interface

Weaknesses: None so far

Overall Evaluation: This drive is fast with the sata interface and also with the usb 2.0 interface. Like other western digital my book hard drives this one too delivers great performance. also the mybook is the most elegant looking externak hard drives available in the market. The drive package contains all the cables needed to use it with sata and usb. The 8mb buffer makes it easy to watch movies that have been transferred to the drive and there is no pause or lag when listening to music stored o n the drive. Its another great product from WD.
Overall Rating
1 Star Review

Reviewed by: pbloverforever

Updated:10-03-07

Duration of ownership:5 Days

Strengths: Small, inexpensive, large capacity, eSATA

Weaknesses: Unreliable, failed drive/bad sectors, lost data, have to reformat to NTFS

Overall Evaluation: I purchased this HD only 5 MONTHS ago and it has already crashed. At first, I was very happy with the HD (other than the fact that I had to reformat it into NTFS - very odd) and it worked great with no complications, but all of a sudden, the HD crashed on me and I could no longer access the drive nor my files. Western Digital offered to send me a replacement drive, which is in process now, but the real value is the data. I'm still debating whether or not I should spend hundreds of dollars on recovering the data. In any case, BEWARE OF THIS HD!!!!!
Overall Rating
3 Star Review

Reviewed by: akanie

Updated:07-18-07

Duration of ownership:

Strengths: Plug and play with nice external case

Weaknesses: Didn't get the eSata to work and after reformatting to NTSF drive is only showing 465GB

Overall Evaluation: A nice plug and play hard drive but comes in FAT32 partition. Had to reformat it to NTSF. It's got a nice case but the case seems pretty big compared to some other external hard drives. Did not get the eSata to work but that could have been my eSata card and was a little more expensive due to the fact it's got the eSata connection.
Overall Rating
5 Star Review

Reviewed by: rosey5758

Updated:07-05-07

Duration of ownership:3 Weeks

Strengths: Easy Plug and Play, and easy to use software; good value for the price.

Weaknesses: Aside from having to reformat after inital startup, none.

Overall Evaluation: I am very pleased with the product in terms of performance, capacity and price. It is easy to use and quiet. The USB transfer rate is about what one would expect and descent.
Overall Rating
5 Star Review

Reviewed by: frankby12000

Updated:06-06-07

Duration of ownership:40 Days

Strengths: fast for USB, eSATA is a nice feature. shows remaining capacity with LED ring, And status

Weaknesses: None that I can think of.

Overall Evaluation: This is definitely the nicest external that I have tried (I have switch the 5 externals I have to My Book Premium ES 500's). It is small, unlike many of the cases that are unwieldy when you're trying to find a place to keep them. capacity And status with LED rings is verry nice.
Overall Rating
4 Star Review

Reviewed by: undertowpull

Updated:06-06-07

Duration of ownership:3 Days

Strengths: Plenty fast for USB, eSATA is a nice (and rare) feature, has the ability to show remaining capacity with LED ring (if you install their drivers). Stand up or lay down without add'l hardware.

Weaknesses: No firewire, which is MUCH faster than USB (not in spec, but in real-world use). Plastic case probably won't survive much dropping, no real "OFF" switch. Only external Power supply (pretty common).

Overall Evaluation: As the owner of multiple external drives and cases, this is definitely the nicest "store bought" external I have. It has a very small footprint, unlike many of the "eye-catching" cases that are unwieldy when you're trying to find a place to keep them. I like the idea of the USB ring showing remaining capacity, but I didn't install the drivers so didn't test this. If you have eSATA, I don't think you'll find another external drive this reasonably priced.Many review sites argue back-n-forth about the "on" button on the front, if I stop the device in XP and press the button, it certainly sounds to me like it shuts completely off...
Overall Rating
4 Star Review

Reviewed by: virologirl

Updated:06-06-07

Duration of ownership:7 Days

Strengths: Works perfectly. USB 2.0 and Firewire

Weaknesses: Expensive

Overall Evaluation: This thing works great. It seems to get a little warm, but not anymore so than other External Drives I've used. I like that I can use firewire and USB (one of my PC's has a firewire connection, while my laptop does not, and I use this for both). Overall, its very easy to use (though all external drives are), however seems to be too expensive. Thirty bucks more than the mybook essential (without the firewire connection) seems to be a more cost-efective choice.
Overall Rating
5 Star Review

Reviewed by: cmsmith325

Updated:05-31-07

Duration of ownership:1 Weeks

Strengths: Plug and Play, Ease of Installation, Case Design

Weaknesses: None at this point

Overall Evaluation: The drive was simple to install and use. It took only a few minutes to replace my other external hard drive with this one. The case design allows for either vertical or horizontal placement. I utilized the USB connection to transfer approximately 140 GB of data in under one hour with no problems. I would recommend this drive for anyone who needed the ability to transfer large amounts of data from one system to another.
Overall Rating
5 Star Review

Reviewed by: christina_shonts

Updated:05-24-07

Duration of ownership:15 Days

Strengths: lost of storage, good design, usb 2

Weaknesses: none so far

Overall Evaluation: This comes pre loaded with software, drivers, and all the tools you need to use the drive. It is preformatted as fat32 which I like because is faster and less error prone.