Western Digital My Passport Essential 160GB USB Portable Hard Drive - Electronics / Photography (Western Digital)

You can pack up your office files and take them home with you thanks to the My Passport Essential from Western Digital! This glossy black hard drive has a huge capacity of 160 GB, yet it's so compact and lightweight that you can po it easily into your pocket. You don't need to use the mains to power up the My Passport Essential; just plug it into your computer's USB port and you're ready to transfer photos, videos and music files. The My Passport Essential is compatible with PC and Mac.

Customer Reviews of Western Digital My Passport Essential 160GB USB Portable Hard Drive

CharlieCeng
Norwich, UK
8th January 2009

Unreliable
I owned one of these drives for about 18 months - it was fine. Software a bit clunky, but workable if you are patient.

Then, the drive died, losing all my data - clicking & scratching noises with no access.

The WD aftersales service works pretty well, the drive was replaced quickly.

Only problem is...the replacement failed in the same way after two weeks.

I won't be buying another.

Al
Cheshire, UK
6th January 2009

It's great, really it is!
Well, i've just read all of the 1 star reviews and i'm finding it hard to agree with a lot of them. I've had my drive for 6 months now and, until recently I had no problems. Plug and play it definitely is. I never bothered with the sync option. It's just drag and drop. I tend to flip between a desktop and a laptop and don't have a problem - dead easy.

About a month ago my desktop started losing contact with the drive every few minutes and I started to get a bit worried. Maybe the 1 star guys had a point. I went to the WD website and ran some diagnositics. You don't need to be techy to do this. Unfortuantely the drive passed their tests so I rang to arrange a warranty swap. The chap on the end of the phone had sorted me out within 2 minutes. He took some details make/model etc then asked me about the fault. It turns out, and this will help some of you out there, that if there's not enough power coming from the USB the drive effectively goes to sleep until you call it again. I had it plugged into a front USB port on my desktop tower but the WD guy told me to plug it in the back and the problem has gone away.

So, easy to use, good help on the web and good phone support. I'm happy, hope you will be to - worth buying.

L. Esteller
IPSWICH, ENGLAND
4th January 2009

SUPER SLOW, NAFF PROGRAM, LOOKS GOOD!
FOR PHYSICAL SIZE AND LOOKS, EXCELLENT AND VERY PORTABLE, FOR USABILITY A BIG FAT ZERO. SO SIMPLE TO USE THERE ARE NO INSTRUCTIONS APART FROM PLUG IN AND FOLLOW SCREEN MENUS. UNFORTUNATLEY THEY COULDN'T MAKE A SIMPLE TASK MORE HAP-HAZARD. "SYNC'D" MY DOCUMENTS ONTO DRIVE, SOMETIMES THEY WERE THERE OTHER TIMES NOT. HARDLY RELIABLE INSPIRING IF THE IDEA IS TO ERASE OFF COMPUTER ONTO DRIVE TO FREE UP SPACE. "SYNC'D" C DRIVE- TOOK OVER 10 (TEN!!!!) HOURS FOR ABOUT 25 GIG, NOW,SOFTWARE JUST HANGS, RANDOMLY TERMINATES OR FILES APPEAR/DISSAPEAR AT WILL.
CONCLUSION- FORMAT DRIVE FROM NEW AND JUST USE AS AN ADDITIONAL "DRAG & DROP" HARD DRIVE. SPOKE TO SEVERAL PEOPLE WITH ONE OF THESE AND THEY ALL DO THE SAME. IT WILL SAVE YOU ALOT OF TIME AND GRIEF.....HONEST!

Jabel
England
30th December 2008

Adequate connection cable not supplied.
The cable supplied with this product is a single USB cable (the kind that everybody has at least three of). For some people that will be enough, because their computer will supply it with enough power through that.

Some (older, say c.2005?) computers will not do this. They require a special Y USB cable. I think this one is adequate, but there are others on Amazon: Ex-Pro USB Cable - Dual Power, 2 x Type A to mini B, USB 2.0, 1m. Provides additional USB power to high draw devices using MiniB (Eg External Hard Drives etc..)

A standard USB only lets out 500mA, this requires 1000mA. Some Computers don't limit the USB to 500, so for those the cable supplied is adequate.

As for the quality of the hard drive, I can't say, because I can't use mine until I get the cable. It looks fine. But that's not enough. Needs to be supplied with the right kit.

K. Burgess
manchester,england
30th December 2008

fantastic product for storing files on
really great item.so easy to use, fantastic for storing films, music etc on.i use mine alot through my dvd player (via usb) and plays films brilliant, no need for discs! great fast devlivery highly recommend