Be very careful when selecting this drive. I have been using Western Digital drives for many years in my work and own hundreds in various capacities, including a few My Book models. Until now, there has been nothing unique about these drives. Plug them into USB port and you're ready to go. ...

Western Digital My Book Essential 1 TB USB 2.0 Desktop External Hard Drive WDBAAF0010HBK-NESN Buy this product from Amazon
 
2.5
Format : CD
Publisher : Western Digital
Company : Western Digital
List Price: $129.99
Our Price: Too low to display
Used Price : $89.00


Features
  • Automatic, continuous backup
  • Visual drive control center
  • Password protection and 256-bit encryption
  • Illuminated capacity gauge
  • USB 2.0 interface

Product Description

The world’s best-selling external hard drive now features a new, smart, visual backup solution that protects your data automatically. Smaller, sleeker, more streamlined design - WD has made these award-winning drives even smaller, sleeker, and more elegant. As always, this book-like shape takes up less space on your desk and allows two or more My Book drives to nestle neatly together like volumes on a shelf. WD SmartWare - A control center for your drive that gives you the power to: Protect your data automatically - Relax. Your data is secure. Automatic, continuous backup will instantly make a second copy whenever you add or change a file. See your backup as it happens - Seeing is believing. Visual backup displays your content categories and shows the progress of your backup. Bring back lost files effortlessly - Retrieve your valuable data to its original location whether you’ve lost all your data or just overwritten an important file. Take control - Customize your backup, set drive security, run diagnostics, manage the power settings, and more from the WD SmartWare control center. Drive lock - Gain peace of mind knowing that your data is protected from unauthorized access or theft with password protection and military-grade 256-bit hardware-based encryption. Illuminated capacity gauge - See at a glance how much space is available on your drive. USB 2.0 interface - A simple connection that offers convenience and compatibility among multiple computers. Power miser - My Book external drives are designed to save energy. WD GreenPower Technology lowers internal drive power consumption by up to 30%, a sleep mode reduces power during idle times, and a power-saving feature turns the drive on and off with your computer. Planet friendly - We designed a small box to minimize waste and used recycled material. We encourage you to recycle it. Ready to plug-and-play with Windows PCs - if you’re a Mac user, check out our Mac version of this product.

Amazon.com Product Description

Our best-selling My Book external drive is an elegant, high-capacity storage solution for all the chapters of your digital life. Our latest edition now features visual, easy-to-use, automatic, continuous backup software and drive lock security protection. At last, beauty, brains, and simplicity together.

Elegant design.

This book-like shape takes up minimal space on your desk and allows two or more My Book drives to nestle neatly together like volumes on a shelf.

See your life safe in one place.

WD SmartWare software - A visual control center with a single screen view of all your data. From it you can back up, retrieve, and secure your files.

Password protection.

An extra level of security with password protection and 256-bit hardware-based encryption.


Features at a glance
  • Automatic, continous backup
  • Illuminated capacity gauge
  • Password protection and hardware encryption
  • WD SmartWare software
  • 2-years limited warranty

Smaller, sleeker, more streamlined design - We've made these award-winning drives even smaller, sleeker, and more elegant. As always, this book-like shape takes up minimal space on your desk and allows two or more My Book drives to nestle neatly together like volumes on a shelf.

WD SmartWare™ - A control center for your drive that gives you the power to:

-- Protect your data automatically - Relax, your data is secure. Automatic, continuous backup will instantly make a second copy whenever you add or change a file.

-- See your backup as it happens - Seeing is believing. Visual backup displays your content in categories and shows the progress of your backup.

-- Bring back lost files effortlessly - Retrieve your valuable data to its original location whether you’ve lost all your data or just overwritten an important file.

-- Take control - Customize your backup, set drive security, run diagnostics, manage the power settings, and more from the WD SmartWare control center.

Find out more about WD SmartWare™

Drive lock - Gain peace of mind knowing that your data is protected from unauthorized access or theft with password protection and 256-bit hardware-based encryption.

Illuminated capacity gauge - See at a glance how much space is available on your drive.

USB 2.0 interface - Powered directly from the USB port on your PC. No separate power supply is needed*.
* An optional cable is available for the few computers that limit power from the USB port.

Power miser - My Book external drives are designed to save energy. WD GreenPower Technology™ lowers internal drive power consumption by up to 30%, a sleep mode reduces power during idle times, and a power-saving feature turns the drive on and off with your computer.

Planet friendly - We designed a small box from recycled materials to minimize waste. We encourage you to recycle it.

Ready to plug-and-play with Windows PCs - If you're a Mac user, check out our Mac version of this product.

Ideal For

  • Protecting your data with automatic, continous backup
  • Retrieving lost data effortlessly
  • Adding extra storage space for photos, videos and music
  • Securing private or sensitive data

Compatibility

Formatted NTFS
Windows® XP, Windows Vista®, Windows 7
Mac OS® X Tiger®, Leopard®, Snow Leopard™ (requires reformatting)

Note: Compatibility may vary depending on user's hardware configuration and operating system.

What's in the box

External hard drive, WD SmartWare software, USB cable, AC adapter, Quick Install Guide.


Backup software you'll really use � WD SmartWare

Five great reasons to love it:

1. It's easy - Data backup can be a chore, but it's your family photos, your movies, your music - your life - and it's important to protect it. So we made this software extra easy because we really want you to use it.

2. You can see your life safe in one place -
See your content displayed in easy to understand categories like movies and photos. Watch the progress of your backup as it happens with the instant-feedback color bars. Now you can truly be sure that all your stuff is backed up.

  • A unique visual interface lets you see the drives connected to your computer.
  • WD SmartWare will automatically scan your computer and find all of your personal files, including e-mail.
  • Content category gauges show how much information you have to be backed up in each category. You can even mouse over a category to see a file count.
  • Simply click Run Backup and WD SmartWare will automatically start backing up your files.
  • As your backup is running the category gauges will change color showing you the backup as it happens.
  • When finished, you’ll see a status screen and information about your backup. You only have to do this once. After the first backup your files will be backed up automatically every time you change or add a file.

3. It's always on the job - WD SmartWare is always watching your computer, so when you change a file and save it, create new files, add new pictures, movies, or songs, WD SmartWare will instantly back them up.

4. You can bring back lost files effortlessly - If you ever accidentally delete an important file, or need to get an earlier version of a file, you can find and retrieve it in seconds with this easy-to-use interface.

  • Restore files and folders by categories – photos, music, video, for example.
  • Find a lost file with the search function.
  • Go back in time to retrieve an older version of a file.

5. You're in control - WD SmartWare software is also a control center for your external drives. From it you can:

  • Customize your backup
  • Set drive security
  • Run diagnostics
  • Manage the power settings, and more...

SimilarProduct

Customer reviews

Be very careful when selecting this drive. 5 by .. Jerry Saperstein (Evanston, IL USA)
I have been using Western Digital drives for many years in my work and own hundreds in various capacities, including a few My Book models. Until now, there has been nothing unique about these drives. Plug them into USB port and you're ready to go.

This unit with its WD SmartWare solution is different from My Book units of the past: very different. Different enough to ruin the day for many people who find that they have something they don't want - an automatic backup system. Thus, this unit must be reviewed from two very different perspectives. One as a standalone backup system - and the other as a standalone external drive. Both merit five stars.

Western Digital blew it on this product line. I guess some MBAs decided that people wanted a plug-n-play backup system. Maybe some people do. But they sure don't make it clear on the box that when you plug this puppy in, it is very insistent on installing its backup software. And there is as virtual CD that pops up and pops up and pops up and pops up: you seemingly can't get rid of it.

As delivered - unless you want a simple backup system - this My Book model is bad news. Western Digital got the message after the marketplace blasted it with reviews running from bad to awful. They finally introduced some software that would update the firmware and suppress the virtual CD function.

So now if you're willing to take the time to download and run the firmware updater and the software manager, in about thirty minutes or so, you'll have what you might have been looking for in the first place - an external hard drive without any bells and whistles.

Western Digital did this one wrong. The advertising and the outside of the box should make it absolutely crystal clear that this is intended as a standalone backup system that can be converted to an ordinary external hard drive.

As a backup system for people who don't want to learn anything about backing up hard drives, it isn't bad. It is simple to use, configurable for default operation and even provides for whole drive encryption. However, it is not a system experienced users will like. It is inflexible and it is WD's backup way or no way. It is, effectively, backup for dummies - and the unsophisticated will probably appreciate it simplicity.

A lot of people, however, are going to buy this unit without reading the current descriptions or the notice of a firmware updater from Western Digital and are going to be very aggravated as they try to get rid of the virtual CD and defeat the backup software.

Physically, the unit is typical of the My Book line. Sleek, no fan and runs cool. One significant design defect, in my opinion, is the use of a "wall wart" power adapter. It is on the large side and doesn't fit conveniently into most power bars. They should have made it inline with a regular power cord going to the outlet. Also, the MBAs have decided the normal convention of putting the USB symbol on the top of the USB connector is too ordinary for them: they put it on the bottom and used a stylized "WD" logo on the top. So expect to attempt putting in the cable upside down a few times. Finally,the sockets for the power and mini-USB did not quite line up with the openings on the case.

For someone seeking a simple backup solution, this is a pretty good idea. For someone who just wants an external hard drive, it works, but only after you remove the backup features. The hard drive itself is a Western Digital product and I have been pleased with them over the hundreds of drives I use in my work.

If you're looking for just a plain vanilla external hard drive, don't buy this unit unless you don't mind taking the time to get rid of the backup features. Otherwise get one without the WD SmartWare features.

Jerry



New software does not force an install, drive is great 5 by .. AKO California (Los Angeles)
The software on my drive (purch Apr 2010) does not force an installation of Smartware. There is now an option to not install the software, which then leads it to only install drivers. It does not prompt for the software install after that and shows as a straight drive that I could drag and drop onto. One nice feature is the drive will power down if the computer is turned off or the usb cord unplugged. Then it turns on automatically when the computer is turned back on, or is plugged into another computer.

See below for a way to enable password protection of the drive without leaving Smartware installed.

The virtual CD can be turned off from within the software, or through a separate download from the WD website. It turned off, then back on just fine. Other people mentioned formatting the drive to get full capacity afterwards, but I didn't try that. Instructions for how to do that are at the WD website.

One thing to clear up is the people saying the virtual CD takes up 70 GB. It takes up less than 500 MB. The 70 GB apparent deficiency relates to the way Windows reports hard drive sizes, not the virtual CD.

A 1 TB drive does not show up as 1,000 GB, but rather as 931 GB in Windows. Right click any drive (or even a file) and go to properties and compare the capacity in bytes to the capacity in MB or GB right next to it. They are not the same. I think you have to divide 1 TB by 1,024 to get how many KB it is, then by 1,024 again to get how many MB, then 1,024 again to get how many GB. So 930 GB for this drive is really 1 TB, minus about 1GB due to the file structure and virtual CD. Again, it does appear you can re-format and claim back the space the virtual CD space back, but I kept it for a specific reason I'll mention later.

After I verified it worked as a straight drive, I tried Smartware. The main problem with Smartware is there's no way to selectively backup certain folders or even just pick a different backup interval besides continuous backup. For many people this will work just fine as it is automatic and you can even set how many old versions of files it keeps. But I need more control since I'm backing up more than one computer and would rather not have yet another program running in the background. And Smartware is really slow. It seems to be cataloging the files. Probably gets faster once it is done the first time, but it seemed like it would have taken a day to back up one of my PCs and that one only had about 40GB of data. But I was just trying it out on a portion of my files, so maybe it's faster if just left alone overnight. However it does run in the background, so you could just plug it in and during regular usage of the PC it would finish the backup over some days.

I installed Smartware on another computer to see what it would do, and it correctly identified it was a separate computer to back up then created new backup folders in the WD folder. The drive also works as a regular drive that you can copy to even if Smartware is storing to it.

Now, the reason I left the virtual CD on the drive. I discovered you can turn on encryption in Smartware, set a password, then uninstall Smartware and the drive stays password protected. There is an unlocker on the virtual CD so you can then unlock the drive from any PC. Obviously, to change the password or turn off encryption, you'd have to install Smartware again but it's still there on the virtual CD. Since I bought this drive over others because of the encryption, I'm glad the password protection works without needing to leave Smartware installed. If the drive were stolen, it'll be encrypted. When plugged into a PC, the password window will pop up automatically. If you start the PC with it already attached, you have to click on the virtual CD, then it'll pop up. Without the password, it'll just start up with the PC and show as a drive.

Speed is pretty good when used as a regular external drive. Although it is limited by being a USB connection. When copying my data overnight it ran around 5 MB/second over an extended period.

Music and video playing from the drive worked fine. I played a DVD content off it and once during playback it froze then picked back up later. But otherwise was fine, which is pretty good for about 1 1/2 hour video.

I'm very satisfied with the drive. My data is secure and the speed is very good. If the backup software were more flexible, it'd be better, but security is more important to me. While I was a little worried about all the negative reviews, they mainly were due to the forced software install which is no longer the case.

Not Nearly as Bad as the other reviewers state! 5 by .. Cebert Currie (Miami Beach, Fl)
I just bought this WD external hard drive to upgrade my computer's memory. My computer is 3 years old, 256 MB Ram, 80 GB Harddrive. I'm upgrading both the RAM and Harddrive, just to make my PC more functional with todays programs, etc. When I got home from Best Buy with this item (sorry Amazon needed it immediately), I nearly had a heart attack seeing how bad most responses were. I didnt open this box for hours as I read on looking for some positive. I did eventually find like 5 recent people who had a difference in opinion based on a recent modification by WD for the product.

First most of the reviews mark this product as unusable because of the Smartware. Apparently everyone hates it. Apparently when the device was first released the Smartware was auto-installing and there was only a way to disable it but it continued to run in the backround, etc. Apparently recently between Nov '09 - Dec '09 WD released a firmware update to allow people to work around it. I would also like to state that it also appears that this firmware update is part of the new packaged items.

Another concern for people was that the Smartware, apparently was not really all that smart. Not always realizing when new files were added, and to make matters worse is a system resource hog. Well apparently this is no longer a problem as well. That worried me as like I said my PC still only has 256 MB of RAM, and my 80 GB hard drive was full. I fully expected trying to use this drive to seize my PC, and I'd have to wait until my 1 GB of RAM arrived to do any work with this drive. Not the case. My PC hasn't crashed, froze, or seized in anyway since starting this product last night.

Because of most people's concern of the software, I did not attempt to use it. I felt if more pro type people with PC's were having such problems with it, I felt I'd just get frustrated and chuck the entire product, and get something else.

Speed, I haven't really seen the full abilities of the speed yet. Like I said my PC is a bit slow still having not upgraded my PC's RAM in 3 years. I felt that most likely slowed down the process of moving files to the drive, but I'll update that in the future.

Noise: It is somewhat noisy. You'll definitely notice its presence on your desk when its not in standby. Apparently it contains a standby mode, which while I type it's just entered.

Lastly, overall at this time I rate it as a usable drive. It does what it needs too. Unless you're a person who just must utilize every iota of space on the drive, or just like to let one bad thing sour the entire bunch, its a good drive for you.

If small things like loosing 70 GB of 1 TB bother you greatly, then look elsewhere. Otherwise, if you have an average to good PC, get this drive. When you load it, it will ask if you want the Smartware, just tell it not to install. If its a really big deal and you don't want the VCD to show either, then go to WD website, they have a fix for that too.

Zero issues for me, and very fast backup 5 by .. Flaherty ()
I set this up to backup my hard drive on my computer. I have a couple of other NAS and external hard driver to store irreplaceable files such as family photos, videos, and business information and I was most impressed with the speed of backup on the Western Digital My Book. It's far faster than any other option I've ever used. Rather than taking several hours, all of my files were backed up in well under one hour. I even (gasp) dropped it once and breathed a sigh of relief after opening the WD SmartWare to double check that everything was still there and accessible.

The My Book is about the size of a thick paperback book, but shorter when placed upright. I've had the drive horizontal and upright, and it tends to run hotter when horizontal. Why that is I don't know, but I assume it's that way because heat rises and the vents are at the top of the drive.

The drive arrives securely suspended between molded plastic holders inside of a box. The drive can be password protected, and I find the drive is not a resource hog like other backup systems I've used. The WD SmartWare software is completely self-explanatory and easy to use. I think this would be a great way for college students to back up their files easily and without a lot of technical know-how.

So far, I am completely satisfied with this drive, and should I encounter problems in the future, I'll be sure to update the review.

Western Digital My Book Essential 1 TB USB 2.0 Ext HD 5 by .. Ignacio J. Rodriguez (Miami, FL)
Excellent backup storage drive for the money. Backed by WD reputation. Have another exactly the same for over 2 years with no problemns at 98% capacity. Can now remove WD Smartware backup software easily if you want. I like the backup software as it allows easy backup of important files in C drive which is precisely why I bought this drive.




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