Mybook Essential
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 AC Adapter F My Book Essential Edition 20 WD6400H1U 00  US $15.95
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 AC Adapter F My Book Essential Edition 20 WD5000H1U 00 US $15.95
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The Western Digital My Book Essential Edition has been a mainstay of WD's external hard drive range for a number of years now. In this article we take a look at the 1TB drive which is the most popular product in the range. The model number is WDH1U10000E.
First of all the drive is well packaged and comes with a USB cable, power adapter, quick start guide and the drive itself. Once unpacked the my book essential edition 1TB is a great looking drive with a very sleek looking casing. It will certainly look good on your desk and can be positioned either horizontally or vertically. Setup was easy, just connect the data and power cables and start your PC. Your computers operating system will auto detect the drive and install the necessary drivers without you doing a thing. The drive itself comes pre loaded with some trial software consisting of back up and sync utilities. It's up to the user whether they feel they need to install them but they are not essential for the use of the drive. Note that the Western Digital My Book comes with a two year manufacturers warranty.
In use the My Book Essential is very quiet and doesn't generate a lot of heat with the casing only ever being lukewarm to the touch, even after prolonged use. The only issue we found was the absence of a power button. The drive turns on and off with your PC but it would be nice to switch it off when not needed.
The Western Digital comes factory formatted in the FAT32 file system which places limitations on the maximum file size that can be stored. The limit is around 4GB so if you are planning on using the WD for storing any large files (video files for example) then you should consider re-formatting it to the NTFS file system before you start using it. It is possible to convert the drive whilst keeping data intact but it's much easier to do it before you start using it. Right clicking on the drive in My Computer and using the 'quick format' option is the best way to do this and it should only take a couple of minutes. The full format option would take a lot longer with the only difference being that each sector of the drive is checked for errors - something which isn't necessary on a new drive. If you use Linux (or ubuntu) on your PC then this will be compatible with NTFS. For Mac users your computer will sort out the formatting for you when you first connect it. WD usually do Mac specific versions of their products which will have the formatting sorted out straight from the factory.
Transfer speeds are pretty fast using USB 2.0 and are on a par with the competition with a 2GB file being transferred in just under five minutes. The drive also works on the USB 1.1 interface but will be a lot slower as a result. There is no support for the upcoming USB 3.0 system.
Overall I would definitely recommended the wd my book essential edition 1tb.
The WD My Book Essential Edition article was written by Martin Holmes who is a technology writer specializing in external hard drives. We hope you enjoyed his in depth review and that it will help you in the purchase of your next external hard disk. If you've got any questions about the my book essential edition 1tb then please ask before buying. Please look out for other great USB hard drive reviews over the coming months.
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The Essential $12.49 The Essential |
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Essential $8.99 Essential |
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The Essential? $8.99 The Essential? |
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The Essential... $6.49 The Essential... |
