| | |  | Computer Accessories | Home » » Western Digital My Book Studio 500 GB USB 2.0/FireWire 400/800/eSATA Desktop External Hard Drive | | | | | | | Description: | | Speed is what you need when for video editing, big design projects, or managing photo shoots and that's what this drive delivers with FireWire 800 and eSATA connectivity. With our automatic backup capability your creative masterpieces will be backed up the minute you save them. | | | Features: | |
• Plug-and-play setup for easy installation
• Automatically backs up important data, synchronizes files to keep them current
• Compatible with USB 2.0, FireWire 400 and 800, and eSATA
• Formatted for Mac OS X 10.4.8 or later, can be reformatted for Windows 2000, XP, and Vista
• Turns itself on and off with your computer and Safe Shutdown prevents the drive from being powered down until all your data has been written
| | | Product Details: | | | Product Length:
| 8.5 inches | | Product Width:
| 7.0 inches | | Product Height:
| 5.8 inches | | Product Weight:
| 2.58 pounds | | Package Length:
| 8.6 inches | | Package Width:
| 7.0 inches | | Package Height:
| 5.8 inches | | Package Weight:
| 3.65 pounds | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 73 reviews |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
 ( 73 customer reviews )
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
82 of 85 found the following review helpful:
 I really WANT to like this drive, but...Dec 09, 2007
By Sam Sheddan
Like it says in the review title, I really WANT to like this drive. Unfortunately, I can't. I don't. And I probably won't. Ever. Why?
I bought one of these from another vendor (sorry Amazon, their price was better). I installed the drive on my 24" aluminum iMac (which I DID buy from Amazon, good job, guys). The drive recognized fine on firewire 800, and I set Time Machine to use it for backups.
Then the problems started. The drive would "freeze" when it went into suspend mode, and it wouldn't come back. OS X is too stupid to stop trying to access a "dead" drive, so the suspended/frozen drive would hang the system. The only solution was to power down the drive (if possible), or remove the firewire cable. Worse, sometimes the drive wouldn't power down using the power button, so I had to pull the power cord. NOT good.
Once the frozen drive was out of the firewire chain, the OS would recover semi-gracefully, with a "Device Removal" error. I figured it was a fluke, so I put the drive first in the firewire chain. No luck. Then I changed cables. No luck. Okay, try the drive as the ONLY firewire drive. No luck. It would still freeze, and still hang the system.
So, I figured I just had a defective drive. No problem. I already had another on order, so I sent the first back to the vendor and waited for the second to arrive.
Same problems with the second drive. I used every connection available: firewire 800, firewire 400, and even USB (iMac's don't come with eSATA, so I don't know if it's a problem too). No luck with any connection, OR any cable (I have several available, which work with other drives). The My Book Studio drive still hangs AT LEAST once a day, usually several times.
So the second drive is going back for a refund, and I'm going to call the other vendor and just have them refund my money for the "defective" drive already in transit as a return.
Now, why do I want to like this drive?
Pros:
- It's good-looking
- It's quiet (because it's fanless)
- Quadruple interface (nice!)
- It's small
Cons:
- It just doesn't work... do I really need any MORE cons?
When the drive started giving me problems, I went looking for a solution (updated firmware, updated Button Manager software, SOMETHING). I found several people on the Apple Discussion Forums with the same problem, which made me realize that the drive itself was the issue.
Google for "my book studio freeze" and you can read the Apple Support discussion, which will lead you to more problem discussions.
That being said, I love Western Digital, and they're my first choice for external drives. I just think they have some MAJOR teething pains with the My Book Studio line. And since other Mac users love them, I suspect that WD Studio drives simply don't like the new iMacs. But since I spent $2000 on my computer, and $200 on the drive, the drive is the one that gets returned. Sorry, WD.
If you want a good, reliable drive for your iMac, I've had lots of luck with LaCie, and I've heard really good things about OWC drives. But if you're a tried-and-true WD fan... stay away from THIS drive.
19 of 19 found the following review helpful:
 USE WITH CAUTION!Jun 09, 2008
By Linda Cappel
"redstar"
I have been a devotee of WD drives for years. I have 15 functioning on my work server (mostly in 2 e-sata enclosures using port multipliers), I have 4 inside my home machine right now, I have a good 30 sitting about for use here at home as I need them. They're work horses that always performed flawlessly...till now.
These MYBOOKS with their sleep "feature" are criminally bad. Can't use them for servers as they will send a server crashing within 10 minutes of disuse in either SATA or FW 800 configurations. Used for backup, your backup will freeze within the same 10 minutes. The drive comes with backup software -- that's what they're being positioned for -- but they can't be left idle or they sleep and won't wake.
Older model MYBOOKS (I have three) work fine. They are in an always-on mode. I thought I was simply buying more of the same when I purchased the Studio Pro models.
This "feature" is built into the drive and system preferences won't override it. Some myopic developer decided what the community needed was a sleeping drive so what we've all got now are bricks. There is no "fix" coming from Western Digital. I called to inquire; that's coming from a Level 2 tech.
Doing a google, there's a PC script to disable this mode and for Mac users, a chron script if you're brave enough to alter your root user password and create the invisible script in the terminal. I am not. This is like playing with Res Edit (I know, I'm dating myself...) and unless you're proficient, I would not recommend it.
So use with caution. They're fine for your desktop where you can push the power button and prompt it to spin back up. They will cause you a lot of grief if you can't monitor it.
22 of 25 found the following review helpful:
 The perfect pairing for Time MachineNov 28, 2007
By Ben D Over
"bmw330i"
I recently bought a new iMac and immediately fell in love with the Leopard operating system(I'm someone that uses both Vista and Leopard now, and as much as I hate the advocates on either side, I'm finding myself using the Mac all the time and only using my Vista box when I'm forced to). One of the features I was looking forward to using was Time Machine, which for those that aren't familiar is a new program in Leopard that automatically(automagically?) backs up your entire Mac and then does hourly backups of any changes that occur thereafter. Wow. Erased an email yesterday that all of a sudden you wished you had today? Go to Mail, click on Time Machine and then go back in time to when that email still existed on your machine and recover it. Awesome. Simple. So enough about that.
Obviously you need a drive to do this, and I didn't have one until the other day when I bought this WD My Book. I plugged it in and immediately Leopard spotted it and asked me if I wanted to use it for Time Machine. I sure did! It's quiet, it's cool to the touch, and it looks cool as well! It matches my Aluminum iMac. The only downside is I hate the light on the front, which is easily solvable...I turned it around!
Now if my Mac ever crashes, I can be back to exaclty where I was within 15-20 minutes. Brilliant. Thank you WD and thanks Apple for making this software a part of your base OS.
12 of 13 found the following review helpful:
DO NOT BUY!Dec 17, 2007
By Vin Dang
I generally don't write reviews but felt compelled to in this instance because there's something peculiar going on with these new My Book drives. I've gotten two of these exact model (500GB) back to back and had to return both because they would die out the same day I got each of them. In each instance, I checked the AC plugs, all the ports, and could not get the drives to spin up again. Like the other reviewer noted, the issues with this particular drive are known and should be avoided. Shame really, as the new drives look quite nice. However, reliability is the only factor you should be looking for in an external drive. I'll be downgrading to an older version of their My Book line to be safe, until WD works out the kinks with these new ones. (PS. These were used with Macs).
ONCE AGAIN, MY FRIENDS, DO NOT BUY THIS DRIVE.
18 of 21 found the following review helpful:
The best companion for my MacBook Pro and Time Machine!Nov 16, 2007
By Santos Lopez
"volkyman"
I have this model and hooked it up to my MacBook Pro using the included(!) Firewire 800 cable. Then I reformatted the drive and partitioned it to dedicate half of the drive for Time Machine and the other half for a clean install of OS X for backup in case I have troubles with my MacBook Pro. I setup the drive to shutdown whenever I remove it from my desktop or turn off my computer and setup Time Machine to do the backups on this drive. Now all I do is plug the firewire cable to my computer (which starts up the drive), start Time Machine to start a back up and when it's all done, I eject the drive from the desktop and it automatically turns the drive off and then remove the cable from the computer.
The drive is very quiet and compact. It only gets really hot the first time you run Time Machine because it does that initial back up of all kinds of files, but after that, it runs cool. I always keep this drive plugged into the wall outlet and only plug the firewire cable to my computer when I want to make backups. You may want to use it on your desktop computer and keep it plugged to the computer at all times, but I take my laptop all over the house and at least once a week I hook it up to the drive to do my backups. It really doesn't matter what hard drive you use to do backups, the important thing is to do backup regularly. But with this drive (and of course, a Mac using OS X 10.5, specifically using the Time Machine backup software) this process is soooo much easier, it is truly the poster child of real "plug and play" (and backup, in this case).
See all 73 customer reviews on Amazon.com
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