Western Digital My Book Studio 500 GB USB 2.0/FireWire 400/800/eSATA Desktop External Hard Drive WDH1Q5000N Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)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.

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Product 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.

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