Reviews of My 4 Tb Passport External Hard Drive
TechRadar Verdict
The WD My Passport Ultra 4TB (2019) is a good storage device, but if a long warranty and a Type-C connector are low on your priority list, and then there are drives that offer better value for money, either from WD's own portfolio or from rivals.
Pros
- +
Smart design
- +
USB Type-C connector
- +
Suite of applications
- +
Three-year warranty
Cons
- -
Price
- -
Average performance
The latest version of WD'due south portable hard disk drive drive throws up a question right out of the gate - what is with the proper noun?
It doesn't help that WD keeps the aforementioned names for its hard disk ranges even if new models are released most every twelvemonth. Have the My Passport Ultra, for instance: TechRadar first reviewed information technology in 2013, and back then, it had a dissimilar design and a much smaller capacity.
The 2019 version is a major upgrade on the 2017 spin, introducing a new design, a Type-C connector (rather than the apartment USB one) and an updated version of WD's Discovery software. The My Passport Ultra (2019) is available directly from WD for $119.99 (4TB), $89.99 (2TB) and $69.99 (1TB) respectively.
Design
WD has given the plastic/metal combo from the previous generation a dissimilar blueprint, fusing mod anodized metal and textures, in either a night blue or a silver end. That's downward from six options in the previous range (which are still on sale at virtually retailers).
There's a white action lite which indicates that the device is active, idle, or in standby, and you lot get a USB Blazon-C connector (USB 3.1 Gen 1) plus a cable and a Type-C to Type-A adaptor.
The reviewed 4TB model weighs 232g without the accessories, with a footprint of 82 x 110mm and a thickness of 21mm, almost double that of the 1TB/2TB models every bit it carries more platters.
Benchmarks
Here's how the WD My Passport Ultra 4TB performed in our benchmark tests:
CrystalDiskMark: 127MBps (read); 124MBps (write)
Atto: 130MBps (read, 256mb); 122MBps (write, 256mb)
AS SSD: 122MBps (seq read); 113MBps (seq write)
Operation
This storage solution uses an OEM drive that's not available on the open marketplace – WD'south laptop drives have a maximum capacity of 2TB. You tin purchase information technology (WD40NMZM) from eBay, but it will price 4 times the price of the WD My Passport Ultra 4TB portable drive – the laws of supply and demand at piece of work!
What nosotros know is that this hard disk drive drive has five,400RPM platters, probably 2 of them, each with a 2TB capacity, hence the increased thickness. We don't know the cache chapters, but what we tin observe is that it generally performs worse compared to the Grand-Tech 2TB mobile USB-C drive, which is likely to comprise a 2TB single platter version of this drive.
Our standard 10GB examination file was transferred in just under 100 seconds, making this one of the slowest drives we've tested recently. The WD My Passport Ultra does go relatively warm in employ and produces an audible hum (about 48dB if you put your ear to information technology – not that you're likely to do that, of grade).
The WD Discovery software acts as a dashboard that offers admission to the My Passport drive and to My Cloud Dwelling (if you have an account). From here, you tin switch off the LED light, and fix a countersign for your drive with 256-bit AES hardware encryption. It too carries an app shop that provides directly access to costless and paid applications at reduced prices. At least one of these apps – ENCSecurity'south Encryptstick– is obsolete, even so. Take hold of WD Fill-in and WD Security, though, as they are decent and versatile solutions which cost nothing.
Then at that place's Upthere.com which is the cloud storage solution from WD. Yous get 20GB costless off-the-bat, with cross-platform compatibility and two-factor authentication past default. Upgrade to 100GB for $1.99 per month with no yearly contract.
Final verdict
With a three-year warranty by default, a useful fix of utilities, a reasonable retail cost and decent performance, the WD My Passport Ultra 4TB (2019) marginally improves on an already practiced product.
In a mature market where the upper limit for portable hard disk drives seems to be 4TB – we tested one of this size back in 2015! – there's little need or desire to innovate, with pricing becoming the sole metric these drives are judged on.
Against the likes of the Seagate Expansion, which costs 25% less, the lure of a three-twelvemonth warranty and a Type-C connector might be macerated. Plus the Seagate bulldoze comes with a two-calendar month complementary membership to the Adobe Artistic Deject Photography Plan worth $20.
And so there's the other more affordable WD portable hard disk, the 4TB Elements, which retails for a smidgen nether $100. Information technology lacks hardware encryption and the three-twelvemonth warranty, but is more than probable to pack the same hard drive as the My Passport Ultra.
All in all, consider the My Passport Ultra if you want the lengthy three-yr warranty and absolutely demand a Blazon-C connector. The bulldoze's performance is on par with the rest of the competition, and its software bundle is useful.
- Nosotros've picked out the best external hard drives
Source: https://www.techradar.com/reviews/wd-my-passport-ultra-4tb-portable-hard-disk-drive-2019
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