[Review] Western Digital Elements 2TB Desktop External Hard Drive

[Tweety.Abd]

Usually people ask for reviews before buying the product, but unfortunately I already have purchased it. I have been reading conflicting reviews that it failed within few days/weeks/months, others say that it works well without any problems at all. I'd like to know what you guys think of the product those who own it or have experience with it or with Western Digital brand as in general. The worst thing about the drive is it is huge, and requires external power supply. My worst fears is that if the power goes off while the disk is in use, it could potentially damage my drive. I were wondering if there was any other way other than using the AC power supply.

Thanks! (:

[rudrax]

My worst fears is that if the power goes off while the disk is in use, it could potentially damage my drive. I were wondering if there was any other way other than using the AC power supply.

Thanks! (:

No worries..The thing is designed putting the matter of power outage in mind.

No other way except for buying a new one that takes power via USB.

[DKT27]

I've never owned an external drive and have no experience it in. However, Western Digital in general is a very good hard drive manufacturer and is known for it's quality products. I'm using a WD internal HDD from 2+ years now.

[rudrax]

I've never owned an external drive and have no experience it in. However, Western Digital in general is a very good hard drive manufacturer and is known for it's quality products. I'm using a WD internal HDD from 2+ years now.

and are friends. :huh:

[Tweety.Abd]

No worries..The thing is designed putting the matter of power outage in mind.

No other way except for buying a new one that takes power via USB.

Are you sure, or you're just saying. I just need something to solid to tell my family lol :P My parents are already pretty mad at me for failing to protect my drive. I failed 2 drives in a years period and the both costed around $100 each. They'll probably never buy me anything ever again (even if its not my fault) if this drive fails :( While I won't dare to test it if it's built with power outage in mind, I think I'll take your word for it (: And just another question, the drive seems to be completely sealed, how does it dissipate heat?

I've never owned an external drive and have no experience it in. However, Western Digital in general is a very good hard drive manufacturer and is known for it's quality products. I'm using a WD internal HDD from 2+ years now.

I also had very good experience with Western Digital internal drive, I used it for about 5 years until I finally disposed the computer and it was still working fine. I were reading a few reviews about my new drive and I freaked out when people said that it failed within a few days/weeks period :o

[majithia23]

hey Tweety , i dont think its much use pondering over if you made the right purchase or right now ,

coz you ALREADY have ! :)

yes , if the store you bought it from entertains Return Policies , then of course it makes sense to think it over ,

but if it does not , even then so , dont worry much , coz WD is a reliable drive ! ;)

i bought a 500 Gb WD Elements a few months back after duly considering my options and listening to other members advice here at nsane !

here , if you want to go through the discussion --

in the end what i have found is ( not by personal experience but by textual experience of other people and here n there stuff ) ,

that ,

-- Any Drive can fail anytime .

-- Shit Happens .

-- Back Up of Back Up is the Thumb Rule .

:D

[RdH]

I have 1TB WD external hard drive and doesn't need power supply to use that

only plug in into USB and ready to use :wub:

;) sorry for my bad english language ;)

[ck_kent]

I haven't seen a 3.5" external drive that doesn't require an AC adapter. There's just not enough "juice" from the USB bus to power a 3.5" external drive.

I own a WD Elements Desktop 1TB. I've been using it for ~2yrs. now and so far so good. :fingers crossed:

Like majithia23 said, all drives regardless of brand can fail anytime. Whenever I buy a HDD or any other electronics for that matter, I always cross my finger and hope that I do not get a lemon. :)

[DKT27]

I haven't seen a 3.5" external drive that doesn't require an AC adapter. There's just not enough "juice" from the USB bus to power a 3.5" external drive.

The good news is, things are going to change soon. :)

EDIT: I see you already know about it. :D

[Win7nerd]

i dont have a western digital drive but ive got a seagate 2TB drive and it works great(so far), i just gotta keep my damn pussies from knocking it over when they jump all over the place :P

[rudrax]

While I won't dare to test it if it's built with power outage in mind, I think I'll take your word for it (: And just another question, the drive seems to be completely sealed, how does it dissipate heat?

My friend, I am from village area and here power outage occurs like crazy. Nothing bad happened to my drive till now. The manufacturers are concerned about the power outage thing and so they have built an AC powered product. And you must have a limited period warranty for your product. So if anything unexpected happens, You will be covered by the warranty period.

And about the cooling thing, my drive has some vents at the bottom. Don't know about your. It there is not any heat dissipation thing, the manufacturers are concerned about that too. They may have some internal heat sink type thing.

[Tweety.Abd]

While I won't dare to test it if it's built with power outage in mind, I think I'll take your word for it (: And just another question, the drive seems to be completely sealed, how does it dissipate heat?

My friend, I am from village area and here power outage occurs like crazy. Nothing bad happened to my drive till now. The manufacturers are concerned about the power outage thing and so they have built an AC powered product. And you must have a limited period warranty for your product. So if anything unexpected happens, You will be covered by the warranty period.

And about the cooling thing, my drive has some vents at the bottom. Don't know about your. It there is not any heat dissipation thing, the manufacturers are concerned about that too. They may have some internal heat sink type thing.

Thank you so much for confirming that. Here electrical outage occurs only when we mess up, like use faulty stuff, etc. so its kinda rare which is good (: As for the heat dissipation, I couldn't see any vents at all, I guess I've got to keep it cool at all times, anyways I'll only be using it at home so ya.

[DKT27]

The cooling is on the other side?

[Olexijl]

Tweety,

I recommend something like that: (http://en.wikipedia....le_power_supply). That will secure your external drive against power loss.

These are quite expensive, but you know, things should be secured.

Now to my experience with external drives. I own 1TB and 2TB drives from Trekstor (http://trekstor.de/e..._hdd.php?pid=49) and i would always buy them again.

AC power supply is great advantage for me. I use 1TB as my data backup and 2TB as the backup of 1TB drive. So i have always my 1TB drive off unless i need data. I always turn off the drive if some important software is installed, like Office 2010, which installs otherwise in my USB drive as well.

To avoid problems with software using folders in USB drives (this is an unwanted behavior for me) i install software with external drives off. Later i can turn them on to get access. No installation folders from any software are currently on drives, that's not their purpose.

[Olexijl]

:irony on: Let's backup everything into the cloud... :irony off:

[calguyhunk]

Using a Cavier Blue 320GB (7200RPM, SATA 3 Gb/s) drive for 3 years now. Used to normally use Barracudas for my builds. Now use the Spinpoint F3 range in general.

First and only WDC thus far. chkdsk /p shows a perfect drive after all the abuse I've put it through :thumbsup:

[myidisbb]

anyone mess with the 4tb ones?

[calguyhunk]

anyone mess with the 4tb ones?

Not me. They'll be slow as hell. You're much better off with 2x2TB drives in RAID 0 if you really need that much storage methinks ;)

[rudrax]

anyone mess with the 4tb ones?

Not me. They'll be slow as hell. You're much better off with 2x2TB drives in RAID 0 if you really need that much storage methinks ;)

Might be talking about external ones :rolleyes:

[rudrax]

anyone mess with the 4tb ones?

Not me. They'll be slow as hell. You're much better off with 2x2TB drives in RAID 0 if you really need that much storage methinks ;)

Might be talking about external ones :rolleyes:

[myidisbb]

i was looking at the internal ones 7200 speed using in a docking station

[rudrax]

i was looking at the internal ones 7200 speed using in a docking station

Then you should do 2x2 TB as calguyhunk said and it give you better performance than a single 4TB drive.

And one important thing, The BIOS can't address a single volume more than 3.xx TB..To address more than 3.xx single volume memory, You will need to have an UEFI enabled mobo.

7200 rpm ones will relatively cost higher than 5400 rpm ones but will give you better performance.

[myidisbb]

4TB for $299

i have a new asus laptop in the boot it says uefi. it is disable i click enable and reboot. still couldnt use the \mouse in the bios. so put it back to disable. im not going to use the harddrives larger then 2.2 TB as a boot drive. just as storage on a docking station. so 2 $TB give me 8 TB of storage. i use one harddrive right now for newsgroup headers and p2p.

[Tweety.Abd]

The cooling is on the other side?

I don't have such vents on my drive, I believe my drive is either older or a newer model of the same drive.

Using a Cavier Blue 320GB (7200RPM, SATA 3 Gb/s) drive for 3 years now. Used to normally use Barracudas for my builds. Now use the Spinpoint F3 range in general.

First and only WDC thus far. chkdsk /p shows a perfect drive after all the abuse I've put it through :thumbsup:

I tried to check out my drive's RPM using CrystalDiskInfo and it said Unknown. While transferring, the speed usually starts with around 60 MB/s and slows down to 20 MB/s towards the end.

And I'm interested in know what kind of abuses you've put your drive through :P

[calguyhunk]

I tried to check out my drive's RPM using CrystalDiskInfo and it said Unknown. While transferring, the speed usually starts with around 60 MB/s and slows down to 20 MB/s towards the end.

Go to 'System Information' from the search box. Click on Storage > Disks and Google the model number. You'll get more info 'bout your drive. In all probability, it's a SATA II [3 Gb/s] 5400/7200 rpm drive :)

And I'm interested in know what kind of abuses you've put your drive through :P

You know just the usual boring stuff. Storing and deleting documents, audio/video files, installing various OS'es. :)

Started with Win XP and Ubuntu 10 dual boot. Now with Win7 & Ubuntu 12 ;) Tried a hackintosh installation that didn't work fully :P So a lot of formatting and deletions etc :)