Customer Reviews

Western Digital My Passport for Mac 500 GB USB 2.0 Portable External Hard Drive (Charcoal)

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I usually buy either Lacie Rugged HD's or Seagate FreeAgent dock system HD's however I came across a bunch of these on closeout at Best Buy and I just couldn't resist. Usually you pay more for HD's that are specifically aimed at Mac but this was one of those rare cases where that wasnt the case, in fact even at full price this HD is right on par with other, non Mac specific, portable HD's. The sale price was only 60.00 and that is a killer price for 500 Gig portable HD's. I swiped the last 8 they had in stock.

I am an architectural photographer and with my current system, I just file away the portable HD with the job file when a particular job is over and buy a new one. Its far easier than my older system which was buying larger external HD's and transferring the data onto those. The client gets billed for the digital storage anyways so why not go with the easier system? I usually have anywhere from 60-80 jobs per year so its either buy a lot of 2 TB drives and spend the time transferring and organizing the jobs or simply buy a 320 or 500 gig portable HD for each specific job. The portable HD route is a far better system.

Overall I have really switched my entire line of thinking when it comes to HD's. I used to think bigger was better as that meant less HD's and more storage capacity. 2 things made me change my mind? The size of the portable drives and the fact that portable HD's don't require an external power supply. If you only have 1 external HD then you only have 1 external power supply and that only requires 1 plug so it isn't a big deal however when you start acquiring more and more HD's those plugs become a serious issue. The fact that portable HD's dont have an external power supply is HUGE in my book. Then there is the space issue. I can literally store 25 portable HD's in a single Mid Sized Hardigg Storm Case. Of course they are also much lighter. Taking into account the external power supply, I estimate that portables are around 1/6th the weight of standard external HD's.

The only negative is price. Portable HD's are more expensive so your going to be paying more per GB of storage but imo its absolutely worth the additional cost and I imagine the price of these drives will continue to come down in price as time goes on.

As for this specific drive, I have been using this model for a couple of months and its basically on par with all of the other portable drives out there. I don't see any reason not to buy this model.

The bottom line - These may not have as much space and may cost a bit more per GB of storage but they have a lot of other advantages including weight, size, portability, easy of storage, and no external power supply. IMO portable drives are definitely the way to go.

I really love it!! Not only does it feel like I have an endless amount of space, but it was also so easy to set up! Just hook up to your computer and follow the directions. Everything that I was looking for in a Portable Hard Drive!!

I currently have two WD external hard drives for my Mac. This one (My Passport for Mac 500GB) I bought in May 2009 and died in Dec 2009. This is my first time called WD for customer service (for replacement) which I should just do it online in stead.

I bought WD product is because I prefer support local business (they are in California, United State) but their customer service/support was out sourcing to India which I didn't know until today when I called for a replacement. I don't know if the long distance connection is bad or what, I can clearly hear the other side, the background was very noisy, but she can't hear me, when I was alone in a quiet room to make the call. I need to repeat the serial numbers, my name and address so many times between Nancy "N" and Michael "M" because she can't get it right. It took me almost 30 minutes on the phone with her and still can't get it right so I give up and hung up.

I will NEVER buy any of WD product again if I have to go through this painful process each time when I need customer service. Cheap labor is not worth it if the quality is not there.

I have to admit I get them because of "my book and passport theme. So neat looking. I recommend to anyone 'cause all you have to do is plug in w/ USB port to your powerbook, etc. I had it for a little over a month now and so far it works fine.

I was very surprised by this product. I originally needed something because my old hard drive "old as in 2 months" stopped working and i needed a way to save huge files being a graphic designer. It works just fine on Mac and PC because i always have to use on both. In all i didn't give it 5 stars because i don't know how long it will last and I've only had it for a little over 2 months. Yet I would still really recommend it.

This drive is nice and compact. Unfortunately my G4 does not supply enough power for the drive, so WD kindly sent me (for free) a "y" USB cable to pull power from 2 ports. Works fine for what I need it to do.

I own two of these and love them. You can't beat having nearly 500gb powered by USB. I don't even take my TB with me anymore because I have it by just carrying two of these.

It's not quite 500gb, but that is just like every other memory device you get. They never have exactly what is advertised due to drivers and other junk.

This is a great product. Really easy to use with my MacBook. 500GB is quite large. I wish I'd gotten a 1TB size though because I'm backing up a large music collection.

I plugged it in my new macbook unibody and it worked just fine. I'm using it for time machine and for saving some files and it's great.

Haven't tried it on windows but probablywon't work since is formatted for mac

I recently purchased this External Drive for my daughter who has a Mac. This harddrive is formatted specifically for the Mac computer. My daughter tells me she is very happy with the drive and it has performed very well for her. I own other Western Digital external drives for my PC and they have always worked well.