Customer Reviews

Western Digital WDG1NC5000N My Book World Edition 500 GB Ethernet Network Storage System

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(26)

 

 

I recently purchased this product and from a basic hardware perspective it does the job. HOWEVER... WD failed to disclaim on the packaging OR in their instruction manual that in order to get the "Remote Access" that is the key piece of functionality you would want you have to use MioNet with a SUBSCRIPTION of $6/mo or $65 per year.

They also fail to tell you that you are limited to 5 PC's using this per account using this software. This includes any PC on your local network. So instead of just mapping it like a regular drive you are forced to use up one of the 5 spaces you are allowed.

The final piece of frustration is its lack of support for long file names. What year was this firmware written? I thought that had gone out with Windows 3.1? Needless to say, saving your MP3's to it forces an auto change of the long name to some abbreviation of the song name that barely explains what it is or who sings it.

Overall I am disappointed that the large "selling feature" about this product is a hidden bait and switch with a subscription fee. From a simple file location for back-ups or storing some general data it's fine.

I have owned this drive now for about 6 months. In that time, it has performed well, with a few caveats:

Skip the Mionet, unless you are really into sharing this drive on the internet. If you are, do a little googling, there are better (and cheaper) solutions. Read the Western Digital Help Site, FAQ answer 1531- it explains how to use this drive without Mionet on your own network. Read that BEFORE you install Mionet.

Mionet is horrible. It seemed slow, buggy, and was always asking if I wanted to update it to a pay version.

I am not a fan of the on/off switch. It looks cool, but it seems to have a mind of its own- never quite sure what it going on when I press it. The LED light show is cool, but since the cat is the only one who ever goes into the computer closet, I am not sure how much she really likes it.

I use the drive in an NAS configuration, and it works great (see Mionet comments above). It may be a little slow, but if you are after speed, an NAS is probably not the best solution anyway. The setup was much easier than some of my other NAS solutions.

The drive is reasonably quiet, and I don't see the thermal problems others have mentioned, although the location I have my drives is pretty cool. I also have not seen any of the long file name problems mentioned.

This drive is one of my "online spares", so it is not on 24/7. However, when I do power it up, it comes up pretty quick, does it's IP address thing with my network, and is visible to computers within 20 seconds or so. Much better than other NAS products I own.

No other issues- 4/5 stars only because of Mionet- WD should really know better.

I received this as a gift about a month ago. Its a neat little machine. It doesn't work like a regular external HD, it actually serves as a storage server on your network. Any of your computers can access it; I suggest mapping it as drive Z on all of your PCs.

What I don't like about this device is the software which comes with it, "Mionet." Basically, Mionet is a company that makes remote access software. A stripped down version of their remote access program comes with the My Book.

So, to use the remote access feature of this product, you have to have a mionet account. Its free, but its constantly pandering to you to upgrade to 'premium.' Its quite annoying.

This is what I did, and its kept me happy with this product.
1. Connect MyBook to network
2. Install drivers and Mionet (you have to) on each computer
3. create basic Mionet account
4. Uninstall Mionet

This way, I don't have the software running on my PC at all times. If I want to access the Mybook while away from home, I just go to [...], sign in, and use the Java interface there.

Overall, 4 stars b/c its great having this device on my network. The remote access feature could use some serious work

I purchased this drive for 2 purposes. First was to enable access to my own files remotely (like when away on business or vacation) and secondly to back up remote computers.

While the setup wasn't too easy, and the included backup software a bit cumbersome and bloated, I did manage to gain control of the process through 3 trips to the WD website FAQ's.
It turns out that this machine RESTRICTS sharing of certain file types based on their extension! If you have .MP3 or .WMV files, the drive won't share them (even if it is NOT copy protected (eg your own recordings or movies)). It also requires (undocumented) username and pwd when backing up system files (eg thumbs.db) which makes autobackup of my personal photo library impossible.

Other people have commented on the slow speed of this drive, and I concur.

Both remote and local network access to the drive is handled through a (minimally) customized version of Mionet, an internet based utility for sharing files, folders, resources, desktop, etc. It is a clever program which opens many aspects of your own computer to others whom you invite to share with you or yourself from another computer.
The default (and non-overridable) settings for remote internet access to this drive is a 30-day trial of Mionet's complete service with downgrade to just data sharing after that. It's a good marketing plan, but I DON'T WANT even 30 days of unwanted access to my current monitor screen, webcam, etc, even by my family!

I would have given this product 4 stars initially, but the more I used it the less happy I was:
1) My IT dept at work will not let even the JAVA web based client install (because it requires port access and the corporate IT restricts this (rightly so), so I can't get to my work from home. I haven't yet tried this via a hotel's internet, but I'm not optimistic.
2) I can't backup files from one remote site to my networked drive (this MyBookWorld) because of "authentication" requests.
3) I can't access shared .wmv files (and a long list of other file types including .aac, .mp3, .wma, see WD web support page), so my home movies and music are not available when I'm away and also can't be shared with my family and friends who are out of state.

All in all, this product is NOT for me, although it might be for someone, I just can't imagine who. Two stars, the second being for the fact that the hardware in fact worked.

Am I crazy, or is anyone else upset that Western Digital should feel the need to protect files by their extension? Sony, Microsoft, and other content producers do a good enough job of it already with their Digital Rights restrictions (even government lawyers are jealous).

This is a strange bundle. I have had no problems at all with the hardware. The device setup on the network is fine with the web interface of the device. I can access the device no problem. I have not turned the unit off in two plus months and I have never had to reboot the device. The machine is quite and I don't hear it all in my work environment. I have the unit in a well ventilated area but it is very cool to the touch and I have no overheating worries. I can read and write to the device easily from any machine and in my network I have never had a problem. With NTFS formatting the device has 454 GB free space.

The software on the other hand is hideous. As noted by many other reviewers the software is difficult to setup, use and make useful. There are limitations on the number of machines that can hook up to the device through the internet. The access speed is variable and far less consistent then a hard drive on a PC itself. Also Western Digital caved into the RIAA and put in protection to allow music and video sharing through the internet. I travel and wanted to access my files remotely in a hotel room. Why is Western Digital playing referee with my content? If I illegally share the content then sue me. This makes about as much sense as cutting out your tongue so you never slander anyone. Silly talk in a PC gone crazy world.

The Good:
- Great Solid Hardware
- Windows managed features work well.
- IP accessed UI is easy to use.
- Cool looking.
- Quite and doesn't over heat.
- Easy setup on home network.
- USB connection in back of drive to daisy chain other hard drives to the network...Great Feature!

The Bad:
- Awful, awful software
- WD has decided to filter your content for you like a good nanny....No Thanks!
- The description on the box and website are not clear of the limitations of above
- The remote access software limits the number of accounts.....why?
- Parts of the software require a monthly service fee to get features that seem to be advertised as coming with the device.

If you buy it for what it is, a network connected wired hard drive, then it is great. Ignore the software features advertised because they are pretty much useless. The device is solid and the price isn't bad. I just really wish they had not bundled any software instead of the mess they included. Five Stars for the hardware. Two stars for the software (the backup software was useable although very slow). Over all I give the device four stars as it is very useful even without the software.

Set up and config is very easy. Driver for Windows Vista is now available from the web site. New firmware supports long file names. Comes formatted as NTFS.

The only down side is that accessing the drive over the LAN is slower than if the drive were directly connected to the PC. I'm getting about 2 mega bytes per second.

The other downer is that some features, such as being able to view the drive over the internet is a "premium" feature, which costs $8.00 per month.

All in all, for backup, archiving, and centralizing files, this thing is great. I have several PCs in the house. This gadget let's me centralize music, photos, and back up everyones files. Also, I no longer have to worry about upgrading my PCs, since the important, "My Documents", folders are backed up.

I would not recommend it for "live" use, such as for video editing or for use as virtual memory swap space.

I've been using this drive for over a month now and haven't had any problems with it since I uninstalled MioNet and the Retrospect back up program it came with.

I mainly bought this drive for archive and backup purposes and as long as you don't install the software that comes with the drive, it works great. It was unusable with MioNet installed on my PC. About 50% of the time the drive could not be found or was off line. Retrospect is just as bad, it's problems (no space left on drive, can't find backup set, unable to perform backup and others)may be caused by MioNet. I would have rated this drive five stars if MioNet and Retrospect were usable.

After I uninstalled MioNet and Retrospect, the drive works flawlessly and I haven't had any problems. It may not be the fastest drive on the planet, but I can stream a 640x480 MP4 video from the drive to my laptop.

A nice feature on this drive is you can plug in another 500GB USB drive to add to your storage capacity as you need it. I'm not sure that it will do RAID however.

I found Western Digital support pretty good. I had a few questions and they answered each within a day.

If you want a network attached storage device, this one will work as long as you don't install MioNet.

I was thinking whether to buy this product or not. I've read couple of reviews for this Hard Drive and people were not happy with it.
This Hard Drive is small linux powered stand alone computer which has it's own IP address. You even access via telnet or browser and do all configurations. I was able to configure and map it as a separate drive to all my computers on the network. I did not use provided software (WD Remote Access powered by MioNet), but you can use it too for looking up this Hard Drive in the network when it sits behind bunch of the routers. MioNet gives you 5 free licenses for this hard drive, but again it's not nesseary to use this software at all.
I've read some complains about firmware does not support long file names. Mine firmaware version 01.01.18 supports long file names and I do not see any problems so far.
It's very difficult to make any statements about reliability at this point though.

Before you plunk down the bucks for this device, you should know that there are 38 file types that it will not share. Unfortunately those include some of the most popular file types (avi, ogg, quicktime, mp3, aac, and wmv). If you plan to share any file that involves sound or moving images (such as the ones from your digital camera) then this drive definitely is the wrong choice.

I recently decided to do away with my Desktop computer in favor of an older laptop that I had previously had not been using. I ran into the issue of not having enough space on the Laptop's hard drive to store all of my music, videos, and pictures. I purchased the My Book World edition a few weeks ago, and thus far everything has been going exactly to plan.

I have iTunes installed on my primary computer, but instead of keeping the files locally on my drive, I now keep them on the My Book. The original transfer took some time, with speeds of approximately 2 megabytes per second, you can do the math on the time it would take to transfer a full library of movies and music, but that wasn't a problem at all. iTunes functions absolutely perfectly, the only noticeable difference is the first time that I synced my iPod, it took a few hours to copy everything over, again, because of the data rate over the network. Each subsequent sync, though, has been speedy, as I don't change more than a few songs, podcasts, or movies, at a time.

The drive is really doing everything that I've wanted it to. It allows me to access the drive from any computer on my network, without issue.

The reason that this review did not get 5 stars is because of Mionet. As you have likely read in other reviews, the software is relatively easy to setup, but it very much hinders the use of the files on your network. First of all, when you transfer files onto the drive using Mionet, you CANNOT modify the files without going through Mionet, again. This causes a big problem when iTunes tries to update tags in songs, or movies, and cannot write to the files. This crippled my use, and made me investigate other options.

The Western Digital site does give instructions to login to the device directly, and I highly recommend using that option. It is just as easy as logging into your router from your PC. You launch a browser, type in the default IP address, (something along the lines of 192.168.1.x), and you can do all of the configuration from there.

I have Windows XP automatically mount the drive, once again, a snap, and it appears under My Computer just like the C, and D drives.

Don't bother installing Mionet, I went against this advice, and that means having to copy my entire library twice, again, sort of time consuming when working with 80 - 100gb of information.

Great drive for sharing files on a network, and a great option if you are running out of hard drive space, but don't want to have an external hard drive on your desk at all times. Skip Mionet, but all else has been wonderful.