Western Digital MyBook Question

BestBuy has an in-store sale on Western Digital My Book Essential 320GB
(PATA) external drives. Cost is $78. Newegg has a better description of
the drive than BestBuy, and more reviews.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136023

The drive comes with Retrospect Express Backup software, which, from what I
read, is already installed on the FAT32 formatted drive, and activates upon
first use of the drive.

I don't really care about backups; I'm just looking for an external USB
drive that I can use to copy data from and carry it back and forth between
my XPHome, WMCE, and Vista desktops/laptops by simply plugging into the USB
ports.

I've heard, but am not sure, that the Retrospect backup software, if left
on the external drive, will not let you 'copy' data from any pc other than
the one it was first used with. I can understand not allowing 'backing
up' more than one pc, but I don't understand not allowing copying or
transfering data from more than one machine, unless Retrospect has to be
involved for this simple task, too.

Anyone know if this is true?

If so, I'd just delete it.

Thanks.

i have used retrospect in the past and it is a good product, but like
any thing, there are a lot of different versions.
i always make sure that my autoplay is disabled so that when you connect
an external drive, it doesnt automatically run any programs on that drive.
i wouldnt be surprised if they restricted its use to one computer.
but there should not be anything stopping you from copying files
directly to it with some other program.

also you should rethink buying it at all.
since the 500gb external drives are only $100
320 is rather small for just a few bucks core.
also you should consider the externals that have sata and firewire or
ethernet as well. so they have more long term use.
using usb for these big drives is very very slow.

also warranty is important, a lot of units are only 1 year.
western has some models with 3 yr and 5 yr as well.
usually i would never by any hard drive without a 3yr or longer warranty.


Boris wrote:
> BestBuy has an in-store sale on Western Digital My Book Essential 320GB
> (PATA) external drives. Cost is $78. Newegg has a better description of
> the drive than BestBuy, and more reviews.
>
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136023
>
> The drive comes with Retrospect Express Backup software, which, from what I
> read, is already installed on the FAT32 formatted drive, and activates upon
> first use of the drive.
>
> I don't really care about backups; I'm just looking for an external USB
> drive that I can use to copy data from and carry it back and forth between
> my XPHome, WMCE, and Vista desktops/laptops by simply plugging into the USB
> ports.
>
> I've heard, but am not sure, that the Retrospect backup software, if left
> on the external drive, will not let you 'copy' data from any pc other than
> the one it was first used with. I can understand not allowing 'backing
> up' more than one pc, but I don't understand not allowing copying or
> transfering data from more than one machine, unless Retrospect has to be
> involved for this simple task, too.
>
> Anyone know if this is true?
>
> If so, I'd just delete it.
>
> Thanks.

the software is provided on the mybook drive but you don't have to use it.
they cleverly use the drive as a way to distribute the software should you
want to use it (instead of wasting a cd that will probably end up in the
trash). weather you choose to install the software on your pc or not i
would say the first thing to do is copy the software off the drive and then
reformat the drive with ntfs. if you leave it with fat32 it will be a more
universally compatible device (for windows 98/95, macs, linix, etc.), which
is their motivation for shipping it with fat32, but it will not be able to
support files larger than 4gb (i think that is the limit for fat32). also,
if your plan is to regularly move the drive from one machine to another then
a more appropriate choice of drive may be one of the 'portable' varieties.
these are typically the smaller 2.5" size and get their power from the usb
connection (no need to an ac adapter). same issue of formatting the drive
applies.

<Boris> wrote in message
news:. ..
> BestBuy has an in-store sale on Western Digital My Book Essential 320GB
> (PATA) external drives. Cost is $78. Newegg has a better description of
> the drive than BestBuy, and more reviews.
>
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136023
>
> The drive comes with Retrospect Express Backup software, which, from what
> I
> read, is already installed on the FAT32 formatted drive, and activates
> upon
> first use of the drive.
>
> I don't really care about backups; I'm just looking for an external USB
> drive that I can use to copy data from and carry it back and forth between
> my XPHome, WMCE, and Vista desktops/laptops by simply plugging into the
> USB
> ports.
>
> I've heard, but am not sure, that the Retrospect backup software, if left
> on the external drive, will not let you 'copy' data from any pc other than
> the one it was first used with. I can understand not allowing 'backing
> up' more than one pc, but I don't understand not allowing copying or
> transfering data from more than one machine, unless Retrospect has to be
> involved for this simple task, too.
>
> Anyone know if this is true?
>
> If so, I'd just delete it.
>
> Thanks.