Can't install SmartWare on my PC

WD External Drives External Drives for PC
1

Plugged in my new MyBook Duo to my Windows 7 (SP1) PC running an AMD Athlon 64 chip, and it automatically downloaded the SmartWare and Utilities setup files.  The Utilities installed fine, but the SmartWare stalled repeatedly near the end of the installation.  When it began “starting services” a dialogue box appeared saying there was an error, and instructed me to verify that I have the necessary privileges.  I’m running as Administrator, so I don’t know what privileges it means.  I made several more attempts, including several reboots, but same thing happens.  Also tried leaving my “homegroup” and that made no difference either.

Any suggestions?

2

Hello and welcome to the WD Community.

Are you installing a version that came with the drive or a version downloaded from the WD Site?

You can try downloading the latest version from the WD Support site.

Link to software:

http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/wdsmartwareupdate/wdsmartware.asp?id=wdfGeneric&os=win

NOTE: To update to this version of WD SmartWare, you need the following minimum requirements:

  • Windows XP 32-bit Service Pack 3, Windows XP 64-bit Service Pack 2, Windows Vista, Windows 7
    or Windows 8.
  • Microsoft .NET Framework 4 or higher installed on your computer.

If you don’t already have the Microsoft .NET Framework 4 installed on your computer, you will be prompted to install it.

3

Thanks.  I spent an hour on the phone with WD support (very patient and helpful).  Discovered finally that my Microsoft.NET Frame was corrupted by a missing .dll file.  After running the repair function in Windows, everything worked fine.  Only discovered it when I successfully installed the Utilities App, but which gave me the error message about the missing .dll file when I tried to start it.  That gave us the clue that led to the solution.  Can’t say enough good about the helpfulness of the WD support phone guy.