I am very much inclined to buy a MCM Gen2. I do however have some questions that I couldn’t figure out either on the WD’s page neither here in the forum. Happy if someone could assist.
a. Is there any option for automatic backup of MCM into a web cloud service? If so, which ones and how much?
b. How exactly does the Dropbox sync function works?. Does it copy to a folder in MCM the Dropbox content?
c. Is it possible to access iTunes library from outside the local network?
d. Does the iPhone/iPad’s automatic Wifi backup to iTunes option still work if I have the iTunes library in the MCM?
Finally, if I buy, this will probably means I need to stop using OSX Photos (which I actually don’t like too much). So question is, how is the user experience of managing a photo library with WD’s apps?
I can assist with some, although I don’t own any Apple iStuff, so not with everything:
a) The firmware cloud backup options are ElephantDrive and Amazon S3. I don’t use either, so I can’t comment on how well they may work.
b) Yes. In the app you select/create a folder (by default a folder in the public share, but you can put it anywhere you like, including in its own private share, as I have mine) and then your Dropbox content gets copied and mirrored into that just like it would using the Dropbox apps on PCs and tablets.
c) One I can’t help with. It is possible to generally set up remote access either via the WD apps or via something like Webdav, but I have no idea if/how that would apply to the built-in iTunes server on the MCM.
d) No idea.
e) I only use my MCM as a dumb photo archive (a dumping ground) and don’t use WD apps at all. But as a simple file archive it works fine.
I’m not much of a photographer (especially with my phone, when I do I prefer to use a camera). But in such cases I just bulk download to a PC, and then Smartware backs them up as part of the normal PC backup.
And for more important/sentimental photos, they are again manually archived and stored on my NAS.
Basically I prefer the “homebrew” methods to the apps generally. For example for remote access I tend to use direct WebDAV onto my files rather than going through the app etc. It just seems cleaner, and more under control for exactly what I want to do (both in terms of access and security).
Thanks Darren, since you have been so responsive, do you know if it was released the MCM 8Tb Gen2? It seems it’s out of stock everywhere. But not sure if it is that or it hasn’t been released yet.
