Considering Purchasing My Cloud EX2

It is that time of year again.

The time when a cloud goes on sale at BestBuy and I think about buying one even though I have no need of it; because I already own a pair of Clouds 8TB.

The problem with a pair of 8TB Clouds is that I’m manually syncing the one Cloud to the other to create a mirror image.

I use a software called Beyond Compare for mac to compare the two drives and sync the new files from my Media Cloud to my Archive Cloud. This process takes about a day to compare then I would manually select files to copy to the other drive.

I hadintentions of automating this process last year using a script but I never got the incentive to do it.

Thus I had always had my eyes on the Mirror Cloud and I think this might be the last chance of getting a mirror Cloud that looks like a big fat book before they change it to the new Ugly diamond shaped encrusted square “My book”.

The mirror EX2 will provide the dual copy that I always need in a NAS system.

However there is only one major question that I need answered before investing and if anyone has the answer, it would be appreciated.

If I pull out one drive and mount it on a hard drive dock, can I mount the drive on a MAC and view the files.

Thanks ahead for anyone answering.

isn’t it amazing that over a 3 hour period, only 3 views on this post and probably 1 of the views is mine.

I’m guessing that I won’t be getting an answer on this… I did order the drive and it will arrive tomorrow however I’ll hold off on opening it until I’m sure that I’ll keep it since best buy up here in canada disallows returns on open hard drives.

I cant answer you question as I have not tried that , however I can advise that in my opinion, you would be best served to stay away from any WD MAS unit , their red drives might be ok but the supplied software and the processing power and memory are a disaster. I have bought some unintended rubbish over the years but this my cloud nas is the worst mistake I have ever made. I do wish that reviewers were honest and actually tested equipment before they promote it as a honest review.

I think I might take your advice @adwb.

I don’t think spending $1k is wise these days especially for something that I don’t really need.

Will be taking it back to best buy once I receive it this afternoon.

To keep or not to keep… that is the 1k question.

The dock is for yanking out one of the drive to see if I could mount it on my Mac.

I’ll sleep on it…

The two clouds have been sitting quietly on the shelf for about a year and a half and I’ve been happy with both the performance and the ability of the clouds to sleep once I had discovered the exact scan services to kill.

The only change that I had wanted in the new mirror cloud was just that, the ability to mirror in real time. However there was just one factor that I needed most, and that was the ability to sit quietly on the ikea bookshelf.

_______________________________Cloud 8tb____________________________Cloud EX2 16tb mirror

Shelf width is 14.5 and already my single drive cloud is over-hanging the shelf by 3cm but the feets fits on the lip of the shelf.

The problem is the ethernet and power cords even with right angle plugs bought from eBay several years prior, it still pushes the cloud out from the shelf by 3cm.

Thus it is for this small form factor requirement that indeed WD has finally lost my sale.