I see there is a new version but no mention of any fixes in the release notes.
WD SmartWare v1.5.0.17 Release Notes:
• Now works with file and folder backup. Users have the flexibility to backup either by selecting pre-defined file
categories (e.g. Music, Movies, Pictures, Documents, etc.) or individual files and folders.
• Now works with Czech, Dutch, Hungarian, Norwegian,
Polish, Swedish, and Turkish.
• Now remembers the password when a password-protected WD drive is connected to a specific computer.
• Updated Learning Center provides users with information on how to accomplish common WD SmartWare tasks
The software still runs like an old dog although I see you have now split the usage with the new “WDRulesEngine.exe”. CPU usage is currently at 100%. If I close WDSoftware.exe it drops to a flucuating 45-65%. Still not good enough.
What am I missing here? Toretto I thought you said a fix would be released in the next release. So now when is the next release due? This one doesn’t say it has the fixes that you said were for 4 different problems.
And as another change request, please put a dropdown on the Backup tad page so we can switch between drives without having to go back to the Home page. Thank you.
I just installed this update and now my computer tries booting from myPassport back up drive. When I check it in CMOS settings my system drive doesn’t even show up. I have to unplug the backup drive to get my computer to even recognize my system disk. Once booted I can then plug in my backup drive and it will work fine.
So, it seems the SmartWare version 1.5.0.17 has a major bug.
I installed the new version and it would not recognize the drive and XP Pro showed the drive as empty. I uninstalled/reinstalled/rebooted and I could see it again. That was yesterday. This morning the drive looks empty again (I know it’s not). Back-up and retrieve tabs are greyed out. It won’t even let me switch to treeview, a new feature I actually liked.
WDFME.exe still running HOT from 47 to 75% with it’s new little friend WDRulesEngine.exe clocking in from 10 to 24%. WDSmartWare.exe is at an acceptable 2 to 10%. Together this trio is pounding my CPU at a consistent 60 to 75% usage. I see I can now set WDFME.exe to Low Priority but that doesn’t help either.
Now perhaps it’s because it’s categorizing again but why when I let it run from 6-10pm all on it’s own!?! It appears this software went from bad to worse. Thank God they added Hungarian…
You guys should have just released the fixes and kept the enhancements for a future release instead of rushing out a bad product. I know, it’s free but it will certainly influence my decision the next time I go to buy a new hard drive.
Installed the new version and it works worderfully. I’m using Windows XP. the problems of Smartware hogging the CPU and causing literally billions of page faults is SOLVED for me.The installation was smooth and required theexpected reboot . Thanks.
I have windows XP SP3 and updated to latest WD software upgrade and now WDFME.exe is constantly running, with or without, drive attached, at anywhere from 50% to 85%.
I thought there would be some improvement in save speed not a vast increase in CPU usage!
I have had to resort to using task manager to end job every time I sign on.
This needs an emergency fix otherwise WD are in grave danger of losing vast amounts of customers.
I have also had very bad experiences with the new WD Smartware v1.5.0.17 (which appears as 1.5.0.16 on the WDFME.exe properties). When WDFME.exe is running, it pegs my dual CPUs at 100% and my memory at mover 75%. Normally, even with the old version of WD SmartWare running, the CPUs seldom go above 10% and memory above 50%.
Environment: HP Pavilion a6230n PC with AMD 64 processor running Windows Vista (32 bit).
In case there is any doubt in anyone’s mind, this version of the software has rendered my PC completely unusable. I have removed the WD SmartWare in order to be able to use my PC. That means I cannot use the WD product I purchased which makes me a very unhappy customer.
I see there is a new version but no mention of any fixes in the release notes.
WD SmartWare v1.5.0.17 Release Notes:
• Now works with file and folder backup. Users have the flexibility to backup either by selecting pre-defined file
categories (e.g. Music, Movies, Pictures, Documents, etc.) or individual files and folders.
• Now works with Czech, Dutch, Hungarian, Norwegian,
Polish, Swedish, and Turkish.
• Now remembers the password when a password-protected WD drive is connected to a specific computer.
• Updated Learning Center provides users with information on how to accomplish common WD SmartWare tasks
The software still runs like an old dog although I see you have now split the usage with the new “WDRulesEngine.exe”. CPU usage is currently at 100%. If I close WDSoftware.exe it drops to a flucuating 45-65%. Still not good enough.
What am I missing here? Toretto I thought you said a fix would be released in the next release. So now when is the next release due? This one doesn’t say it has the fixes that you said were for 4 different problems.
And as another change request, please put a dropdown on the Backup tad page so we can switch between drives without having to go back to the Home page. Thank you.
We did release a fix to improve the memory and cpu utilization in the wddmservice. rearcher did have this issue and it appears that the issue was resolved for him/her. We can investigate the issues you are seeing on your computer as well. Can you PM me your contact information so that I (or someone else) can get in touch with you to collect information?
I just installed this update and now my computer tries booting from myPassport back up drive. When I check it in CMOS settings my system drive doesn’t even show up. I have to unplug the backup drive to get my computer to even recognize my system disk. Once booted I can then plug in my backup drive and it will work fine.
So, it seems the SmartWare version 1.5.0.17 has a major bug.
There is no function in our software that would change your CMOS settings. You are not seeing a bug, but you will need to change your CMOS settings to boot from your internal drive first.
WDSmartware not able to upgrade. with error 1603. And now the older version of smartware not able to to see the drive to do backups.
(I can see and open the drive in My computer no problem.)
Tried to uninstall, fresh install, upgrade downgrade. What a mess.
Not working.
Ed
This usually indicates an issue where the MSI cannot find an installed file (sometimes temp file cleaners or registry cleaners cause this issue). Please contact our support. They can help you with this issue.
I updated from the 1.4 version today, and I am facing some problems with the new 1.5 versions.
First, I am only able to resume the backup of C drive. When I select my other drive (E Drive), and click the start backup button, the backup for this drive is not starting.
Then, in the home and back up pages, the files are shown as system files, and the breakup by file type does not show anymore.
I am afraid that the old backup will be deleted. Will the backup using new version, delete any older backup files?
I am using Win XP and have .Net 4 installed. Please advise. thanks.
My experience with WD SMartware and it’s “community moderators” have been almost completely negative. Torretto you have been friendly and helpful. I can not say the same for your coworkers.
If someone has been rude, please let me know in PM. Just a follow up, I did receive your PM and we are looking at a seperate reported incident as well. We have a team meeting tomorrow so hopefully I will have an update past that point. I may also try to send you a new version we are testing.
I upgraded to 1.5.0.17 after backing up about 14 GB to my new My Book Live. Last night the software listed the size of the backup as 27 GB. Today the size of the backup is listed as 2.12 GB. It should be noted that the size of the backup is listed correctly on the drive’s setup webpage. Most of my music files are in an iTunes folder, and it seems the music files are not reporting correctly in the categorized files.
“There is no function in our software that would change your CMOS settings. You are not seeing a bug, but you will need to change your CMOS settings to boot from your internal drive first.”
Thanks for the reply Toretto. I did recheck the CMOS settings and was able to configure it properly. However if it wasn’t the SmartWare update that caused the problem then it would have to be some sort of software conflict. The process was:
I updated the SmartWare software
It told me to reboot
My system hung in the boot process trying to boot from MyPassport backup drive
So, something changed boot priority.
My system FYI:
Asus P6T mobo
Windows 7
2 x Seagate Barracudas in RAID 0
Wondering if WD was playing a joke because my system drives are Seagate
Personally, my experience with the latest version (only just purchased, so got nothing to compare it against) was fairly typical for this type of thing. My initial attempt to install SmartWare failed, but it actually turned out that windows 7 SP1 had silently installed itself in the background and I never noticed the little dialog in the background asking me to reboot.
win7 does not like trying to run an installer when it’s waiting for a reboot… once I rebooted and attempted the install again, I was successfully able to get it up and running. I posted another message in the forum explaining what happened after I’d backed up my first drive, but other than that little glitch (and higher than expected CPU/memory usage) it seems stable enough. Would be nice to see faster backup speeds though.
Yesterday, I installed 1.5.0.17 and it is using more disk space than before. CPU usage is still 100% because it is still categorizing files. My laptop had 2.5 GB free, but now it has 754.2 MB free. I had to move many music files from my laptop to the external WD 2TB drive. Then smartware seems to use up the more space on my laptop. I moved more music files to the external WD drive. Then smartware uses up more on my laptop hard drive, now 665 MB free.
Yesterday, I installed 1.5.0.17 and it is using more disk space than before. CPU usage is still 100% because it is still categorizing files. My laptop had 2.5 GB free, but now it has 754.2 MB free. I had to move many music files from my laptop to the external WD 2TB drive. Then smartware seems to use up the more space on my laptop. I moved more music files to the external WD drive. Then smartware uses up more on my laptop hard drive, now 665 MB free.
When will smartware stabilize?
Are you sure SmartWare is the culprit here? It doesn’t save anything to your local drive unless you are restoring data back to the computer from your backup. If your losing internal drive space at that rate than something else may be going on in your system.
Had to manually change the settings for paging and hibernation, because the hiberfil.sys and pagefile.sys were over 1GB. Also the etilqs from Firefox were sometimes as large as 1GB. After fixing those, then smartware was able to complete categorizing(several hours) and CPU usage went down below 5%.
Been using a 2TB My Book Live for a continuous backup solution for a few months now. Everything was working okay. I load Smartware yesterday, it prompts me to install the new version which I do and everything goes smoothly. I check afterwards and the new version still recognizes my backup so I close everything for the night.
I start working on the computer saturday morning and suddenly everything runs sluggish. I check the processes and wdfme.exe is draining the ressources like crazy. Using most of the time over 1.5gb of RAM and 85% of the CPU. Luckily after about half an hour or so the usage dropped down to around 50% of CPU usage and 90mb of RAM use so I managed to register here and voice my displeasure with this update. At the time of writing it is still using 50% of CPU and 90mb of RAM constantly.
Any hope that wdfme.exe stops being such a pig with ressources anytime soon?
“Had to manually change the settings for paging and hibernation, because the hiberfil.sys and pagefile.sys were over 1GB. Also the etilqs from Firefox were sometimes as large as 1GB. After fixing those, then smartware was able to complete categorizing(several hours) and CPU usage went down below 5%.”
So all we have to do is modify our system files and a Firefox file and it’s fixed? Oh dear me is that all? Please be more specific in your solution so the “engineers” (who don’t read this and couldn’t care less) understand how your “systemic” solution might affect their software. Or better yet how their software affects our systems.
After all this is supposed to be users helping users… at least that’s what the moderator told me.
File categorization finished yesterday evening so I was like “okay, that’s done. If that was a one time thing would have been nice they warned about it before installing the software update”.
Fast forward to this morning around 10:20am and wdfme.exe goes at it again. I check Smartware and for some reason it started a whole new file categorization again while eating pretty much the whole CPU and 1.5gb of RAM. It’s back down to eating 50% of the CPU and 90mb of RAM like yesterday now but this is really troublesome.
I hope WD comes up with a patch so the software doesn’t do this file categorization all the time.
