WD shouldn’t pretend to pair software with hardware: The result is exponentially more grief and even less WD “support”, (if that were even possible). Your “FAQ” are useless. Your knowledge base is useless. That WD would let a hardware product go out the door with the half-witted user manual that came with the product is shocking. (The product is a 2T “MyPassport Ultra” ) I’m half tempted to walk it back into Office Depot where I bought it and shove it down their throat before I go to Amazon and buy Seagate’s version…all because the smart-■■■■■ line in WD user manual that dares to suggest the thing is supposed to function in a certain manner. IT DOES NOT. Daring to ship a drive with software that is supposed to “work with” is dangerous territory for a company that isn’t about “customer service”. In doing such WD has created an infinite array of new headaches for both itself and the customer.
Now, The reviews on WD My Passport Ultra ■■■■…mostly because the “security” software is a sham. I wasn’t worried about the security aspect, because if I wanted security on my backup drive I would throw TrueCrypt on it. I bought the drive KNOWING that WD security software has multiple holes in it that even elementary school hackers could bust. No, All I wanted was big block of backup space…to do backups. I thought WD might be able to handle that task. Oh looky…WD included Backup software! + a scheduler too…squeelll! So now for the last 3 days I’ve been pulling my hair out thinking that your software and scheduler would actually work as the WD manual states. So, I wasted about 27 total combined hours so far just dealing with WD backup software and it’s shortcomings. Then, I have to fight your site to even send an email to your “no support here” department. All emails end with a “error searching knowledge base” message. Hey, I didn’t search the knowledge base, and neither did WD. It’s just WD’s ploy to block emails.
HERES WHAT THE WD My Passport USER MANUAL SAYS - VERBATIM: “… Note: Whenever you disconnect and reconnect a backup target or source
device, the WD Backup software rescans the backup source device for
new or changed files and resumes automatic backup protection
according to the schedule”“”
(Note that the WD “schedule” interface also includes the option for simply hitting a button saying “back up now”)
“resumes”. This word means something very specific. WD software does not “resume”, and certainly not when hitting the button that says “back up now”.
NO WHERE IN YOUR USER MANUAL DOES IT SAY: Hey…when you disconnect the backup drive because you and your portable laptop have to leave a location, the backups (which were never completed because they will take maybe 25 + hours) are going to be treated as though they never happened, and instead of resuming / rescanning and going forward with yet undone backups, WD insane software will just start from scratch every single time, doing a full “rescan” then starting from zero backing up as though nothing ever happened before, so NOTHING IS ACTUALLY EVER GOING TO BE “BACKED UP” let alone the total of your choices. Neither will anything be in any form that could actually be “restored” using WD software. Because WD backup software does not complete the job in any reasonable amount of time and does not “resume” to finish the job it started, your files will never be in a complete “restorable” condition.
I was getting about 23% through a backup in 7 hours before having to disconnect/leave thinking it would scan+resume only to find that it doesn’t “scan+resume”. Oh yes, and sorry, WD never included the info that your “2.5” external drives should never be used on any portable machine that is ever going to actually be shut down. Also, WD does not bother to include any information anywhere on its site re: how-to get a hold of anyone in a reasonable manner after you’ve banged your head against the walls searching for answers that don’t exist anywhere on the WD’s site, + the company was too short sighted to include “online chat” because that would make sense. NO, WD would much rather just get the drive returned. I suppose it’s easier to do RA’s for major corporations that were shipped drives with BS software + lame reference material + no corporate vision. Then they can repackage it and sell it again pretending it was a refurb.
Hopefully someone on-line will be able to provide me some answers, or WD will have yet one more drive to eat, and Seagate + Amazon will get one more customer. BTW, I’ve worked with computers about 30 years, and was building them when people were still using windows 3.1 with daughter-cards and hateful ISA slots that required driver installation booting from DOS on a floppy. I can truly say that I have never seen “backup” software do what WD backup software is doing. Ive seen bad backup software that came with warnings and work-arounds for maneuvers that people shouldn’t expect to do but do anyway, but Ive never seen complete meltdown of common sense for maneuvers that companies should expect people to engage in (shutting down a laptop for example, before an insanely slowwwww process such as your “full backup” might complete). I tried both shutting down the computer and ejecting the WD drive before shutting down the computer to see if that made any impact on the decisions your software made to simply ignore any previous work. WD software should KNOW when the drive is disengaging and mark the spot so to speak. IT DOESN’T. I’m not seeing anything redeemable in this piece of hardware or software that came with it. If the unit was designed such that it requires to remain on for 20 - 150 hours for the initial “backup” (or however long it takes dependent on the amount of source files), then WD should include that information UP FRONT where people can see it BEFORE making a purchase. THAT would save WD returned drives and people could decide for themselves if that product was right for the way they compute. WD is clearly not a portable computing backup solution in any respect.
I can get something that works for the same price that I paid for yours. Hey…WD Corporate…re-read that sentence, many times over.
Meanwhile, do not email me anything. I use 10minutemail so that I don’t have to deal with unscrupulous marketers that sell peoples private info. That email address is long gone.
