Using longer cables with Passport

WD External Drives WD Portable Drives
1

I have recently bought a Passport Ultra. Its primary use is for regular backups of my ‘desktop’ PC, with occasional use on a couple of laptops, also for large data transfers between those devices.

I chose a USB-powered device deliberately for perceived ease-of-use and the ability to move it between different PCs without needing to take the power-supply as well. However the supplied 18-inch cable is insufficient to use it on the rear USB ports of my PC ‘tower’ and still have the Passport in a convenient location for regular plugging/unplugging. If I use the front ports the plug often gets knocked and the Passport has to sit on the floor - not ideal!

My intention was to use the WD-supplied cable for laptop connection and purchase a longer cable to provide a permanent connection from the rear of the ‘tower’ to a handy position for the Passport on my desk. Depending upon availability, the cable length is likely to be either approx 30", 40" or 60". However Knowledge Base Answer ID 197 would seem to suggest that the drive may/will not work with a longer cable? What are peoples’ views/experience on this please?

2

Hi, I have a My Passport for Mac 2 TB, and I’ve use it with a 36’’ cable. There has being some times where if the cable is not plugged in correctly you lose connection and might encounter data corruption and data loss, so be on the lookout for that. Also keep in mind that although is possible, WD does not support the use of longer cables on the my passports.

3

Longer cables means lower power or higher losses. Best practise is using an active USB-hub with a power supply, placed on the desktop and then connect any external drive to this active hub. So you bypass any power issues in both directions, to/from your PC and to/from your external drive.

BTW: this is related in general to all external hard drives.