Welcome to the WDLabs Community Forum! We’ve established this community to promote open discussion of ideas about how the WD PiDrive can be used with the Raspberry Pi.
I’m part of the engineering team here at WD Labs and I look forward to answering any questions you may have about the WD PiDrive or other WD Labs projects. Feel free to pitch in with new ideas or suggestions, or to just discuss cool projects on the Raspberry Pi platform!
Well this is new. 
Ok, so what is the PiDrive?
I asked the same question too ! 
Yeah, I saw that.
I thought this was something else and was going to ask a totally different question. 
If you know what I mean.
Is this a closed forum?
TonyPh12345 wrote:
Is this a closed forum?
Nope. Logged out and it’s still here.
For the benefit of everyone else looking at this forum … (thanks for the link flhthemi)
http://dealnews.com/Western-Digital-1-TB-Pi-Drive-Kit-for-52-6-s-h/1438402.html
WD PiDrive Kit
Hackers and makers, rejoice… your favorite little DIY computer has just been given a major storage upgrade! The WD PiDrive Kit instantly expands the HDD storage on your Raspberry Pi to a full 1 TB so you can create (and save) to your heart’s content. Model: WDLB001RNN $79.99
Note: You will need to put your operating system of choice on the microSDTM card before the Raspberry Pi will boot.
Connect the USB 3.0 Micro B male plug to WD PiDrive.
Connect the USB 3.0 Type A male plug to a USB port on the Raspberry Pi.
Connect the USB Micro B male plug to the power port on Raspberry Pi.
Connect the USB Micro B Female to the USB Micro B male connector on the power cord.
Plug the USB Type A male plug of the power cord into the provided 5V power adapter.
Plug the USB Type A male plug of the power cord into the provided 5V power adapter.
Why You’ll Love it
What It Comes With
What It’s Compatible With
___________________________________________________________________________________________
Now the only thing that puzzles me is incorrect information …
eg. the Raspberry Pi 2 can Power a 1TB Portable HDD without the need for a Hub or a special cable.
All you need is the recommended 2A 5V Power Supply which 99.99% of RPi2’s come with either in a bundle or sold separately.
All you do is edit the config.txt on your MicroSD Card and add the line max_usb_current=1
Here is a video of my RPi2 powering a 1TB WD Elements HDD
You’re absolutely correct, with max_usb_current set you can power an external HDD from the RPi2. The difference is that powering the drive separately using the cable ensures that the drive can maintain stability and performance when the RPi is under heavy load. This means that your other peripherals (camera, WiFi, keyboard, etc) can also maintain higher voltages when under heavy load, and remain stable as well.
As an example, it really helps out if you’re doing something interesting but power-hungry on the RPi, like recording 1080p video to disk and simultaneously streaming said video on your LAN 
Tinwarble wrote:
Well this is new.
Ok, so what is the PiDrive?
Hi Tinwarble,
Just in case your question still hasn’t been answered, it’s a drive we designed for the Raspberry Pi hobbyists to REALLY expand the amount of storage that can be used with the RPi. The cable is just our insurance againist not having enough power to run the drive. So, yeah, JoeySmith, it may not need it, but…
And the forum is to encourage discussion over different ways the RPi can be used.
Bill_S wrote:> Hi Tinwarble,
Just in case your question still hasn’t been answered, it’s a drive we designed for the Raspberry Pi hobbyists to REALLY expand the amount of storage that can be used with the RPi. The cable is just our insurance againist not having enough power to run the drive. So, yeah, JoeySmith, it may not need it, but…
And the forum is to encourage discussion over different ways the RPi can be used.
Hey Bill,
Late to the party again I see.
Yep, got it figured out. But it would have been easier if someone would have posted a link, picture or a description in the original post…sort of like what JoeySmyth did.
Ok, thanks for the feedback regarding the PiDrive
So basically, if you needed a drive to maintain stability and performance when the RPi is under heavy load and insurance againist not having enough power to run the drive…
then an externally powered hdd will do the same thing ?
Tinwarble wrote:> Hey Bill,
Late to the party again I see.
Yep, got it figured out. But it would have been easier if someone would have posted a link, picture or a description in the original post…sort of like what JoeySmith did.
Yeah, that’s cause you caught me on vacation. :stuck_out_tongue:
I have one of these, I’m looking to do something like Joey did with his.
I’m assuming that’s your RPi in the video. If so, are you using one of your themes you created for it. And/or is it possible to adapt one of the themes you did for the WD TV to the RPi?
[edit]
Forgot to address your question: I suppose you could use a powered external drive, but you’d lose the portability of the PiDrive. :smiley:
Bill_S wrote:> Yeah, that’s cause you caught me on vacation. :stuck_out_tongue:
I have one of these, I’m looking to do something like Joey did with his.
I’m assuming that’s your RPi in the video. If so, are you using one of your themes you created for it. And/or is it possible to adapt one of the themes you did for the WD TV to the RPi?
[edit]
Forgot to address your question: I suppose you could use a powered external drive, but you’d lose the portability of the PiDrive. :smiley:
What’s a vacation! :smileyvery-happy:
JoeySmyth is running OpenELEC (Kodi) on his Pi, which is what a good major of us Pi users use.
All skins can be found here: http://addons.kodi.tv/category/skins/
Bill_S wrote: I’m assuming that’s your RPi in the video. If so, are you using one of your themes you created for it. And/or is it possible to adapt one of the themes you did for the WD TV to the RPi?
Yes Bill, that’s my RPi2 (i shot the video on my phone and uploaded it to Youtube) 
It’s not my Theme / Skin … It’s Aeon Nox 4.1.9.6. (Gotham Only)
… but i edited the addon.xml to make it install on Isengard Kodi 15
http://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=185290
(the “No Mods” version)
It should also be mentioned that as an alternative to the Pi/Pi2, there is also the Odroid C-1.
There’s a lot of people that actually like this over the Pi2. There’s over 13 different OS’s you can run on the C-1 including Andorid 4.4.
I would guess though that a Kodi install on a Pi2 (or similar) wouldn’t really need the PiDrive, as the real benefit would be the portabliity which Kodi doesn’t really need (unless you’re using a niche case like an entertainment system in your car).
In my case I also have a Pi2 running Kodi wired up to my TV at home, but it gets fed from my MyCloud Mirror, which also holds the MySQL database with all the metadata and watched status etc on it (I also run Kodi on my laptop and tablet, which both also share that database). With the nice range of ways to get stuff from the MCM to the Pi (NFS, SMB, Webdav etc, in my case with NFS for local mounts and Webdav for my tablet when I’m travelling) it works superbly.
Personally I prefer Amber as my skin of choice, but that’s mainly as the Pi2 is an upgrade from the previous Pi1 which wouldn’t have had the power to run Aeon Nox and I’ve just stuck with it. Amber is a very sweet skin for use on a Pi, plenty of features (if not quite as powerful or widespread as AN), but with a very lightweight footprint for the lower powered kit.
Hey Darren,
Yeah i used Aeon Nox on the RPi1 and it was pretty disappointing (performance wise)
But the RPi2 is *HEAPS* better … if you wanna give it another go, here is the (modded) version i’m using …
http://download1588.mediafire.com/bx0p7jeyo0ag/9guy7per7i7b2ct/skin.Aeon-Nox-Gotham.4.1.9.6.zip
ignore the “Gotham” bit … i removed the dependencies, so it will install on any version of XBMC/Kodi (eg. Isengard, Frodo, Eden etc)
how did i remove the “dependencies” … easy, delete everthing between the “requires” tags in the addon.xml file
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<addon
id=“skin.aeon.nox.gotham”
version=“4.1.9.6”
name=“Aeon Nox Gotham”
provider-name=“Big_Noid|phil65”>
<requires>
</requires>
<extension
point=“xbmc.gui.skin”
defaultthemename=“Textures.xbt”
debugging=“false”
effectslowdown=“1.0”>
Or you can use Aeon Shednox, which is basically the same as the Gotham build, with some minor changes/additions, but works on Helix and Isengard.
Thanks Tinwarble, i will give it a give try … pretty happy with the performance of the Gotham version (on Isengard) but will give this a try soon to compare …
Cool to be here, and discuss all things XBMC / Kodi / Skins / Raspberry Pi … oops, and the 'PiDrive"
Just curious if the name “PiDrive” has been trademarked ?
Because here’s another “PiDrive”
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