- It is that time again. Time to decide whether to keep or replace your Mac laptop or desktop computer. If you are reading this article, chances are you've already come to the decision to replace your Mac with the iMac Pro (or maybe you just got a new Mac as a present!), and you're thinking about selling your old model.
- I recently purchased an Apple MacBook Air and also have a Dell laptop. My Passport is serial number WXM1C5294201. How do I re-format MY Passport for PC so that it will work with Mac and PC?
WD My Passport Ultra USB-C Edition
It is easy use your WD My Passport for Mac and Windows in 7 steps. You’ll find other documents on the site all about your WD My Passport portable external hard drive. Why not take a look: Format WD My Passport for Mac, 10 Quick Steps. How to Use WD My Passport for Mac 5 Ways No Anger. Partition WD My Passport For Mac, Teach Yourself in 10 Steps.
Pros
- Easy to use
- Sleek design
A fantastic storage companion for MacBook users.
I’ve been a fan of Western Digital storage options for a very long time. A company I used to work for had to do daily backups and per project backups and we relied on Western Digital products to ensure that our data was secured. In all the time we used WD hard drives, I don’t think we ever had a drive fail. Now that I am working independently and I need storage solutions for my media backups, I immediately looked to Western Digital. I have a 2016 13-inch MacBook Pro, which only had USB-C ports on it so I was grateful to find that WD had a portable storage option for people in my situation -- the My Passport Ultra USB-C edition.
DETAILS
The My Passport Ultra USB-C edition has the same compact design as classic My Passport drives from WD with the addition of a USB-C port. The case has been modified slightly from previous versions to include a metal cover. The drive is USB-C ready (as previously mentioned) and compatible with USB 3.0 (with the use of a provided adapter). The hard drive can act as an automatic backup drive and features password protection as an option. The hard drive can also be encrypted using 256-bit AES hardware encryption through WD Security.
Thanks to WD’s built-in software, WD Discovery, the drive also features social media and cloud storage import. This utility software can also help to manage your hard drive with WD Drive Utilities. Out of the box, the drive is Windows 10 ready, but it can be formatted to work with Mac computers, too.The My Passport Ultra USB-C is available in three sizes -- 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB. It’s very easy to use and has a 3-year limited warranty. There are two color options -- Blue/Black and Silver.
USB-C version (blue) versus USB 3.0 version (white/gold)
Package Includes:
- My Passport Ultra Portable Storage
- USB-C™ cable with USB 3.0 adapter
- WD Discovery™ software* for WD Backup™, WD Security™ and WD Drive Utilities™
- Quick install guide
USER EXPERIENCE
The My Passport Ultra USB-C is an updated version of the My Passport Ultra (2017). The older version was only available with a USB 3.0 connection cable, which meant that users like me (with a USB-C MacBook computer) would have to use an adapter or dock in order to interface with the hard drive. The physical size of the hard drive hasn’t changed much model-to-model except that the corners are rounded on the 2018 model and it simply looks sleeker. Both models are formatted for Windows machines out of the box, but you can reformat using Paragon NTFS for Mac (included with the drive).
The My Passport Ultra USB-C is really an exceptional hard drive. It does a beautiful job of storing data and makes it really easy to keep a portable drive with me at all times. The one thing you really have to be cautious of is the fact that this is a mechanical hard drive and not an SSD. Because of that, the hard drive does not have any shock protection. If it is thrown around a lot, it will be more prone to fail. That said, because it is a ‘portable’ hard drive, I think that it’s probably a bit more svelte than other mechanical drives. To date, I’ve not had any issue with Western Digital’s portable hard drives being carried by hand during daily treks through the urban jungle or on a coast-to-coast airplane ride.
One of the first things I usually do with any hard drive I test out is to open up Disk Utility to see that the capacity of the drive matches what the box says. In this case, Disk Utility stated that it was a 2TB hard drive which matched up with the packaging. Because the drive is formatted for Windows and I use a Mac, I did end up using Paragon NTFS to erase and reformat the drive as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) so I could use it freely with my MacBook Pro. After the formatting, the drive showed up as a 2TB drive, but space was shown as ‘free’ instead of used like it did when it was formatted as NTFS.
At this point, I ran two disk speed tests on the drive -- AJA System Test Lite and Blackmagic Disk Speed Test. The AJA test is unique because you get a sense for how specific video files will be processed using the selected hard drive. Typically, I get the same type of speed from both tests, but I like running them both regardless. With the AJA test, I selected 1080p (1920×1080) and 4K-Full (4096×3112). Each test returned approximately the same results with a read/write time of 124/122 Mb/s and 126/122 Mb/s respectively. With the Blackmagic Speed Test, I got a read/write result of 125/121.4 Mb/s. The Blackmagic test will show whether or not the speed of the drive tested will hold up with some common video formats.
The final test I ran on the My Passport Ultra USB-C was a file transfer test. I used a video file that was 2.36GB in size. Using the stopwatch function on my iPhone, I timed the transfer at 19.01 seconds. After converting the file size to MB, I calculated the transfer rate to be 124.1 Mb/s, which is in line with what I was seeing from the disk speed tests.
Mac 10 for sale and auction. Buy a mac 10 online. Sell your mac 10 for FREE today on GunsAmerica! Login Register Menu. They look like great fun guns and we can’t wait to get one on the range. Local Listing Results Show All Refine Your Search. Mac 10 For Sale 1000. Mac 10 guns for sale.
CONCLUSION
The WD My Passport Ultra USB-C is a solid hard drive for any user of USB-C compatible products. Not only does it have a stylish look to it, but it also functions exceptionally well. I believe that the investment in this product is well worth it. Even though it is still a mechanical hard drive, the cost difference between this drive and the SSD version is quite a lot (2TB My Passport SSD, $599.99 vs. 2TB My Passport Ultra USB-C $89.99). This hard drive is much more affordable and it does a great job as a backup drive.
NOTE: There is also a My Passport Ultra for Mac available. It’s designed to work with macOS out of the box without having to format it. That drive is available in 2TB and 4TB sizes, but is only available in silver.
For more information, visit wd.com.
Find WD on Facebook and Twitter.
Find WD on Facebook and Twitter.
Advertisements
Related
Important: |
|
To reformat an external hard drive to the NTFS (Windows) or HFS+ (Mac) file system, please follow the instructions below: Rar extractor for mac online.
- Download, unzip, install, and run the WD Quick Formatter for Windows ( if running Windows, or WD Quick Formatter for Mac if running macOS 10.5, 10.6, 10.7, 10.8, or 10.9 (Leopard, Snow Leopard, Lion, Mountain Lion, or Mavericks).
- When the application is started, the WD Quick Formatter's welcome screen will appear displaying the following warning message. After reading the warning, click Continue to move to the next screen.
- Click on Accept to accept the End User License Agreement.
- Next, the application will scan for WD external drives to be formatted.
- Depending on the size of the drive and the Operating System (OS), one of two screens will appear. If the system is running Mac OSX, follow the instructions under the first choice below. If running Windows, however, follow the instructions based on the drive size:
- When the scanning process comes to an end, there will be a drop down menu listing a WD external drive under Drive to format. This is the screen displayed when the drive is 2TB in size or less. Click on the drop down menu to view and/or select different external drives from the list, should there be additional drives connected to the system. When ready, click on Format Drive.
- On a Windows system and if the drive is greater than 2TB, the screen below will be displayed. Decide if the drive is to be used with a computer running Windows XP. If it might be used on Windows XP, then select XP Compatible.If the drive is not to be used with Windows XP, then select Factory Default. Once this selection is made, click on the drop down menu to view and/or select different external drives from the list, should there be additional drives connected to the system. When ready, click on Format Drive.
Important: - XP Compatible configuration option is not available on Windows 8 and 10
Important: - If an error is received stating that the drive cannot be unmounted, this means that another application, service, or program is actively using the drive. Proceed to determine what is interacting with the drive and close that application or process prior to formatting the drive. Common programs that may be using the drive are automatic backup programs (such as WD SmartWare), anti-virus, file downloading applications (BitTorrent clients, FTP clients, etc.), and remote access applications.
- Do not disconnect power while the utility is running.
- When the scanning process comes to an end, there will be a drop down menu listing a WD external drive under Drive to format. This is the screen displayed when the drive is 2TB in size or less. Click on the drop down menu to view and/or select different external drives from the list, should there be additional drives connected to the system. When ready, click on Format Drive.
- The WD Quick Formatter will show the progress bar while the format is taking place.
- Once the Format is completed, click on the Format Another Drive button to select another WD external drive to format, or click on the Exit button to exit the program.
Note: | WD Quick Formatter for Mac is not supported on macOS Yosemite, El Capitan, or Sierra. It's best to use Disk Utility. Please see Answer ID 8200: How to Partition and Format a WD Drive on Windows and macOS for more information. |
Note: | When WD Quick Formatter is finished, the drive will have one partition. This is necessary in order to optimize the performance of the drive. |