Western Digital My Passport Wireless
1TB $199.99/£149.99 | world wide web.wdc.com

At the end of last year, storage manufacturer Western Digital launched a new Wi-Fi enabled hard drive that features a born SD carte reader, chosen the My Passport Wireless. Aslope the bulldoze, it also launched the My Cloud app, allowing photograph, video and audio files on the bulldoze to be viewed wirelessly from a phone or tablet.

Cardinal Features:

  • Built-in SD card slot
  • USB-3 Connection for data and charging
  • Wi-Fi connection with up to eight devices (802.11n with MIMO)
  • Rechargeable battery
  • DLNA/UPnP media streaming
  • Wi-Fi hotspot mode
  • Free iOS and Android app for control and browsing
  • Claimed 20 hour battery life in standby, 6 hours for streaming
  • 500GB, 1TB and 2TB models are available for £109, £129 and £199 (500GB not available in all markets)
  • 5400rpm
  • Dimensions: 500GB (3.39 in x 5.0 in ten 0.86 in), 1TB (iii.39 in x 5.0 in x 0.96 in), 2TB (3.39 in ten 5.0 in 10 1.17 in)
  • 500GB (0.55 lb / 0.25 kg), 1TB (0.sixty lb / 0.27 kg), 2TB (0.77 lb / 0.35 kg)
  • 2-Year warranty

In Employ

A question I've often been asked is whether there's a proficient style to backup photos on the road without a reckoner. Sometimes it'southward but not applied to carry a laptop, forth with the necessary card reader and power adapter, especially if your destination is a remote ane. Some years ago I explored a production from HyperDrive called the Colourspace UDMA which was essentially a hard drive with a congenital in CF carte reader and a screen on it. The user interface left a lilliputian to exist desired, but information technology did exactly what it said information technology would practise and copied everything off your card and onto its internal bulldoze.

In more recent years I've tended to recommend that people shoot to two memory cards in the camera and use this as their backup method. As the toll of CF and SD media has fallen, this has get a more and more practical option and the number of cameras that feature dual card slots has also been on the rise. When launched, the My Passport Wireless immediately caught my attention considering it looked equally though it might solve the problem of being able to view your backed upwardly images in a larger format, but without the need for a bulky laptop. A photographic camera, an tablet computer and a My Passport Wireless should, in theory, give yous everything you need to backup and verify your images on the route. Just how applied is this solution?

My Deject App

Afterwards downloading the WD My Cloud app from the App Shop, initial wireless connection to the drive was a breeze. I was able to view and quickly scan the collection of sample media files that come pre-loaded on the drive. Wi-Fi connection requires you to connect direct to the drive in your mobile device'due south Wi-Fi settings, simply since the My Passport Wireless tin can also act as a mobile hotspot, you can stay connected to the net once you accept logged the bulldoze itself onto your network using the app. Network discovery took a while merely once the drive was on the network, my iPhone was able to connect to the internet through the bulldoze with no issues.

The My Cloud app has a simple interface that shows you the drive's current battery condition, also as how your storage is being used.

The settings bill of fare in the app likewise gives you the important control over how the SD carte is treated when inserted into the bulldoze. You can choose to have files on the card deleted later on import, and you can also choose whether importing takes identify automatically every bit soon every bit a card is detected. If auto-import is turned off, the app, or a calculator, is needed to start the downloading process.

From a functionality bespeak of view, the app has some notable limitations. It shouldn't come up as a surprise, simply it's non possible to preview Raw files that are stored on the drive. You can encounter them in the binder to confirm they take transferred from the SD card, but you tin can't view the actual prototype, or even the embedded JPEG thumbnail.

Given the growing number of apps that practice support the viewing of Raw files, I promise this is something that WD considers for any hereafter versions.

The workaround, if yous observe information technology too disconcerting to have no visual confirmation of the Raw files in the folders, is to gear up your camera to Raw+JPEG. For the JPEG, you tin simply select the smallest size that your camera will allow. This will permit you to confirm that the files in the folders are really the ones you expect them to be, although the app is not smart enough to stack a Raw+JPEG pair as ane item in the file viewer.

The biggest omission from the iOS version of the My Cloud app is the ability to simply save an image from the bulldoze, into the iPhone or iPad's Camera Roll. Having backed up your photos to the drive and browsed them in the app, information technology's natural that you lot might want to save some of them to your device for like shooting fish in a barrel viewing or social sharing. In fact, it'due south but most the very first matter I tried to use the drive for in my workflow!

With some of Catechism's DSLRs lacking built-in Wi-Fi, I thought I could use the My Passport Wireless to speedily become images from my photographic camera, onto my phone, and then out onto various networks. You can share the photos out to a large number of other photograph apps, like SnapSeed if you accept it installed, but the "Save To Camera Curlicue" omission is mystifying.

A little enquiry shows that since the My Passport Wireless' launch, this is something that has been mentioned time and time again by buyers and reviewers alike. I really wish that based on that feedback, Western Digital had updated the app to include what I consider to be the most basic of features for whatever iOS photo management app. You lot can share the photo to another app, and then save it to the Camera Roll from in that location, simply nobody likes to add another step to their workflow when it seems and then unnecessary. While the app does provide a specific option to save a local copy of an image to your device for offline viewing, that viewing has to happen within the My Cloud app.

Browsing images on the My Cloud app as well has some limitations. On the iPad, the thumbnails or file list are confined to a small portion of the screen on the left-hand side. When an image is selected, the preview fills the residual of the screen, but if you are trying to browse several hundred images and then the bulk of the screen'southward real manor is going unused. When information technology comes to browsing folders that you have uploaded from an SD card, or dragged to the drive from your computer, you are limited to a list view that shows a filename next to the thumbnail epitome.

It would have been logical to offer a proper thumbnail view option as well, peculiarly since this is how images are presented if you tap the 'Photos' button at the bottom of the screen which reveals all photos on the drive in one continuous gallery.

One of my favorite features of the app was the pick to connect with various deject storage services like Google Drive or Dropbox. You lot tin can chop-chop movement images from the drive up to the cloud, and this means they tin can exist shared very easily with a elementary link via e-mail. For photographers like myself, it means yous could carry around your entire portfolio of 'keepers' and motion them to a deject service to share with a new client every time you make a sale.

Speed Testing

The My Passport Wireless features a USB 3 port for connection to your computer once yous render habitation with a bulldoze full of photos. Testing with the standard AJA Organization Exam gave results that were cypher to write dwelling about. The average write speed of the drive was approximately 84 MB/s, while the read speed came in at around 90 MB/due south on average.

The drive inside the My Passport Wireless is a 5400rpm drive, the same speed as the LaCie Rugged Thunderbolt that I tested recently. By comparing, the LaCie drive achieved a read speed of 144MB/south and a write speed of 138MB/s over USB3. The WD drive isn't the slowest 5400rpm USB3 drive I've tested, but it's likewise far from the fastest.

After the USB iii test, I moved on to check the speed of the built-in SD card reader. The easiest way to get some ideas about that was to compare the transfer speed of a folder of images from an SD card to the My Passport Wireless, with the speed it took to re-create the same folder of images to my computer from a standard USB 3 carte reader. What nosotros're looking for here isn't the actual numbers, because they can be affected by the speed of the carte du jour I used. Instead we just want to note the relative difference in speed betwixt the two options. A 3.6GB folder of photos took 44 seconds to copy from my SD carte du jour to my figurer using a normal card reader. That same folder of photos took iv minutes and 46 seconds to copy to the My Passport Wireless.

SD Card Backup In Use

On a recent ii week photography trip to the Rocky Mountains, I used the My Passport Wireless to create a rolling backup of all the images from my daily travels effectually Banff and Jasper. I usually shoot with CF cards, so the showtime change I made was to switch to SD cards. Every bit I mentioned earlier, you tin can't view Raw previews in the My Deject app so initially I switched to Raw+JPEG in order to be certain that my files were existence transferred. Later about 20 successful imports, I had the confidence to revert back to just shooting Raw though.

I set the bulldoze to re-create files automatically when the card was inserted and never had any issues with the import procedure at all. The My Passport Wireless provides incremental fill-in, so information technology won't re-create files over that it has already copied in a previous session. That ways y'all can utilize huge chapters SD cards to maintain a second re-create of your images, whilst incrementally adding to your difficult drive backup whenever the opportunity presents itself.

In this regard, the drive works incredibly well, and there was definitely some added peace of mind, knowing that my freshly shot images were already duplicated even if I hadn't yet had the take chances to go my laptop out and do a proper import to Lightroom. A lot of my photography specific trips have long days of shooting and at the end of a twenty-four hours I don't necessarily feel like setting up the laptop, drives and card readers. With the My Passport Wireless in my bag, I was able to shoot and backup without e'er feeling the need to deal with the laptop.

For a couple of reasons, I wouldn't go into a shoot with the intention of moving my images to the My Passport Wireless and then deleting the images from a full carte du jour to re-utilize information technology. Firstly, as the speed test showed, this isn't a fast style to go photos from a card. If you were relying on beingness able to motility them from the card in order to use it again, you could miss important opportunities while yous look for the files to copy. The 2d reason is that the solid state memory of your SD card is probable much more durable that the hard drive in the My Passport Wireless with its spinning disk and moving parts. I'one thousand e'er wary of that when I'm constantly on the move with my gear, every bit I was on this shoot.

These kinds of photography trips are always the existent test for me as I see how a piece of gear settles into my shooting workflow. Firstly, I wish the drive displayed a fleck more information on it. The two LEDs are designed to give you a variety of information based on what color they are and whether they are flashing, pulsing or continuously on. In the course of the trip, I had to refer to the transmission several times to decode exactly what information technology was these lights were trying to tell me. When one of them flashes white for case, it means the SD card is importing photos. Given that both lights can flash white at diverse times, and neither is labelled as an indicator for the bill of fare reader, yous can see how confusion can arise.

Once I became confident in the drive's power to backup my photos, I almost stopped using the app entirely since I could not view the Raw files. What I would have appreciated is a small LCD on the bulldoze that gave me more detailed information near the battery life and remaining drive chapters, likewise as an import progress indicator for the current SD card download. Some of that information is available if yous open the app, just this required connecting the devices over Wi-Fi and information technology felt a flake clumsy to take to do that just to get some basic information like that.

Afterwards a successful landscape shoot at a particular location, or a swell encounter with some of the amazing wildlife in the Rockies, I would put the SD bill of fare into the drive and leave it in my photographic camera bag while I drove to the next shooting spot. In once example after an aerial shoot from a helicopter, I was able to support those photos on top of a mountain before we flew back abode. After those kinds of once-in-a-lifetime shoots, it'south great to be able to create such an instant backup.

The battery life also proved to be excellent, and while I would top it up with a USB bombardment pack every at present and once more, I never really felt like I had to worry about the power levels also much. If you were looking for a fill-in solution for a very remote expedition, the drive could be charged using a solar ability choice such as those available from Goal Zero. Given my experience with the drive on my Rockies trip, I'd be confident in that kind of solution for a computer-less backup strategy.

Build And Immovability

The My Passport Wireless has a plastic casing that feels a lilliputian fragile for a drive that's designed to be used in the field and on the move. I don't like to carry gear with me that feels like I accept to infant it, and this definitely felt that way. In fact, at some unknown point during my fourth dimension testing this drive, the plastic casing did indeed develop a crevice. The drive remained fully functioning, just it simply underlined my initial impressions of the unit of measurement. This is a product that is, for many reasons, corking for travel. A bulldoze like that needs to be a little tougher and be able to better withstand being thrown in and out of backpacks and camera bags. On acme of that, the terminate of the plastic casing is hands scratched, leaving my test unit of measurement looking several years former subsequently just a few weeks on the road.

In decision

The WD My Passport Wireless is a nice idea that's let down a petty fleck by both hardware and software deficiencies. While information technology does everything that it sets out to do, it's not without fault and occasional speed-related annoyances. Information technology feels very much like a starting time attempt right at present, but it could become a truly excellent device with a lilliputian refinement and a 2nd iteration. Those who were hoping that this could exist a device to unload cards to, mid-shoot, will be disappointed. It's likewise slow for that so I wouldn't recommend relying on it in whatsoever situation where time is a gene. Anyone looking for off-the-grid SD carte backup on longer trips might merely find what they are looking for though. In that respect, it proved to exist reliable and extremely useful.

What nosotros like:

  • Intuitive mobile app
  • Decent bombardment life
  • Reliable SD card downloading
  • Wireless access to a huge collection of your images
  • Upload files to deject storage services from the My Cloud app

What we don't like:

  • Slow startup speeds
  • Slow SD carte du jour transfer speed
  • Tin can't exist used as a regular SD card reader when plugged in via USB
  • Minimal indication on the drive as to what information technology's currently doing
  • No 'Save To Photographic camera Roll' function on iOS
  • Could exist tougher