I just purchased an My Book Essential and I am very confused in how to use it. I brought it just wanting to store some files from my computer to save hard drive room. After looking at the software instructions for “WD SmartWare” it looks like this drive is made more to back up my entire hard drive. Well this is not what I want to do. I purchased this Hard drive to simply Drag and Drop a few files from the drive on my computer for later use, and thats it. Is this drive capable of doing this? Do I have to install the software? I did drag and drop 1 folder to see what would happen, but I am too worried to store anything else. I am worried because after reading the manual. No where does it say that the drive is to be operated by Dragging and Dropping. It only gives instructions to operate it using the software.
Please let me know because I have to say this product so far is nothing what I expected. I do not need to back up my computer, and I definitely don’t want any software continuously working in the back ground. My computer has enough strain on it already. I simply want to Drag and Drop a few folders. Thank you.
You do NOT have to use SmartWare to use the drive. You CAN drag and drop directly into the drive. If you have installed SmartWare, you can uninstall it if you want. Also, just ignore the SmartWare VCD.
Thanks for the advice. I’ve been using this hard drive for about two weeks now and so far so good. But the instruction manual should be more specific about drag and dropping files to the hard drive. There is only one sentence in the entire manual that says you can use the hard drive without Smartware. And it does not give any instructions on how to use it without the Smartware. For the not so computer literate people in the world, the manual reads as if the Smartware option is the best and only way to use this hard drive.
Thats my only gripe. Put more instruction details on drag and dropping since that is what most people are going to be using it for. Other than that its been great so far. Thank you
My question is somewhat similar. I know you can retrieve files from the WD external drive and this thread seems to say if I uninstall the WD software I can drag and drop files and/or use Windows Backup.
Can I drag and drop files if WD Smartware is installed?
Can I view backed up files if I use WD Smartware? Or can I only retrieve them? I have tried to look at the backed up files and they appear to be compressed or in a special format (maybe to allow for incremental backups of only changed files?) I’d feel better if I could “see” my pictures backed up on the external drive.
I am probably missing understanding the general concept of the WD software. I have a Passport I use for work only as extra storage, not for backup.
Yes, you can drag and drop files if WD SmartWare is installed.
Yes, you can view your backed up SmartWare files by navigating down through the SmartWare folder on the drive without using retrieve. However, depending on which version of SmartWare you are using, you file and folder organization may be different. Support always recommends upgrading to the latest version. But that’s up to you.
I am having the same issue!! I tried the drag and drop method, but when I look at the WD software the folders still show to be on my desktop and nothing shows to be in the external drive. However when I look in the f/ drive(External) thru the My computer icon the files show to be on the external drive. Now which one do I trust, the computer or the External drive software??? Am I doing something wrong??
You’re not using any kind of software when you drag and drop files. Also, when you drag and drop from one drive to another, it does a copy not a move. So, you will have the files/folders in both places. Read Microsoft’s explanation in the link below to make sure you’re doing it correctly.
QUESTION: What must I do to my 500 gig My Book Essential to basically fdisk it then reformat it? Have XP Pro Last Sp installed. What drivers do I need to have my dell E6500 talk to My Book Essential via Windows. What WD “tools type” software ie diagnostic, formatting, etc. must I download from what address???
There is nothing you need to do in order to repartition and format it. You can simply do this as you normally would with your operating system. You will need USB Mass Storage device drivers to use the My Book Essential with any operating system, and these are included with Windows, Mac, and Linux and are not provided by Western Digital.
We do not produce formatting software because this is a job for your operating system, but if you would like to diagnose a drive you can use the Data Lifeguard Diagnostics tool available from the following link:
I too have just bought ‘my book essential’: the empty box keeps looking at me, ‘take me back’!
I installed the drivers and WD smartware. After 30 minutes of registering etc the smartware refused to upload. I uninstalled, re-installed it, and everthing was fine. I allowed it to back my entire pc over the course of about 6 hours. All seems ok. I came out of the software. I then went in again… nothing, ‘encountered a problem and needs to close’
When I look on ‘my computer’ the drive is visible, with 487MBytes free (500MB drive), where’s my backup of >200MB.
So I try to drag and drop, no chance, the drive is read only?!!
Judging by the number of viewings against this post, there seems to be a profound mis understanding from the customers about how to use this hard drive. May i suggest a complete rewrite of the software!!
I too have just bought ‘my book essential’: the empty box keeps looking at me, ‘take me back’!
I installed the drivers and WD smartware. After 30 minutes of registering etc the smartware refused to upload. I uninstalled, re-installed it, and everthing was fine. I allowed it to back my entire pc over the course of about 6 hours. All seems ok. I came out of the software. I then went in again… nothing, ‘encountered a problem and needs to close’
When I look on ‘my computer’ the drive is visible, with 487MBytes free (500MB drive), where’s my backup of >200MB.
So I try to drag and drop, no chance, the drive is read only?!!
Judging by the number of viewings against this post, there seems to be a profound mis understanding from the customers about how to use this hard drive. May i suggest a complete rewrite of the software!!
We no longer make 500 MB drives, so I’m assuming that you have a 500 GB drive. Once formatted it should yield about 465 GB’s of useable space. Installing, uninstalling, and re-installing can cause issues if you don’t reboot in between. Also, if you don’t have all your Windows/Mac updates done, then you may have issues. You also need to have minimumly .NET framework 3.65. If you don’t think you will be satisfied with SmartWare, then you can uninstall it, and just use the drive as a typical external drive. You can also use it with any third party software.
I can drag all files except one. It is a home movie file that is 18 gb. I drag it and it tells me that the file is to big for the destination file, but I still have over 250 gb left free on the drive.
Do you know what is happening and how I can fix it?
My hard drive is basically a paper weight! I tried uninstalling the software but I keep getting a -36 error saying I don’t have the permission to read or write the file how can this be I took the pictures and i recorded the video so I am pretty sure I have permission!!! This is beyond frustrating any help will be much appreciated
