My Passport Essential SE and JVC camcorder

Can anyone help me with my JVC camcorder HD620 Everio, as it cant detect the external hard drive, even with the correct cables.

It probably doesn’t like the unlocker VCD and is expecting a bare drive to be attached.

Another customer with VCD problems !

Another customer who was not well informed by WD before buying the product (information about the 

product’s abilities and limitations, outside of the containing box).

Another customer who will be probably blamed by someone here that “it is your fault”.

To Oostie : Please read the locked topic “Remove the VCD from my drive” .

akala wrote:

Another customer who was not well informed by WD before buying the product (information about the 

product’s abilities and limitations, outside of the containing box).

"_ Compatibility _

  • _ Formatted NTFS _
  • _ Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 _
  • _ Requires reformatting for Mac OS X Leopard, Snow Leopard  _ "

I don’t see anything saying it would work connected to a JVC camcorder.  Instead of printing a list of what it _ will _ work with, it’s unreasonable to expect a list of everything it _ won’t _ work with.

RoofingGuy wrote:

 


akala wrote:

Another customer who was not well informed by WD before buying the product (information about the 

product’s abilities and limitations, outside of the containing box).


 

 

"_ Compatibility _

  • _ Formatted NTFS _
  • _ Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 _
  • _ Requires reformatting for Mac OS X Leopard, Snow Leopard  _ "

 

 

I don’t see anything saying it would work connected to a JVC camcorder.  Instead of printing a list of what it _ will _ work with, it’s unreasonable to expect a list of everything it _ won’t _ work with.

    • *>

The Crucial information that is missing is that there is a PERMANENT and UNREMOVABLE Partition (The VCD).

This is causing all the problems and there is NO information about its existence (and the limitations because of its

existence).

But it causes absolutely no problems with systems on the compatability list.

It only causes problems if you decide to ignore the list, and go ahead and try to use it connected to something it was not designed (or stated) to be compatable with.

Guess what…

My TV won’t work with a PAL signal!!!  Toshiba never told me it wouldn’t!!!  Sure, they did tell me in the specs that it would work with NTSC, but they never told me that it wasn’t compatable with PAL.  It’s _ their fault _ that I can’t watch PAL on that tv like I wanted to.  I bought it for watching PAL, and they didn’t give me the crucial information I needed!!!

RoofingGuy wrote:

But it causes absolutely no problems with systems on the compatibility list.

 

It only causes problems if you decide to ignore the list, and go ahead and try to use it connected to something it was not designed (or stated) to be compatible with.

 

 

Guess what…

 

My TV won’t work with a PAL signal!!!  Toshiba never told me it wouldn’t!!!  Sure, they did tell me in the specs that it would work with NTSC, but they never told me that it wasn’t compatible with PAL.  It’s _ their fault _ that I can’t watch PAL on that tv like I wanted to.  I bought it for watching PAL, and they didn’t give me the crucial information I needed!!!

What a bad example (and comparison) !!

A TV is a consumer product for the general public and everybody knows that there is a different system for every country. EVERYBODY knows that.

On the other hand a hard disk (especially an external hard disk) is a dynamic PC component which you expect to freely and easily move  from one place to another, format in different  formats (Fat, Fat32, NTFS ,ext4 etc), read and write files in it etc.

The existence of a permanent partition is creating all the problems, especially as it happens to be the 1st partition.If a company decides to restrain the capabilities of a hard disk by creating a PERMANENT PARTITION this is a very important issue and the customer MUST BE INFORMED before he buys the product. 

THIS IS A CRUCIAL INFORMATION and it should be clearly written upon the containing box (in addition to all the other information).

So Guess What…

If a company doesn’t respect its customers probably customers will not respect the company either.

akala wrote:

 

What a bad example (and comparison) !!

 

A TV is a consumer product for the general public and everybody knows that there is a different system for every country. EVERYBODY knows that.

 

Au contraire, mon ami.

My first monitors, Commodore 1701, would work fine whether you gave it an NTSC or a PAL signal, either composite or luma/chroma.

My next monitors, Commodore 1902, would work fine whether you gave it an NTSC or a PAL signal, either composite, luma/chroma, or RGBI.

My next monitors, Commodore 1084s, would would work fine whether you gave it an NTSC or a PAL signal.  I could switch my Amiga back and forth between NTSC and PAL all day long, and the monitor would just adapt to whatever CVBS, S-VHS, or RGB signal it was being sent at the time.

So, when I went to buy a TV set, there was nothing in my experience to indicate that CVBS into other display devices wouldn’t auto-adapt to whatever you fed it, regardless of where you lived and what the nominal system was for that area.  That’s just the way things have always worked for me.  Isn’t that the exact same as your argument about how the Passport you bought should have worked with your PVR, despite nothing indicating it would, just because previous drives would have?

Or, are you saying that the specs actually MATTER and that it’d be stupid to just ignore the specs and go by what other devices have done in the past, without looking into the new specs and what they actually mean and what the new devices capabilities are and aren’t??  Would it to be stupid to just buy the first thing you see without researching your purchase?

“Gee… I wonder if there’s a reason why WD makes a separate line of drives, expressly for connecting to PVRs?  Surely every drive they make must automatically work…”

I’m perfectly sure WD has fulfilled all the legal formalities and that what they write on the box of their products has been checked by a whole team of specialized lawyers. But that is not the matter, is it?

The matter is that 95% of consumers are normal people, not experts, and when they buy a hard drive, they expect it to be a standard pkug and play hard drive, unless the box says in big letters on the front

THIS IS NOT A STANDARD PLUG AND PLAY HARD DRIVE

I bought a My Passport Essential SE thinking it was a standard drive and it isn’t. It fails to work in several environments (MS-DOS, my car, some media players, etc, etc, etc). Even is Windows XP it crashed seveal formating software when I was trying to format it in FAT32 to use with my PS3. The shop didn’t accept it back because there was technically nothing wrong with it and I’m stuck with a useless drive for which I paid 90 euros. I had to go to the shop and buy another drive from another brand.

 

WD may have all the formal arguments of their side, but I haven’t bought any WD products after I bought this drive and I will never again until someone gives me back my 90 euros or swaps this drive by a standard one. I was last week in a shop wanting to buy a USB 3.0 portable drive and I didn’t because they only had a WD one.

 

WD wins in the courts I win in the shop.

Pedro wrote:

THIS IS NOT A STANDARD PLUG AND PLAY HARD DRIVE

Right… and it COSTS MORE than a standard pnp simply BECAUSE it has non-standard extra features.

The bare pnp drives next to it on the store shelf are cheaper.

So, why pay extra for features that will prevent you from using it?  Why not just pay less and buy the drive you want that _ will _ work for you?

Because it was the only portable drive in the shop that had 750 GB. That’s why I thought it cost more.

Obviously it never occurred to me that it cost more because it couldn’t be used in situations where other drives can be used.

I have nothing against niche / specialized products, provided it says clearly on the front of the box that they are specialized products.

But the fact remains that WD has lost more from em than the 90 euros that were stolen. Some months ago I bought a network NAS storage with 2 drives inside. WD could have been a contender for my money. It wasn’t. I just can’t trust what they write on their boxes

RoofingGuy wrote:

 

The bare pnp drives next to it on the store shelf are cheaper.

 

So, why pay extra for features that will prevent you from using it?  Why not just pay less and buy the drive you want that _ will _ work for you?

Exactly. Here is the problem.

WD does not inform its customers about these “extra features”. More precisely WD nowhere mentions anything

about VCD or the existence of a PERMANENT  1st PARTITION (as VCD really is).

A company misinforming (or not clearly informing) its customers about the characteristics of a product may have both legal and marketing problems.

But that’s where you’re still trying to twist things to try and put yourself in the right, akala.

The drive is perfectly functional with any of the systems that WD lists it as being compatable with.

It’s up to the consumer to check compatability, and it’s the consumer’s risk to try and use it in any situation not known to be compatable.

You’re still saying that instead of saying “the drive will work on…” you essentially want them to change the list to “the drive will not work on…” and provide a much larger list.

And the main problem with doing things that way, is then then WD is in trouble everytime something not on the “incompatable” list on the box is released after the box was printed… because the box doesn’t say it won’t work with the new doohickey, and you get a whole new round of “you never said it wouldn’t work with…”   There probably isn’t even enough room on ten boxes to list EVERY device that it won’t work with.

It’s far easier to just list what it _ will _ work with.  And, admittedly it looks better for any company to say “will work with…” than “won’t work with…”.  Even cars do that.  A high compression engine will tell you that you need a minimum of 89 or 91 octane (or whatever).  The car manufacturer doesn’t say that the car won’t run properly on standard 87 octane.  It’s sufficient to say what it will work on, both legally, and from a benefit-of-the-doubt customer intelligence standpoint.  It’s reasonable to assume that most owners won’t try running it on 87, or at least won’t be surprised that it runs poorly if they do.

So, if the owner does put 87 into it, the owner can cry “you didn’t say it won’t work on 87!!!” all they want, and be speaking the literal truth, but their complaints are going to fall on deaf ears except for anyone else who did it and jumps in with “that happened to me too!!”   Everyone else will just shake their heads and ask “well, what did you expect??”

The whole subject is so simple that there is no need for comparisons with TVs or cars etc.

If only WD had upon the containing box something like :

“VCD included - Permanent Partition for encryption” or something like that, everything would be fine and very clear to every customer.

If you produce something for special purposes or “with special features” as you say, it is very important to inform the customer BEFORE he buys your product (and not ask him to be informed from the Internet or return it back for some other “plain” disk).

Bottom line. There is a problem. So many people complaining about the same reason. JUST SEARCH THE INTERNET. All of them are wrong ?

Thank you for your time.