WD My Book Essential drive questions

[Olin K. McDaniel]

I just bought a new Western Digital USB external hard drive, 250 GB in
size, called "My Book Essential" and am trying to use it to store some
large backup files created with Nova Back, vers. 8 - I think. The
files are roughly 4 GB in size with extensions of .nb7, thus the
confusion on the actual version at the moment. These files are all on
an internal IDE hard drive, and the computer has Windows 2000 on it,
and it is claimed to be good for USB 2.0, with 8 such sockets. The
CPU is an AMD 3100+.

My problem is - these files seem to be taking FAR too long to copy
over, for what USB 2.0 claims to be capable of. That claim is for 480
Mb/s, which I believe should be the equivalent of about 40 MB/s. For
whatever reason these 4 GB files are consistently taking 75 minutes
to copy over, which seems absurdly too long for USB 2.0. It's more
like USB 1.0 or 1.1.

Has anyone else out there got any experience in this area, with this
"external" or "Essential" drive? The particular model number of this
one is WD2500D032 or the Order No. is WDG1U2500N. I've already plowed
around W.D.'s web site, their knowledge base, etc. and still do not
have an answer. Any help will be appreciated.

Olin McDaniel

 

[craigm]

I just bought a new Western Digital USB external hard drive, 250 GB in
size, called "My Book Essential" and am trying to use it to store some
large backup files created with Nova Back, vers. 8 - I think. The
files are roughly 4 GB in size with extensions of .nb7, thus the
confusion on the actual version at the moment. These files are all on
an internal IDE hard drive, and the computer has Windows 2000 on it,
and it is claimed to be good for USB 2.0, with 8 such sockets. The
CPU is an AMD 3100+.

My problem is - these files seem to be taking FAR too long to copy
over, for what USB 2.0 claims to be capable of. That claim is for 480
Mb/s, which I believe should be the equivalent of about 40 MB/s. For
whatever reason these 4 GB files are consistently taking 75 minutes
to copy over, which seems absurdly too long for USB 2.0. It's more
like USB 1.0 or 1.1.

Has anyone else out there got any experience in this area, with this
"external" or "Essential" drive? The particular model number of this
one is WD2500D032 or the Order No. is WDG1U2500N. I've already plowed
around W.D.'s web site, their knowledge base, etc. and still do not
have an answer. Any help will be appreciated.

Olin McDaniel

Are you running W2k with SP4? Do you actually have USB 2.0 drivers running?

 

[Ed Light]

According to HD Tach, my usb 2 enclosure with my Seagate Barracuda IV in it
communicates at 29 mb/s but the average serial read is 18. Out of the
enclosure the average read is in the 30's. I think that's pretty typical.
Can't say why.

You might download it and see what it says about yours.
--
Ed Light

Smiley :-/
MS Smiley :-\

Send spam to the FTC at
(e-mail address removed)
Thanks, robots.

Bring the Troops Home:
http://bringthemhomenow.org

 

[craigm]

According to HD Tach, my usb 2 enclosure with my Seagate Barracuda IV in
it communicates at 29 mb/s but the average serial read is 18. Out of the
enclosure the average read is in the 30's. I think that's pretty typical.
Can't say why.

You might download it and see what it says about yours.

Serial protocols have significant overhead. As you add an additional level
of complexity to the data transfer, the throughput goes down.

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

Serial protocols have significant overhead.

All protocols have overhead, serial just has more.

As you add an additional level of complexity to the data transfer,

You need more raw transfer speed (bus speed) to transfer the same
amount of user data.

the throughput goes down.

Nope, that only applies to the transfer rate ceiling.
That defines a maximum possible user data throughput for the bus.
If the needed raw throughput is more than the serial bus can deliver.
Everything below that fits within the available bandwidth and is not limited.

That does explain(?) the 29MB/s userdata transfer rate vs the 60MB/s
(480Mb/s) serial bus clock but doesn't explain the low average of 18.
Based on the average 35MB/s or so his drive can do externally that gives
you roughly 45MB/s on outer zones, 22MB/s on inner.

That should give you around (29+22)/2 = 26MB/s average.

 

[Olin K. McDaniel]

Are you running W2k with SP4? Do you actually have USB 2.0 drivers running?

I am running W2K with SP-4, but I cannot prove the USB 2.0 drivers are
running. How can I test for this?

Olin

 

[Olin K. McDaniel]

According to HD Tach, my usb 2 enclosure with my Seagate Barracuda IV in it
communicates at 29 mb/s but the average serial read is 18. Out of the
enclosure the average read is in the 30's. I think that's pretty typical.
Can't say why.

You might download it and see what it says about yours.

Where can I download it, or should I just do a Google search for it?

Olin

 

[Olin K. McDaniel]

All protocols have overhead, serial just has more.


You need more raw transfer speed (bus speed) to transfer the same
amount of user data.


Nope, that only applies to the transfer rate ceiling.
That defines a maximum possible user data throughput for the bus.
If the needed raw throughput is more than the serial bus can deliver.
Everything below that fits within the available bandwidth and is not limited.

That does explain(?) the 29MB/s userdata transfer rate vs the 60MB/s
(480Mb/s) serial bus clock but doesn't explain the low average of 18.
Based on the average 35MB/s or so his drive can do externally that gives
you roughly 45MB/s on outer zones, 22MB/s on inner.

That should give you around (29+22)/2 = 26MB/s average.

OK, on all that, except for my data. Unless I'm confused in my
rational between Mb/s and MB/s, for this thing to take 75 minutes
(which is 4500 seconds) to transfer 4 GB (which is 4000 MB), then I'm
only averaging less than 1 MB/s. Not your 22 MB/s at the slowest!!!
How about explaining this if possible.

Incidentally, my initial post was looking for some one who also owns
one of these drives, and checking their experience. Is there anyone
out there who can fit this bill and share observations?

Not to slander this drive too much, but I just found another negative
about it. I hooked it up to an older computer, subsequent to the work
described in my initial post, and let it do its installation of the
software existing on the WD MyBook drive. That includes some form of
a Google package, and the Picasa photo workup program. This older
computer has a dual boot with the choice of Win98SE and Win2000. I
let the MyBook do the same on both systems. Much to my dismay, the
Win98SE began running very jerkily on many, many applications,
including Windows Explorer. Even Win2000 was not behaving as well as
before.

So, I uninstalled those 2 packages from the Win98SE setup, and cleared
all traces from the Registry, and AMAZINGLY things returned to the
previously speedy behavior. Thus I find 2 strikes against this drive
from the start. Wonder what else is to come?

Olin

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

OK, on all that, except for my data. Unless I'm confused in my
rational between Mb/s and MB/s, for this thing to take 75 minutes
(which is 4500 seconds) to transfer 4 GB (which is 4000 MB),

then I'm only averaging less than 1 MB/s.

There's a very clear message in there for you.

Not your 22 MB/s at the slowest!!!

How about explaining this if possible.

What is there to explain? It's rather obvious.

Ding-Ding-Ding-Ding: USB1 ?

 

[Andreas Keppler]

I am running W2K with SP-4, but I cannot prove the USB 2.0 drivers are
running. How can I test for this?

Do you have a USB2.0-Cardreader for memory-cards?
(or a friend of yours!)

You can try if USB2.0 is running by reading a large File from a SD or
CF-Card (Highspeed) for example!

If you get more than 1 MB/sec, typically 3 to 5 MB/sec with a SD-Card,
USB2.0 is running!

---

I have a 250 GB Western Digital mybook pro connected via Firewire to
my computer and I get 20 to 30 MB/sec.

Better go and buy the cheapest FW-Controller for your Computer, it
will be much better and faster than USB2.0.

Oh, sorry! I forgot that you have the "essential my book" :-(

If you can return it and get a "pro", better do so!


Andy

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

Do you have a USB2.0-Cardreader for memory-cards? (or a friend of yours!)

You can try if USB2.0 is running by reading a large File from a SD or
CF-Card (Highspeed) for example!

If you get more than 1 MB/sec, typically 3 to 5 MB/sec with a SD-Card,
USB2.0 is running!

Which is perfectly attainable with USB too.
I would even go so far as saying that 30MB/s is low for FW.

 

[bxf]

There are no great solutions here, but you may want to have a look at
these:

http://groups.google.pt/group/comp....13a0de8?lnk=gst&q=bxf&rnum=3#3f4ecc6f113a0de8
and
http://groups.google.pt/group/comp....dda395b?lnk=gst&q=bxf&rnum=1#7d653fc56dda395b

Basically, I've found that my MYBOOK Essentials is impossibly slow if
it remains connected across a restart of Windows. That is, if the drive
is connected and I do a reboot without shutting down. When I find
myself in this situation, I have to fix it by using "Safely Remove
Hardware" then unplugging or replugging the drive, or by sending the
drive into STANDBY using WD's Spindown Utility. Actually, I can just
hit the power button the drive twice (OFF then ON), and that fixes it
as well.

I'd suggest trying " Safely Remove..." to see if your problem is the
same as mine.

Bill

 

[SHQ]

HEEEELP! I dont know how to start a new discussion thread so I use this
one. Hope its ok.

I have a WD 250 GB

This drive was working perfectly but one day my system refuses to
recognize it. He says its there but dont know what it is. No WD logo,
No "H:/" .. nothing. A systemreset as far back as a month does not
solve it. At the same time some other USB units does not work all the
time. Could be that I need to update my USB drivers but 5 hrs of
looking on the net at MS and Elitegroup does not solve it.

It does work on other computers but not mine XP.

I tried download drivers from motherboard, SIS but it does not work.
Something tells me I need USB 2.0 drivers to tell my system to get it.

I have also tried 10 other methods to get it working. Can anyone tell
me why it does not appear in explorer anymore?

 

[jeslpd-google]

OK, on all that, except for my data. Unless I'm confused in my
rational between Mb/s and MB/s, for this thing to take 75 minutes
(which is 4500 seconds) to transfer 4 GB (which is 4000 MB), then I'm
only averaging less than 1 MB/s. Not your 22 MB/s at the slowest!!!
How about explaining this if possible.

Incidentally, my initial post was looking for some one who also owns
one of these drives, and checking their experience. Is there anyone
out there who can fit this bill and share observations?

Not to slander this drive too much, but I just found another negative
about it. I hooked it up to an older computer, subsequent to the work
described in my initial post, and let it do its installation of the
software existing on the WD MyBook drive. That includes some form of
a Google package, and the Picasa photo workup program. This older
computer has a dual boot with the choice of Win98SE and Win2000. I
let the MyBook do the same on both systems. Much to my dismay, the
Win98SE began running very jerkily on many, many applications,
including Windows Explorer. Even Win2000 was not behaving as well as
before.

So, I uninstalled those 2 packages from the Win98SE setup, and cleared
all traces from the Registry, and AMAZINGLY things returned to the
previously speedy behavior. Thus I find 2 strikes against this drive
from the start. Wonder what else is to come?

I'm considering this drive myself and have learned it comes formatted
as FAT32. Also, that unless you reformat to NTFS it will be much
slower. This may be in addition to your possible USB 1 problem. In
general this series of drives gets very good reviews. Hope this helps...