If you are thinking of purchasing a new external hard drive, then you may want to consider a few benefits that come with the Western Digital Elements line. Many people like these drives because of their low price, but there are some cons that you should know about before making your final purchase decision. You can read more about the advantages and disadvantages of this brand of external hard drive in this article. This information will help you decide if this brand of drive is right for your needs. In fact, just a few minutes of research online can provide you with all the information you need to make an informed decision about this product. After reading this brief article, you should be able to determine if this brand of drive is right for you or not.
One of the biggest advantages of Western Digital Elements is that they are extremely affordable. This means that you can get tons of storage for a very reasonable price. However, you will have to contend with a slow spinning hard drive, and a strange shroud that does not inspire much confidence. That is certainly true for many inexpensive external hard drives made today, but Western Digital does not appear too interested in going against the norm.
With this in mind, we can begin to look at some of the cons associated with the brand. One of these is that this is only available in a high capacity format. While it is true that the lower capacity drives are less reliable than the higher powered ones, the flip side is that they are also less expensive. In some cases, this may end up being a trade off that you cannot afford. It may be that you need the data on these less reliable drives more than the higher powered USB 3.0 drives. If this is the case, then you should definitely look for an external hard drive that uses a high capacity format.
Another problem that you may run into is compatibility. The drives are compatible with most of the leading brands, including SanDisk, PATA, and SMART. However, all three of them use different interface standards. This means that if you want to back up your data to an external hard drive using one of these brands, you may have trouble doing so. If you are using a USB 3.0 interface drive, this is no big deal, since the interface is not going to be affected.
If neither of these two issues applies to you, then you are likely looking for high performance hard drive utilities. Western Digital is known for providing both, and for good reason. Their drive utility software is very efficient, and it works well with both FAT and NTFS partitions. You can also expect automatic backup software to be included in the package.
If you need software that will manage a Windows domain, then you will find that Western Digital’s suite of hard drive utilities is ideal. You can create a user account, add disks and storage devices, and work with users and groups. The utilities also include a detailed report about what is on each disk. If you need more control over your storage management, then Western Digital also provides that as well.
If you have problems with the drive’s performance, then you need software that has been designed to work with problematic hardware. This software can fix many of the problems that you are experiencing, including slow performance and power outages. It can even recover files that have been corrupted by a virus. There are a number of advantages to using this software, and you will see just how useful they are when you need to restore your computer.
Western Digital offers both software and free downloads of its utility software. You can choose the software that works best for you and then download it. No software is perfect, but Western Digital’s software comes extremely close to being so. In fact, the software utility is so good that it may even replace the need for a backup drive or other hard media storage device entirely.