WD My Passport Ultra Review - Watch CNET's Video Review

WD My Passport Ultra review:

Compact, easy-to-use, and superfast

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Rating

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Excellent

Review Date: 5/15/13

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The good: The compact and good-looking WD My Passport Ultra offers fast data speeds,
has helpful bundled software, and comes in stylish color options.
The bad: At launch, the drive's suggested price is slightly higher than those of its peers, and
its 2TB-capacity model is not yet available.
The bottom line: The WD My Passport Ultra is one of the best portable drives you can buy
with software that makes backups fast and easy.
Looks aren't always important for storage devices, but they don't hurt, either, and in the case
of the WD My Passport Ultra, looks are a great bonus. This is because the drive has
everything else: fast performance, large storage space, and helpful bundled software.
The new drive is the successor to last year's similar-looking WD My Passport Edge. In my
testing, it's much faster than its predecessor. The Ultra offers up to 2TB of storage space,
comes with WD SmartWare backup software, and is available in four colors: titanium, red,
black, and blue.
At the suggested retail price of $100 for 500GB or $130 for 1TB (the price of the 2TB version
is not yet available), the My Passport Ultra seems slightly more expensive than its peers.
The drive's street price, however, is likely going to be lower, as was the case with the Edge.
The WD My Passport Ultra is one of my favorite portable drives for its fast performance,
large storage space, and its good looks. It's easy to recommend it, as it ranks among the
top drives on the market.
Drive type

2.5-inch external USB hard drive

Connector options

USB 3.0, USB 2.0

Available capacities

500GB, 1GB, 2TB

Capacity of test unit

500GB, 1TB

Dimensions (LWH)

4.34 inches by 3.21 inches by 0.5 inch

Weight

9 ounces

OSes supported

Windows 2000 or later, Mac OS 10.4 or later

Software included

WD SmartWare Pro, WD Utility, WD Security

Design and features

At first glance, the My Passport Ultra could easily be mistaken for the My Passport Edge. In
fact, other than the word "Ultra" in place of "Edge" on the casing, the new drive looks just
like its predecessor. The drive is very compact and light, but it also feels sturdy.

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WD My Passport Ultra Review - Watch CNET's Video Review

Unlike the Edge, which only came in titanium, the Ultra

also comes in three other colors: red, blue, and black.
(Credit: Dong Ngo/CNET)

The device has a Micro-USB 3.0 port on one side and comes with a foot-long USB cable.
This is the only cable you need; it handles both power and data functions. The Ultra works
with both USB 3.0 and USB 2.0, but if you want to get the best performance, you need to
use it with USB 3.0.
The My Passport Ultra is preformatted for Windows (NTFS), but it can be easily reformatted
for Macs (HFS+). The drive comes with the WD SmartWare backup program, as well as WD
Drive Utilities and WD Security. By default this suite works only with the drive it's bundled
with, but with the Ultra, you can upgrade to the Pro version for free. WD SmartWare Pro
works with all external hard drives, including those made by other vendors. With the My
Passport Ultra, you can activate WD SmartWare Pro two times on two separate computers.
Though not required to be installed for the drive to work, the bundled software package is
useful. WD Drive Utilities contains (as one might guess) utilities that enable you to check on
the drive's status, test its functionality, or even reformat it. WD Security lets you secure the
drive's content with a password. The drive supports strong encryption, and once you've
picked a password, the content is completely inaccessible if that password is forgotten. Both
WD Drive Utilities and WD Security are available for both Windows and Mac.

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WD My Passport Ultra Review - Watch CNET's Video Review

WD SmartWare now supports backing up to Dropbox.

(Credit: Dong Ngo/CNET)

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WD My Passport Ultra Review - Watch CNET's Video Review - page 2

WD SmartWare, on the other hand, is only for Windows. This is not a big deal; on a Mac,
you can just use Time Machine with the drive. Backing up data is very easy and intuitive job
with WD SmartWare. You can choose to back up folders and files, or it can automatically
back up important data, which is very useful for those who aren't as computer-savvy. With
the Ultra, WD SmartWare now supports backing up to Dropbox's online service (you do need
to have a Dropbox account of your own). In all, the backup software works very well. One
thing it doesn't do, however, is back up the entire system as an image for system recovery in
case the hard drive fails, or when you want to upgrade your computer to a new internal
drive.

WD Drive Utilities is helpful for managing your portable

drive.
(Credit: Dong Ngo/CNET)

Performance
I tested the 500GB and 1TB version of the My Passport Ultra and it performed very well with
both USB 3.0 and USB 2.0. The drive's 2TB version will not be available until the third
quarter of the year.
When used with USB 3.0, the Ultra scored 119MBps for writing (compared with the My
Passport Edge, which scored 83MBps) and 118MBps for reading (compared with the Edge's
98MBps). This is the fastest score among the USB 3.0 portable drives I've tested thus far.
When used with USB 2.0, the drive registered 27MBps and 33MBps for writing and reading,
respectively. These scores were above average for USB 2.0 drives.

http://reviews.cnet.com/hard-drives/wd-my-passport-ultra/4505-3186_7-35760678-2.html[5/15/2013 9:27:06 AM]

Where to Buy
MSRP:

$129.99
See manufacturer website for availability.

Set price alert

WD My Passport Ultra Review - Watch CNET's Video Review - page 2

Similar to the Edge, the My Passport Ultra worked quietly in my testing and produced no
vibration and almost no heat at all.

External hard drive USB 3.0 performance scores (in

megabytes per second)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
Read

Write

WD My Passport Ultra
117.87
118.5
Silicon Power Armor A15
112.09
113
IoSafe Solo G3
110.98
109.1
Seagate Backup Plus
110.1
90.9
Lexar JumpDrive Triton
112.19
90.8
Toshiba Canvio Desk
103.74
88.9
Silicon Power Armor A80
102.7
87.8
LaCie Minimus USB 3.0
104.9
87.7
LaCie FastKey
115.5
87.1
G-Drive Slim
100.3
86.7
Hitachi Touro Mobile Pro
103.5
86.2
WD My Passport (March 2012)
100.59
82.7
WD My Passport Edge
97.68
82.6
Seagate GoFlex Slim
101.9
82.4
Seagate 1.5TB FreeAgent GoFlex Ultra
89.7
78.8

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WD My Passport Ultra Review - Watch CNET's Video Review - page 2

HP Portable Hard Drive

83.65
69.4

External hard drive USB 2.0 performance scores (in

megabytes per second)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
Read

Write

Seagate 1.5TB FreeAgent GoFlex Ultra

41.9
28.8
Seagate GoFlex Slim
37.3
27.7
LaCie FastKey
36.6
28.8
LaCie Rugged Key
35.22
26.6
WD My Passport Ultra
33.67
28.4
Lexar JumpDrive Triton
33.13
28.8
WD My Passport (March 2012)
33.01
27.8
Seagate Backup Plus
33
28.74
Silicon Power Armor A80
32.8
28.8
G-Drive Slim
32.74
25.6
Toshiba Canvio Desk
32.71
25.8
WD My Passport Edge
32.69
25.1
Silicon Power Armor A15
32.64
26.4
G-Technology G-Connect
31.3
30.9
Hitachi LifeStudio Mobile Plus
30.9

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WD My Passport Ultra Review - Watch CNET's Video Review - page 2

29.8
Seagate BlackArmor PS 110
30
24.6

Conclusion
Topping my USB 3.0 testing charts, the aesthetically pleasing WD My Passport Ultra proves
that stellar performance can come in a very small package. The drive's helpful bundled
software also makes backing up data convenient even for novices.

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