Western Digital 250GB Passport Review
I am back again with another review, this time of Western Digital 250GB Passport External Hard Disk.
I had been thinking about buying an external hard disk from a long time due to lack of space on my HP DV6516TX laptop as it has only 160GB Hard Disk and my 2 mbps MTNL Triband broadband is quick to download loads of data in a single day.After researching a lot about external hard disks I zeroed in on this one mainly because of two reasons:
- It is a 2.5″ Hard drive and hence does not need external power
- It is one of the very few 2.5″ drives that come in 250GB capacity
Portability was one of the prime factors for choosing this drive and it lives up to that reputation and more as it weighs only 104 gms which is exceptionally light and can be carried around easily in pocket as it dimensions are also small.I bought the Glossy Black color to complement my laptop 
Some of the downsides include the outer surface is prone to oily fingerprints very easily thus making it hard to keep it shiny and also it develops scratches pretty easily.
The bundled package didn’t have anything much to say with just a USB cable being supplied along with the drive. it didnot even include a manual 
A soft copy of the manual is although available on the hard disk itself. The company didnot even care to give its customers a carry bag which is an absolute necessity for a portable product.
The setup was a breeze as it is a plug-n-play drive and was recognized easily by Windows Vista in a matter of seconds. The contents on the hard drive included Acrobat Reader setup and some Google goodies like Google Desktop and Picasa other than its proprietary synchronization software WDSync which requires installation on the hard disk to function.
Coming to the most important part ie. performance of the drive! The drive comes preformatted in FAT32 partition to make it compatible with both Windows and OS X. The formatted space available on the drive is 232GB.To gauge its performance I copied a 2GB file to the passport and it took 105 seconds to copy the file giving an average write speed of 20MB/s which is very good considering that it is a 5400rpm drive and works on USB 2.0. I formatted the drive with NTFS partition and repeated the same test again and got a write speed of 22MB/s second an improvement of 10%! To sum it up , it is not one of the fastest drives that can compete with Firewire drives available in the market but certainly offers excellent performance for a USB 2.0 drive.
Conclusion: The positives of this drive outweigh the negatives by a big margin hence making a very good buy.I cared less for the scratchy surface than the portability of the drive.I cared more for its USB powered interface than the performance of the bulky 3.5″ firewire drives that need a separate AC adapter. All in all this drive is worth buying if you need high storage capacity on the move at a decent price.Its price in India that I bought it for was Rs. 6750/- only.
My Rating: 
Popularity: 2% [?]
Dont agree… It may be a good product but certainly not value for money as Rs. 800/- for a 3.5″ SATA-II USB casing with a 500 GB SATA-II disk which is Rs. 4800/- makes it Rs. 5400/-..
Though it is bulky but for the purpose like small Notebook HDD need bigger storage it is my choice !!!
Choto Cheeta
10 Dec 07 at 5:12 pm
Ankur Hi Again,
1. Can you please check (using some diagnostic tool) what is the make of HDD in your 6516.
2. What is warranty on WD 250 gig thing.
I hope u see the point.
- Anil
Anil Kumar Sharma
14 Dec 07 at 2:06 am
@Choto Cheeta
You need to keep in mind other factors like portability which certainly make it value for money.
With 3.5″ ones you don’t need get mobility as you have to carry around the bulky AC power adapter along with it which is not always possible.
So it depends what you basically want: Portability or more storage !
@Anil Kumar Sharma
It is a 5400rpm Western Digital Hard Drive..Will check and tell if I can extract the info using some diagnostic tool.
It comes with 3 years limited warranty.
Ankur Gupta
14 Dec 07 at 2:04 pm
I am thinking of going for something like this as suggested by my hardware guy.
2.5% casing from LaCie
80 GB (or 160 GB) Hitachi Laptop hard disk. I don’t need too much storage. This is mainly for backing up important data.
This will cost me around 4.5k
I already have a HD casing in which I can fit in a desktop HD for 2k. But I will not prefer a desktop hard disk because it is not supposed to move around. I am apprehensive of some jerks spoiling the heads and then data, So looking for something that is little more robust.
Any suggestions?
Ashish Mehta
19 Dec 07 at 1:43 pm
@Ashish Mehta
If you are looking for storage of upto 160GB then a laptop HDD+casing will turn out the cheapest.
If you are looking for more than that then consider Western Essential Edition or Seagate FreeAgent Desktop drives.
Make sure you go for a good casing.BTW I don’t really trusts casings..personal opinion
Ankur Gupta
19 Dec 07 at 8:31 pm
hi ankur,
Even im planing to buy external hard drive, I have zeroed down with three choices
1)Seagate FreeAgent Go 160 GB
2)Iomega eGo Portable Hard Drive (160GB )
3)Western Digital Passport USB Portable Hard Drive (160GB, black)
but can you tell me the place where you hve brought ur external hard drive.
Keep me posted!!
Cheers
Nishant
Nishant
1 Jan 08 at 12:35 am
@Nishant
I would say choose between Seagate and Western Digital.
I bought mine from Nehru Place,Delhi.
Ankur Gupta
3 Jan 08 at 3:07 pm
hey ankur, cool article man. wht a co-incidence i just ordered 120 gb version of same hdd
it cost me rs 3600 from an online gadget portal. the 250gb one was for 7k.
btw i wanted 500 gb – but those would be electrical ones. was advised by friends that they arent safe as chances of data loss on electric fluctuations…
can u clarify whts a desktop hdd ? its uses electrical?
pretty confusing. even the electric ones say – “USB drive”
i really wish to have a 500 gb or even 1000 gb hdd to store all the movies i download from torrent
abhishek shah
13 Jan 08 at 10:25 pm
@abhishek shah
Desktop HDDs are 3.5″ drives which use AC power supply to work unlike 2.5″ ones which draw power from USB port itself.
Ankur Gupta
18 Jan 08 at 5:45 pm
hi ,
i am getting the same device for Rs.5500/- (converted) in manila,philippines.Should I go for it or you still think I should buy it in Inida? do let me know.
abhijeet
28 Feb 08 at 4:06 pm
@abhijeet
Please check if the warranty will be applicable here in India also.If it is then surely buy from there.Else I would suggest buy from here because warranty is an important part of sensitive products like external hard drive.
Ankur Gupta
3 Mar 08 at 7:59 pm
Hi ankur,
As i am in need of external hard disk drives, i was surfing the net i got ur website. Your description is good for “Western Digital 250GB Passport External Hard Disk”. Also i got some knowledge and difference about 3.5″ & 2.5″.
I am in need of more capcity external HDD’s (ie) 400 or 500 GB HDD’s, which will be good.It should be a portable, no external power supply, faster rpm.Please suggest me on this.
Also tell me if there is any websites where i can learn about HDD’s.
Thank You.
venkat
22 Mar 08 at 1:56 pm
Well you can also try the 320GB WD paortable one … the higher capacity drive you buy , the cheaper the storage gets.
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=387
sells for around 117GBP in the U.K.
Ishaan Prasad@IIITA
1 Apr 08 at 9:52 am
Have u had any problems with the drive?? the max operating temperature range for the drive is 35C… am interested in the MyBook Home edition. but there are many reviews on the net regarding how the drive fails within a few weeks of the 1 year warranty expiring…
any thoughts?
Amith
18 Jul 08 at 4:06 am
Hi Ankur,
I was browsing the internet for External HDD, and found Transcend 160Gb Portable Usb Hard Disk… and found it interesting… can u advice me on this as I am also planning to buy external HDD for my laptop imp data.
thanks.
Shaukat
8 Oct 08 at 7:46 pm
hi ankur
the price of 1TB hard drive(ext) is just 4500 in US.
pankaj kumar
4 Aug 09 at 12:24 pm
PLease do not compare nonsense seagate with Western Digital. Today the 320 GB passport drive is available for Rs 3200/- in India. If you do not like the passport HDD because of its glossy finish then buy WD Elements. It costs 2900/- for 320 GB.
Jeswin
2 Dec 09 at 1:27 pm