WD 1TB MyBook: 2.8 stars,
Every time I need to restart my computer, my WD MyBook 1TB model starts up with its loud noisy fan.

For about 5-10 minutes, it's blasting really loud for no apparent reason. It doesn't take that long to scan the contents of a hard drive or does it?

So after about 5-10 min. of loudness, it suddenly just "crashes" so to speak. I can hear the actuator arm slide back and I get the blinking blue light of "doom" (lol, yeah I know).

In XP, after you hear the drive completely shut off and crash, you will get a "read/write fail" error message. In Vista, you don't get that exact message. The drive just disappears completely from My Computer.

Some days, I will restart my computer and it will quietly work like it's supposed to. However, most of the time, it will just spin up and then crash.

I really like this product when it's working. If you leave it alone for long periods of time, it will eventually stay quiet without interruption. But if you restart your computer or turn it off and restart the drive itself, it will go berserk. Sadly, I need to leave it on at all times for it to work properly.

I'm literally about ready to throw this in the garbage. Too many times have I lost sleep at night because of its loud fan when Vista was patching and restarting itself.

And just today, I was so P.O.'d that I was looking for a replacement MyBook. Also, I'd like to point out that my other MyBooks are great, not hating on Western Digital, but this particular model simply sucks. I really like the new line of 1TB MyBooks that WD has put out recently. *Those* drives are actually quiet and simply work. Below is a link to the product I am speaking of:

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Just thought I'd vent this out. Hope this little review helps anyone else out there! =)

one year warranty
There is a fan inside the case and you have a one-year warranty... I would get the Studio II instead (five year as of this writing).

Vista users--read this
Overall---good device. Main problem - WD tech support - hard to understand when talking to them - called twice, had to wait about 20 min before talking to someone overseas. Instructions shows it works with Vista - which it does -- as long as you don't want to use the RAID software that allows you to split the drive in half and back up all data on the other drive. Tech said you must hook up device to a machine with XP and then set up in RAID 1 format - then rehook up to Vista machine. If you only hook to Vista - you will only be able to use it in full 1 TB mode. I recommend the device - just not their tech support. Also, couldn't get firewire 400 to work with Vista - had to use USB. The loud fan noise others mention only comes on when it first powers up ..and then it's on for only about 5 seconds. I paid 200 via the popular auction site.