Are compact hard drives just as good?

[Cybernettr]

I recently bought a WD 5TB My Passport hard drive for troubleshooting purposes. I was amazed at how compact this thing is, compared to the bricks I am used to. Almost six of these could fit in the space of my 10TB WD elements drive! I would guess these compact HDs are also available in 10TB or greater capacities.

I suppose they are intended for laptop users who travel, but I was thinking of how nice they are for anyone. My question is, are they as good as the larger HDs in terms of reliability, longevity, price, etc? I wouldn't mind paying a little more for such a sleek design. Added bonus: the HD appears to be powered via USB, meaning one less power brick I have to fumble with.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

I recently bought a WD 5TB My Passport hard drive ...My question is, are they as good as the larger HDs in terms of reliability, longevity, price, etc?

No, not even close. The low price and tiny form factor are a tipoff that these drives are a huge compromise.

The use of USB power instead of a power supply, and lack of fan or heatsink, mean that this drive is living on the edge with regards to power and thermal conditions, rather than what would be ideal for a rotating disk hard drive. It would be a very bad idea to use such a drive as a desktop hard drive turned on for long periods of time. It's not built to survive this.

Plus the tiny, low RPM (5400rpm) interal rotating disk hard drive mechanism that uses Shingled Magnetic Recording to achieve such high capacity for such a low price, guarantees that this drive will be slow compared to a regular desktop drive.

Choosing a backup drive | Carbon Copy Cloner | Bombich Software

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In addition, inexpensive external Western Digital-branded hard drives (of any design) in general have a horrible reputation with respect to reliability. I'm told by people in the know that they save money by not testing their products much, or at all, before shipping them out.

This drive is good for making quick saves or incremental backups while out and about with your laptop. I wouldn't trust it for anything else, or for data that was invaluable.

 

[krs]

No, not even close. The low price and tiny form factor are a tipoff that these drives are a huge compromise.

For drives that have been used in laptops for many, many years, also for the Mac Mini, you have some pretty strong words.
I have used both 3.5-inch externals by many manufacturers, all with external power bricks, and about the same number of 2.5-inch externals, mostly Seagate, with a USB 3 interface (for data and power) and I have had more failures with the 3.5-inch drives.
Turns out the failure was either the SATA-USB bridge or the board on the WD 3.5 inch drive, not the actual mechanical platters and heads, but still.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

For drives that have been used in laptops for many, many years, also for the Mac Mini, you have some pretty strong words.

You are conflating internal and external drives, and you are conflating 2.5-inch drive mechanisms. wherever they appear, with the specific one that I was referring to.

2.5-inch drives in laptops generally have either a heatsink, or a fan, or both, to cool them. They also have beefy power supplies to power them. The WD MyPassport provides neither.

Also, the WD drive mechanism that the OP has in his portable external drive has something new, and that is Shingled Magnetic Recording (SMR), as I said. Look at the link that I included.

The 2.5-inch drive mechanisms in Apple's laptops and the mini are quality pieces that had to meet Apple's specifications before Apple would accept them. They aren't great performers, but they are in a competely different league than the mechanism in the WD MyPassport that the OP has.

 

[krs]

I stopped using 2.5-inch WD a few years back when I found out they no longer use a SATA-USB bridge in those drives.
The few failures I did have with externals were always the electronics, by taking the drive out of the enclosure and connecting it directly via SATA I could always access the drive and retrieve all data.
Most 2.5-inch Seagate drives I use for backup are SMR drives - I write to them once and hopefully that's it until the next backup. It's just very convenient to not have that extra power brick.

 

[Cr00zng]

My external 2.5" drives are "custom" built, so to speak for backup purposes...

I get an internal 2.5" drive, usually Seagate, and a slim aluminum case with USB3.x interface. The external cases have better SATA-USB bridge than the WD/SG external drives. The cost of the better cases does make the custom built a bit more expensive, but well worth for me.