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Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Model number: WDH1U5000N | SKU: 8475063

This easy-to-use hard drive features 500GB of storage space for your digital photos, music, movies and more. Take a product tour.

Average Customer Rating:

3.9 out of 5

94 of 120 (78%) customers would recommend this product to a friend.

Customer Reviews for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Review 1 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

5.0 5

NOT ONE PROBLEM IN TWO YEARS 01/07/2009
By JeannieJ from Phoenix, Arizona

Value for Price

5.0 5

Ease of Use

5.0 5

Performance

4.0 5

Ease of Installation

5.0 5

What's great about it: Easy To Use
What's not so great: Interfers with Computer Hard Drive

"I use this everyday - 24 hours a day. I have never had any problems with My Book. I store images, files, folders and keep the heavy stuff off my computer hard drive. My Book works hard and has never let me down. Now, the only thing I have noticed is that sometimes it likes to run in the background and it slows me down on my computer. I just turn it off and get back to work. If I need My Book I turn it back on. This is great! Two years and not one problem....it’s a hard worker. I have abused it by taking it with me traveling and have stuffed it in a backpack and it always starts up and my info is there waiting for me. This is a great product and as a matter of fact going out to Best Buy tonight to buy the WD 650GB as my boss wants his My Book back. See Ya!"

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: Yes
Is this product used primarily for business?: Yes

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Review 2 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

2.0 5

Worked Excellent, and all of a sudden.... 12/07/2008
By Applebite from Corpus Christi, TX

What's great about it: Set up is easy, the price was affordable, easy to use
What's not so great: Not reliable after one year

"I bought this product in May 2007. It is now December 2008, and the hard drive has started dying. It has never been dropped or otherwise abused. I used it to store photos, movies, music, and as a back up to my pc. I got 19 good months out of this Western Digital. I'm relunctant to buy another Western Digital because most reviews mirror the experience I've had.

Since I can't afford a solid state external hard drive (which I've only found ones that cost thousands of dollars), I will look into the other big brands. Most experts will agree, though, that all hard drives will eventually die. So that's something to keep in mind. The computer geeks I've spoken with recommend backing up on disks because of this.

Also--thanks to Best Buy for posting all reviews and not just the positive ones as some sites do."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: No
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 3 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

2.0 5

Favorable Size/Ease - Poor Reliability 11/30/2008
By JSL19317 from Bethel Twp, PA

Value for Price

2.0 5

Ease of Use

4.0 5

Performance

2.0 5

Ease of Installation

5.0 5

What's great about it: Size and ease of set-up/update
What's not so great: Reliability

"The hard drive failed within 23 months of purchase, when stored in a proper environment and used in accordance with manufacturer instructions. (Warranty: 1 Year Only). It was a very disappointing ownership experience, especially since WD does not attempt to cultivate brand or existing customer loyalty by offering replacement drives at discounted pricing. I am very hesitant to buy WD again, despite its past brand reputation."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: No
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 4 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

4.0 5

Product good, software horrible 11/23/2008
By Wildlife1 from Springfield, MO

Value for Price

4.0 5

Ease of Use

2.0 5

Performance

1.0 5

Ease of Installation

4.0 5

What's great about it: External Drive is Great
What's not so great: Memeo software for 64 bit is horrible, beta test stage

"The hard drive performs great, the Memeo software and their customer support get a -10. The software has multiple problems with Vista and 64 bit processors and they do not officially have a software to use on it, they keep saying its beta only. Microsoft had to repair software registrations due to Memeos problems. DO NOT LOAD or USE the SOFTWARE on the drive. I have wasted untold hours with very poor Memoe Customer support."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: Yes
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 5 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

2.0 5

Quits after warranty expires. 11/21/2008
By ozsrq from Sarasota, Fl

Value for Price

2.0 5

Ease of Use

5.0 5

Performance

1.0 5

Ease of Installation

5.0 5

What's great about it: Easy to use when it works
What's not so great: Quits working after warranty expires.

"It was easy to set up and use. Imagine how safe I felt with all my IMPORTANT files backed up there. Whoops, one day soon after the warranty expired it stopped working. What good is the warranty anyway after you have lost all your data? So much for secure backup. If you go online for support they want to charge you for asking for help. Judging from these reviews this is not an isolated incident but the nature of the product. You need a backup for the backup etc...Shame on you WD for still sellling this garbage."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: No
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 6 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

1.0 5

Only lasted 15 months. This is My Book #2 dead 11/19/2008
By Linuxfurme from Rockville, MD

Value for Price

1.0 5

Ease of Use

5.0 5

Performance

1.0 5

Ease of Installation

5.0 5

What's great about it: Cheap, looks sleek and minimalistic, plug and play
What's not so great: Does not live long. Beware.

"I now have two dead My Book external USB drive. One is this model and the other is the much more expensive model with firewire and usb 2.0 Both lived slightly past their warranties and died. I thought WD was a brand that I could trust but I was wrong. I will buy some other brand. I wish I could find out what brand is reliable. That is all I want. Not the fastest, or smallest, or best looking. Just a rock solid drive. Who here knows?"

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: No
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 7 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

4.0 5

Decent 11/19/2008
By Tades from Spring Valley, NY

What's great about it: Simple plug & play interface, comes pre-formatted using fat32, capacity, whisper quiet, MEMEO back-up sw included.
What's not so great: Not that fast, MEMEO Autoback-up software requires $29.99 CD key to activate.

"I picked this up because our family picture and video files are piling up and this was on sale. I don't need a cutting edge hard drive, just a fairly large capacity and decent performance. I really like the included MEMEO software and its simple/intuitive menu BUT it ticked me off it's only a trial version and you need to pay $29.99 for the full privileges after 30 days when it should've been free that comes with the hardware. If you have Roxio or Nero, that would be a back-up alternative software. I heard a couple of people saying it went dead after a year or so-will have to wait and see if this device is reliable."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: Yes
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 8 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

1.0 5

My absolute LAST Western Digital! 11/18/2008
By jmw29406 from Hanahan, SC

Value for Price

1.0 5

Ease of Use

4.0 5

Performance

1.0 5

Ease of Installation

5.0 5

What's great about it: Easy to install and use
What's not so great: Crapped after 4 months, lost massive data

"I bought this on sale, figuring it was a good about of storage for the money. Then, without warning, it died. The PC sees a WD something attached but can't access a thing. 1500 + photos....gone! Close to 40 gigs of MP3s....gone! These included many obscure, rare tunes that are nearly impossible to find. Being on fixed income, I can't afford a fancy recovery service. I am sooooo screwed!

Thanks, Western Digital! My next purchase will be a Maxtor!"

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: No
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 9 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

1.0 5

Short Lifespan - 14 months. 11/08/2008
By Redbeardracer from Kansas CIty

Value for Price

1.0 5

Ease of Use

3.0 5

Performance

1.0 5

Ease of Installation

3.0 5

What's great about it: when it worked, it was good.
What's not so great: Only lasted 14 months.

"Drive failed after 14 months. (Warranty is 1 year.) I was pleased with the drive until it failed, but I certainly expect longer life than this. I never moved it around, it just sat on the desk next to the monitor, so I don't believe any external forces or impacts contributed to its short lifespan.

Disappointing product."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: No
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 10 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

1.0 5

Even my replacement drive failed 11/06/2008
By markl from Wellesley, MA

Value for Price

1.0 5

Ease of Use

4.0 5

Performance

4.0 5

Ease of Installation

4.0 5

What's great about it: Nothing stands out
What's not so great: The drive failed: the replacement also failed

"I bought a 500GB MyBook which failed under warranty after less than a year. I got a hassle-free replacement - though I lost all my data. Now today, the replacement drive failed. Hmmmmm. 100% failure rate. This time I did not lose any data because I only used it for backup and temp files. I recommend to avoid storing data on MyBook drives and, if you do, back up all the time. BTW, there was no warning to the failures. The physical disk simply disappeared from the Disk Manager."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: No
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 11 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

4.0 5

A nice external hard disk 11/04/2008
By Ben51424

Value for Price

4.0 5

Ease of Use

5.0 5

Performance

4.0 5

Ease of Installation

5.0 5

What's great about it: Fine price, easy to carry around
What's not so great: Transporting files can be slow sometimes

"This is a very neat external hard drive. Its design saves a lot of room and allows you to carry it around easily. It is easy to set up; all you have to do is plug it into the computer. It also has a good price. However, the speed of transporting files can be slow sometimes. But overall speaking, it is a great deal."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: Yes

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Review 12 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

5.0 5

Dependable Backup Device 11/04/2008
By Anonymous Reviewer from San Antonio, TX

Value for Price

5.0 5

Ease of Use

5.0 5

Performance

5.0 5

Ease of Installation

4.0 5

What's great about it: Inexpensive and dependable
What's not so great: If you want to use windows backup you need to reformat the drive in NTFS

"I use these drives external storage and for backup drives for my customers servers. I have used Western Digital drives for years and they continue to be the most reliable drives I have found. As stated above if you want to use windows backup you need to reformat the drive in NTFS otherwise you will only be able to backup 4GB then the backup will fail. If you want to use the software that came with the drive make sure you copy it before you reformat the drive."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: Yes
Is this product used primarily for business?: Yes

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Review 13 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

2.0 5

don,t buy 11/02/2008
By wexwimpy from FL,New Port Richey

Value for Price

3.0 5

Ease of Use

3.0 5

Performance

1.0 5

Ease of Installation

3.0 5

What's great about it: its big and when its working is nice
What's not so great: can,t read or write date,slow,

"Can read or write date to hard drive rma back to WD"

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: No
Is this product used primarily for business?: No

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Review 14 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

5.0 5

Tons of room 11/01/2008
By Xiro from SD, CA

Value for Price

5.0 5

Ease of Use

5.0 5

Performance

5.0 5

Ease of Installation

5.0 5

"Hooked it up, and it was ready to go. It has more room than I need. I just needed it for transferring files for another computer and it did its job, and fairly quick. Great hard drive"

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: Yes

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Review 15 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

5.0 5

500 GB Westbook 10/21/2008
By slj812000 from DeKalb, IL

Value for Price

5.0 5

Ease of Use

5.0 5

Performance

5.0 5

Ease of Installation

5.0 5

What's great about it: Very easy installation, good price for the size.
What's not so great: None so far

"Westbook came highly recommended by my nerd friends, so I sought out the best size for the price and came up with the 500 GB. Insert CD and let 'er rip. Installs itself with just a few clicks and helps my laptop run much faster. Definately would recommend this to others."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: Yes

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Review 16 for Western Digital My Book Essential 500GB External USB 2.0 Hard Drive

Customer Rating

5.0 5

Easy to Use 10/20/2008
By GeekSquad4Hire from Christiansburg, VA

Value for Price

5.0 5

Ease of Use

5.0 5

Performance

5.0 5

Ease of Installation

5.0 5

What's great about it: Install and forget about it.
What's not so great: N/A

"I purchased this hard drive with low expectations, but was pleasantly surprised with it's performance."

Would you recommend this product to a friend?: Yes

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