Western Digital My Passport Wireless SSD

amazon Western Digital My Passport Wireless SSD reviews

The Western Digital My Passport Wireless SSD is expensive, but the drive with this feature can do more than wirelessly transfer files.

Modern smartphones like the Samsung Galaxy S9 take stunning photos and videos, but if your life is constantly being recorded, you’ll find yourself running out of space on your phone to store all your photos and clips. That’s where portable hard drives come in, like the Western Digital My Passport Wireless SSD ($499), which lets you wirelessly transfer files from your phone.

Solid, no-frills

The advent of SSD-based external storage has led manufacturers to cram tons of gigabytes into small packages. To wit, the 512GB Adata SD700 measures just 0.5 x 3.3 x 3.3 inches (HWD) and weighs less than 3 ounces, and it’s not the lightest or smallest drive we’ve seen. However, this miniaturization trend doesn’t apply to wireless external drives, even those using SSDs like the My Passport. Partly because of its ruggedness and partly because it has to match the Wi-Fi antenna and accompanying hardware, this square drive measures 0.95 x 4.97 x 4.97 inches and weighs 15.6 ounces.

On its own, the drive feels sturdy, like it can withstand a few drops or falls, and indeed Western Digital claims that it can withstand shocks, vibrations, and drops of up to 1 meter (3.28 feet). That’s assuming you’re using the included rubber gasket, which adds a few millimeters of circumference in each direction.

The drive’s aesthetic is more about function than style, with large gray and orange rubber bumpers don’t have much of a design cue with a plastic cover, a completely different shade of gray, and the top covered in stripes horizontally.

Port selection on the backside includes a USB 2.0 port for charging phones and other devices and importing data from a USB stick and a data-out port for connecting to a computer or charging the My Passport Wireless SSD with the included USB cable 3.0. The power button and the second button that controls many functions, including starting SD card transfers and checking the battery level when the device is off, are also located on the rear edge. At the same time, you’ll find a full-size SD card slot on the right side.

The top of the drive has a few indicator lights. A row of four in the upper right corner can show battery level or data transfer status, while the two middle lights show Wi-Fi status and whether the drive is importing data. Well, this last light is redundant and probably unnecessary.

In addition to my review unit’s 1TB capacity, you can also choose 256GB ($229), 512GB ($299) or 2TB ($799) versions. Western Digital offers a standard two-year warranty.

Powerful software

When you first take the My Passport Wireless SSD out of the box, you’ll notice a paper card full of pictures explaining how to set it up with an Android or iOS device. I used the LG V30 to test it, as the Android version of the app has some features that the iOS version doesn’t, including Google Cast support.

First, you turn on the drive by holding down the power button for at least 2 seconds. Next, you download Western Digital’s My Cloud app from Google Play or the App Store to your mobile device. Then, connect your device to the drive’s Wi-Fi network and enter the password printed on the card. Finally, open the MyCloud app, tap through a few prompts, and it will eventually find the drive.

The process is easy enough, but you can’t do it in order, as the app won’t recognize the drive unless your phone or tablet is connected to its Wi-Fi network first. Once you’re done, there’s a comprehensive, even dizzying array of options for interacting with the drive. The first thing you’ll want to do is set up a Wi-Fi pass so your device can still access the internet; you do that by tapping the gear icon next to the My Passport entry in the app’s menu. In addition to changing Wi-Fi settings, you can also view the space occupied on the drive, remaining battery life, and options to start importing from a connected SD card or USB drive.

There’s a completely separate application settings menu where you can set up automatic syncing, define cache sizes, upgrade firmware, and set a password for the drive’s Wi-Fi network, among other tasks. It’s confusing at first, but it makes more sense when you consider that the same MyCloud app is also used to control other Western Digital wireless storage products, such as MyCloud Home.

Finally, you can use the MyCloud app to view everything stored on your My Passport Wireless SSD. Files are conveniently grouped into categories, such as Music, Videos, and Movies. In the Android version of the app, you’ll be prompted to choose the viewer you want to use to open each file. You can also download individual files to your mobile device’s internal storage for access when you’re not connected to the drive. Conversely, you can use the backup feature to automatically download files from your phone or tablet to the drive whenever it’s connected.

If you don’t have enough time to pull out your smartphone to use the app to transfer data from your SD card to your drive, you can use the physical button instead. Press this button for 2 seconds to start transferring and watch the battery LED “count up” to show progress.

Most of the app’s functionality is available in a desktop web interface that you can access on your Mac or PC. First, make sure your computer is connected to the drive’s Wi-Fi network, then type http://mypassport.local (on a Mac) or http://mypassport (on a PC) into your browser your web. If you plan to connect your drive to your home network, you can also use the web interface to configure it as a Plex media server. Popular among enthusiasts, Plex servers can stream local video files and more to other compatible devices on your network, including some smart TVs.

The obvious weakness of the web interface is not accessing files as easily as on the mobile app. To access the files on your computer, you’ll have to mount the My Passport Wireless SSD as a network drive in Windows Explorer or the Finder on Mac.

During an hour of playing with settings and viewing files on both the LG V30 and the Windows 10 laptop, the My Passport Wireless SSD’s 6,700mAh battery drained about 25%. Expect it to drain much faster if you also charge your phone or camera by connecting them to a USB 2.0 port.

where can you get a Western Digital My Passport Wireless SSD online

WD 500GB My Passport Wireless SSD External Portable Drive, WiFi USB 3.0, Up to 390 MB/s – WDBAMJ5000AGY-NESN: Buy it now

WD 500GB My Passport Wireless SSD External Portable Drive – WiFi USB 3.0 – WDBAMJ5000AGY-NESN (Renewed): Buy it now

A wired bottleneck

While the My Passport Wireless SSD is explicitly designed for wireless access, the fastest way to retrieve or send files is through a wired connection to your Mac or PC. In this respect, it’s unfortunate that Western Digital limits the drive to the USB 3.0 interface instead of including Thunderbolt 3. As a result, I measured read speeds of 370MBps and write speeds of 350MBps in the benchmark test by Blackmagic. That’s fine for transferring several gigabytes at a time; I was able to transfer the contents of our 1.2GB test folder in less than 4 seconds. But for larger transfers, you’ll crave Thunderbolt speeds. For example, the Samsung Portable SSD T5 recorded a read speed of 506MBps and a write speed of 477MBps using Blackmagic.

As a result, the SSD’s speed advantage is lost when it hits the USB 3.0 transfer cable’s bottleneck, meaning you’re paying for an expensive SSD without all the speed benefits. Fortunately, Western Digital offers a regular rotary disc version of the My Passport Wireless. The spinning platters mean it’s not too sturdy. Still, if you’re going to use it primarily at home, it’s a much better choice considering the 1TB capacity has a list price of $149 versus 499 dollars for the SSD version of the same capacity.

How much speed do you need?

There is a lot of functionality built into the Western Digital My Passport Wireless SSD. Its most obvious use is easily accessible storage to free up space on your smartphone, tablet, digital camera, or USB stick when you don’t have your computer. The SD card slot, Wi-Fi, and USB port can pretty much import data any way you want to send it, and the software’s robust functionality is a plus if you enjoy tinkering with setup menus. You can even use the My Passport Wireless SSD to charge your phone, and when you bring it home and connect to your home network, it can stream media files to any Plex-enabled device any.

Just make sure all those features appeal to you. As a plain old hard drive, the My Passport Wireless SSD is not a very good value $499 for 1TB of space is insanely expensive if you don’t need the speed of an SSD (and if you mainly transfer data over Wi-Fi, then don’t). So if you regularly upload and download terabytes of data from your external drive, you might be better off buying a Thunderbolt-equipped SSD instead, such as the Samsung Portable SSD T5.

Advantages

Durable, for sure.

Built-in SD card reader and USB port.

Plex support.

It can be used as a power bank.

Defect

Expensive.

Does not support Thunderbolt.