Western Digital's My Passport Studio external HDDs

Amongst the editors bullpen of a gadget blog, there can surely be no shorter straw drawn than the requisite, soul-killing USB external hard drive post. Who the hell cares? Just go to Best Buy and pick one up, they're basically all the same.

But Western Digital's My Passport Studio brand of portable hard drives are actually something I can use. Advertised as "Mac-ready storage to go," these diminuitive drives are little larger than a set of car keys and come in sizes up to 320GB. But hey, they managed to fit in both USB and Firewire connections into the thing. Self-powering USB and Firewire connections, no less. And it's even Time Machine ready.

I could actually use this. My first Gen MacBook Pro has a tiny 80GB hard drive. My iTunes library, on the other hand, is 300GB, meaning I never have my music or videos with me when I'm on the road. Amazingly, this might be just what I am looking for. Even better, a chance to burst the hymen of my MBP's dusty, shriveled and completely unused FireWire port. Neat.

My Passport Studio [Western Digital]

[#1 posted by w000t , May 21, 2008 1:33 PM]

One strange design choice for this:

"Capacity Gauge - Connect My Passport to your computer and see at a glance how much space is available on your drive."

This would be great if it worked without plugging in (some kind of bistable indicator?), but if I connect it to a Mac, it is trivially easy to see capacity remaining through the OS.

[#2 posted by things , May 21, 2008 7:09 PM]

'time machine ready'? Doesn't time machine work with any internal/external drive?

[#3 posted by historyman68 , May 22, 2008 12:07 AM]

"burst the hymen of my MBP's dusty, shriveled and completely unused FireWire port."

ew. okay, you win.

[#4 posted by jimkirk , May 22, 2008 7:20 PM]

"...these diminutive drives are little larger than a set of car keys..."

3 by 5 by 0.7 inches, someone has some giant car keys!