Western Digital external drives : proprietary format?!?

[b4u]

Hi,

I need to ask a question about Western Digital external hard disks, and their "proprietary" format. Volume format, not physical dimensions .

I know a person that has a MyBook, and it just refused to work. So data was there, and he was shocked by the idea of loosing it.

He opened the box, took the WD disk, and connect it directly to an eSata port on the computer, with an appropriate cable.

Windows 7 refused to accept it, telling the format was unknown and requiring a drive format.

"D@mn! All data lost!" - he thought, but luckily, he picked another MyBook he had, opened it, removed the working disk and replaced with the supposely ruined disk. Connect it to windows, and all data was there ...

So this to show that putting the disk in another box allows data access, but raises a few questions in my mind:

Western Digital disks have a proprietary format?!?!?!? So if a box interface ceases to work, we cannot access data without another box around?

I have myself a Western Digital Elements, and een though it is not a MyBook, but just a basic product, do I have the same proprietary format?

Because when I bought it, I thought that if the USB interface circuit one day refuses to work, I could open the box and get a normal disk from it's inside, and just connect to my windows machine to access all data ... if it doesn't allow it this way, I'm better off getting another Western Digital Elements box just to make sure ...

Anyway, it's bad that a brand like Western Digital sells disks with proprietary format.


Thanks

 

[Gunbuster]

AFAIK there is not proprietary formatting specific to the USB bridge. Sounds like your buddy just sucked at hooking it up via ESATA, had a bad cable, or other unrelated ESATA issue.

I would think that trying a desktop pc internal sata and power connection would have been the logical choice, not voiding the warranty on another mybook. Next time dont panic and do some troubleshooting.

It is also possible the drive is having an intermittent problem. I would not trust it until diags were run on it and they come up clean.

 

[stargazr]

Yes they do have their own format - Advanced Format

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2888

http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/WhitePapers/ENG/2579-771430.pdf

 

[Zap]

Some WD external drives have proprietary connectors, so you can't take them out of the enclosure and hook them up to a normal SATA port.

 

[b4u]

As far as I know, he connected the disk into a drive bay that connects with USB, and he uses it often to other disks for backing up stuff.

It is a bit weird that they have proprietary format, maybe they have for the MyBooks that have the advanced feature of displaying disk capacity on the box itself (something I personally don't care nor pay for it).

I'm getting worried that my elements external disk has a proprietary format too, that will prevent me from recovering data if the box interface fails.

 

[mfenn]

Yes they do have their own format - Advanced Format

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2888

http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/WhitePapers/ENG/2579-771430.pdf

Not really, Advanced Format is just WD's branding of the industry standard 4K sector spec.

 

[Soundmanred]

Out of the many WD externals I've owned only one was unable to be removed was the 2.5" one. I've owned WED externals from 320GB to 2TB and all of them were eventually used as internal drives without any reformatting or anything special.