The World Thru My Eyes - I speak my mind and man does it like to talk.
Published on February 2, 2010 By CharlesCS In Gadgets & Electronics

As far as I'm concerned Western Digital will be known to me as Southern Digital as my like for their products has gone down every time I come across one of their new products.

First it was their drives. While I commend them for going Green, I want my normal 72000 RPM drives. I have a hard time finding these drives in stores and those that i do find are expensive compared to previous models. I just don't want to deal with slower drives. I will be building a new PC in a few months and I see Seagate or other brand drives filling i where WD once ruled on my PCs.

Then it was the WD TV Live (and other versions). I thought this was the coolest gadget I had found but it turns out there are several other media players with similar or better features that work better. I read far too many complaints about this particular media player and WDs terrible firmware updates. I got myself one of a different brand once I did my homework on many of them.

But WD did not stop there. They then decided that you were not smart enough to use their external drives so not only did they put software on the external drives that would automatically run and create virtual drives without asking, but they put it as firmware, built into the chip of the interface as oppose to installed on the drive itself as software so that you could not uninstall it and sometimes not even disable it. Of course after some complaints they did updates to change the disabling issue but why wait for complaints that would obviously come? I already found an alternative, my new external drive was from HP. Cheaper, with good reviews and no uninstallable software. And don't get me started on their new 1TB Passport drive which not only has this software built into the firmware but they also made it so you could not remove the drive and use it on another external case or even on a laptop since their welded the interface right on to the drive. Sorry, I'll wait for the 1TB laptop drive (any brand) and just get an external case (or use the one I already have).

I remember when Western Digital was the best according to most people I spoke to. It's sad they decided that they should control everything we do with their products. Products we paid for. I don't understand why all these companies all of a sudden feel that they should be in control of something even when it's in the hands of the customer. Talk about DRM-like ideas going from digital content to hardware. Why can't I just buy a product and do what I want with it without having the manufacturer meddling with thier crappy software?

Research, always do your research before you buy. You'd be surprised what brand you might end up buying.

Powered by Zoundry Raven


Comments
No one has commented on this article. Be the first!