Western Digital 3Tb My Book Studio

Photo answers review

Photo answers rating

Why is it essential?  File sizes are always increasing, requiring even more disk space. Filling up your computer hard drive can cause problems; Photoshop may slow down and it can even decrease the performance of your processor. An external hard drive offers extra storage capacity for your photos leaving your computer’s in-built hard drive free, with the added advantage of increased portability between computers.

Key features: Designed with a simple and sleek metallic look, the WD 3TB My Book Studio offers 3TB (3000GB) of hard drive space connected via USB 2.0, Firewire 400 or Firewire 800. The Firewire spec means it’s pre-formatted for MacOSX but it can be reformatted easily for Windows if you use a PC. It features an aluminium case for an increased cooling effect, which prevents overheating, meaning it can run without a fan and gives a silent performance.
 
Cost: Available for around £170, that works out at less than six pence per GB.

Conclusion:  The My Book Studio runs like a charm, is remarkably quiet and despite not having a cooling fan built in, it doesn’t get hot. Using its Firewire connection file transfer is wonderfully quick, too, plus with 3TB of space it’ll be ages before you have to think about getting any more. Add to that a stylishly simple design, which means it will look good in any desktop environment.