I don’t know about you, but I can’t seem to have enough storage. As we speak, I’m already about to exhaust the storage on a 2TB portable drive, which I thought was ample at the time. WD has realised our (well, my) thirst for both storage and portability, so they released a new line of portable drives, dubbed the My Passport Ultra.
The My Passport Ultra that is sent to us is a 1TB variant, but you should know that the product comes in a smaller 500GB model too, so if you don’t need that much space when you’re on the go, you can opt for that instead. Both variants are further divided into four colours: grey (the one we have here), black, blue and red. The casing looks and feels sturdy, and has a nice heft to it. You will not find any flimsy or shoddy workmanship here. The slim size fits right in your backpack without adding any noticeable weight, par for the course when compared to most portable offerings. The drive comes with a pouch, which is pretty neat if you decide to carry it around.
Connected to the testbed (Intel Core i7-3770K, Asus Maximus V Gene, 16GB Kingston HyperX Beast DDR3, 128GB SSD), the drive was put through the benchmark gauntlet. To get the best speeds, it is recommended that you connect it to a USB 3.0 port.
In CrystalDiskMark, the My Passport Ultra produced read and scores of about 107MB/s. This score is within expectations of a USB 3.0 portable drive. Expect it to be significantly slower when connected to a USB 2.0 port.
The same score was reproduced in ATTO, with speeds approaching 110MB/s. Suffice to say, you won’t be suffering from slow transfer speeds when using this.
NASPT reveals the portable drive’s strength – media. The My Passport Ultra managed to score high in the benchmark’s HD Video Playback scenario, as well as its variants. Copying files from NAS also produced similarly high scores. It is safe to assume that the drive works best as a portable media storage solution.
Like all WD offerings, the My Passport Ultra comes with WD’s own apps, like WD SmartWare to handle your backups, as well other tools like WD Security (encryption) and WD Drive Utilities (diagnostics). If your PC is running Windows 8, WD’s app will automatically install itself and you can access it on the Start Screen.
If you’re looking for a portable drive that offers ample storage, as well as offering a variety of value-added features, the My Passport Ultra is a definite blip on your radar.
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