WD My Passport external drive ?

[fatbloke]

Does anyone know if this device will work seamlessly as a straight external drive, or ha e they done some techno wizardry so it only works via software as listed by their OS support info (windows and Mac) ?

regards

JtFB...

[oshunluvr]

It'll work.

External drives are no different with Linux than Windows or Mac. File system choice is another matter.

[kenj70]

I suggest looking into this further. Both Seagate and WD use a bare-bones version of linux to format their drives and enable them for use with their included software. You didn't buy just an external HDD with suitable formatting.

-=Ken=-

[fatbloke]

So in theory, if I get one I should be able to format it with a Linux file system ?

Only because I'm still trying to work out about storing music (as per a previous thread/question of mine), so it'd be an ideal location for an external archive.

Hence I'm thinking of getting one (seen them for good prices via Facebook and ads from Amazon...

[oshunluvr]

I suggest looking into this further. Both Seagate and WD use a bare-bones version of linux to format their drives and enable them for use with their included software. You didn't buy just an external HDD with suitable formatting.

-=Ken=-

I'm not sure if I understand or agree with this. I'm looking at my 4TB Western Digital Elements drive right now. It came formatted as NTFS - perfect if you're sharing it with Windows computers along with Linux as I do. No software or reformatting of any kind required.

[kenj70]

Hey oshunluvr, it sounds like you got a plain external drive. I have the Seagate Goflex Home 2 GB and, as I said, it has a spartan version of Linux on it. I think the WD Passport is similar. I found a tutorial on the 'net explaining how to log into the Seagate Linux but, as I recall, it didn't allow me root and rather than reformat it as a simple external drive I decided to just leave it alone. My point of caution was to say unless the OP has some experience with this (or courage) I would recommend against it. But that's just me.

-=Ken=-

[oshunluvr]

Well, GoFlex is not a simple external drive, it's labeled as a "Home Network Storage System" with WiFi and who knows what else.

The WD Passport that the OP asked about is just a USB external drive. However, I did read that WD has put some hidden partitions on the Passport and something they call "Smart Ware" that makes it difficult to reformat unless you're using Windows.

You can do it using this to "fix" the drive: https://blog.bestcoding.net/en/unloc...t-drive-linux/ but I would just find one you know will work for you out of the box. Google is your friend.

[fatbloke]

It's just a possible "master plan", because when I saw the ad, it was alluding to a 4TB external drive for less than £100 - so good VfM at that. I do tend to take the easiest root to sort a problem, but that's because I may be an experienced user, I have little understanding of the mechanics of "how" stuff works (so either have to take things on faith, or get my older brother to help as he works in IT doing security and storage - he just struggles to put it into english, as he's now fluent in geek and nerd. So it's easier if I just borrow him, tell him what I'm trying to achieve and watch what he does to try and understand what's going on)...