When I checked the drive's capacity, Windows XP SP3 found 931.51GB (technically that's just over 1 trillion bytes). I tested the drive with HD Tach 3.0 from Simpli Software. Using its thorough "Long Bench" test (using 32KB blocks for reads and writes across the entire drive), the benchmark registered 31.9MB/sec. burst speed, an average read speed of 28.6MB/sec. and CPU utilization of 16 per cent. That compares favorably with the Buffalo DriveStation Combo 4 that I recently reviewed (see "Review: The DriveStation Combo 4 is very well connected").
Using Version 2.55 of the HD Tune benchmark test, I saw an average transfer rate of 27.0MB/sec., 16.3 ms average access time and a burst rate of 23.0MB/sec. using 15.5 per cent of the CPU, which is average for a drive of this size.
Copying a 1GB MPEG file on my hard drive to the My Book (when configured as RAID 1 took 53 seconds.
According to Western Digital, the My Book uses a convection cooling architecture that keeps the drives cool without fans and uses one third less power than competing drives. I can attest to its cool and quiet operation.
You can open the top of the enclosure and replace either drive (though you're limited to using "WD Caviar GP hard drive assemblies," according to the user manual). The My Book starts the rebuild process automatically; rebuilds usually take between five and seven hours, according to Western Digital, but can take up to 12 hours.
The drive includes a three-year warranty. The company also sells a 500GB model (1TB as RAID 0) for US$289.99.
Sometimes you just can't protect valuable files enough. Whether you use the "primary" drive of the My Book (and rely on RAID 1 to make a second copy on the "hidden" secondary drive) or use the included backup software to make an additional copy of files on your system's built-in hard drive (using RAID 0) or two copies (with RAID 1 enabled), the quiet, fast and easy-to-set-up My Book gives you the best and simplest data protection in a user-friendly drive I've seen.
Rich Ericson is a US-based technology writer and is the reviews editor of The Office Letter, a site devoted to tips for Microsoft Office.