Western Digital’s WD My Passport range has been a staple in the external hard disk space for a number of years. And having tested their latest 6 TB one, it’s easy to see why. It’s an unobtrusive HDD that does what it says on the box, and a few things extra if you like.

With its size a bit larger than a cigarette packet, the My Passport 6 TB is a hard disk drive (HDD) that you can pop into your notebook bag and forget about. And at a spacious 6 TB in size, it has a considerable amount of storage available in a device that fits in the palm of your hand. Taking a look at all of my previous storage solutions, the My Passport is by far the smallest, with no external power needed to run it.

Unobtrusive when it needs to be

The WD My Passport is, of course, plug and play, working without hassle if you stick it into your PC. On my Windows notebook it immediately opens the drive to show what’s on it. This keeps things uncomplicated if you simply want a device to save files to now and then.

However, Western Digital does include extra software for PC and Mac, providing access to added security and backup services. Once the onboard software is installed, these applications can be found in the WD icon in the systems tray on the taskbar.

The most basic layer to this is WD Security, providing password protection of the HDD. This can be done without the installation of any extra applications, also offering the option of auto unlocking on the device the My Passport is currently connected to.

The more important backup application is Acronis True Image for Western Digital. At its core, Acronis can backup and restore files, folders, or full disk images. A download is necessary and once it is up and running you can do a complete PC backup, back-up specific folders or files, clone disks, permanently destroy data on disks, or create bootable media for when Windows does not want to restart.

Acronis also automatically protects your PC from ransomware attacks and illicit crypto-mining, as soon as the My Passport is plugged in. This can be turned off if not required.

Using Acronis, I did a backup of my Windows drive, taking in the region of two hours for 764 TB of data for the initial setup. Acronis True Image for Western Digital does pop up with alerts here and there, for example, if the My Passport is not present when a scheduled backup is supposed to happen. 

The final app is WE Drive Utilities which checks for potential drive failures, performance problems and bad sectors. Using this can also set when the drive must go into sleep mode when connected, and you can turn off the small LED light at the front.

A few things more

The My Passport 6TB provides a USB 3.2 Gen 1 connection, allowing for data transfer speeds of up to up to 5 TB/s, and comes with a 40 cm SuperSpeed USB-A cable included in the box. A 3-year limited warranty is included, although I did have a problem with the registration of the product, with certain image files not going through.

One concern is the My Passport's plastic design (made from 50% post-consumer recycled plastic), which appears as if it would not like more than a few bumps and bruises. Although Western Digital notes it is durable, I would have been more comfortable if Western Digital included a small padded carry case. For those for whom this might be problematic, the Western Digital My Passport Ultra includes a metal casing. 

Apart from this, it’s very difficult to fault Western Digital’s My Passport 6 TB. This HDD is small in size considering the massive 6 TB of storage space it offers, and once connected it’s also low-noise and doesn’t really heat up that much. Plus, Western Digital offers extra backup and security software if further protection is needed.

At the time of publishing, the 6 TB version of the My Passport was not yet available locally. However, the 5 TB retails for R2 599 at the official retailer Incredible Connection.

FULL DISCLOSURE: WD My Passport 6 TB WAS RECEIVED FROM WESTERN DIGITAL AS A TEST UNIT AND NOT RETURNED.