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4TB WD Easystore External USB 3.0 Hard Drive Expired

$90
$199.99
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Update: This very popular offer is still available

Best Buy.com has 4TB WD Easystore External USB 3.0 Hard Drive (WDBCKA0040HBK-NESN) for $89.99. Shipping is free or select free store pickup where available. Thanks slickdewmaster

Note, availability for in-store pickup may vary depending on location.

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Edited April 13, 2017 at 08:34 AM by
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4TB WD Easystore External USB 3.0 Hard Drive [bestbuy.com] (WDBCKA0040HBK-NESN) $89.99
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Community Wiki

Last Edited by burner1515 April 21, 2017 at 07:07 AM
This drive does not use a proprietary connection and can be shucked for the bare drive fine. It will fit in your PC as a normal 3.5 inch SATA WD40EFRX (WD Red) Bare Drive drive would.

This drive does not have encryption on the pcb board itself.

Please see post

https://slickdeals.net/f/10049636-4tb-wd-easystore-external-usb-3-0-hard-drive-black-89-99-free-shipping?p=99111560#post99111560

and

https://slickdeals.net/f/10049636-4tb-wd-easystore-external-usb-3-0-hard-drive-black-89-99-free-shipping?p=99123296#post99123296

There are a few others, feel free to edit and add here.


If you shuck you lose the warranty. if you check the sn on the external enclosure, it is the same as the internal hard drive. When you register that SN it coems up as 'WD easystore Desktop' on their site. If you ever have to send it in for warranty service you have to put it back in the enclosure. They will know you opened the enclosure and will void the warranty.


IF for some reason WD's site said it was a bare nas drive, they would still not honor the warranty because your receipt shows you bought a external hard drive. You need a receipt for the bare drive. Really silly I need to explain this IF situation.



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Featured Comments

At $22.5 per terabyte this is pretty decent.
LOL, are you suggesting Western Digital would use Seagate drives inside their external drives? I guess that would be physically possible, but would make no financial sense; why buy a competitors drive and incur the overhead costs of their manufacturing process???

Anyway, you have any proof of this? I'd really like to know. Or perhaps I just got lured in by troll bait... shake head
So I went to the store because I have some in-store only coupons. However, the coupon won't work because their internal store price is higher ($109) and had to do a price adjustment. No luck on that.

Upon plugging it in, Hard Disk Sentinel reports that the model ID is WD40EFRX-68N32N0. Google searches indicate that it's a Red drive. YMMV.

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Joined Dec 2015
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> bubble2 2,832 Posts
523 Reputation
burner1515
04-20-2017 at 03:06 PM.
04-20-2017 at 03:06 PM.
Quote from mektarus :
So does anyone know when the encryption kicks in? Is it when you first activate the enclosure or when you install the software? I bought this to use with my PS4 but I was going to hook it to my PC first just to see which drive was inside. Now I'm not sure if thats a good idea.

this is not encrypted.

on WD drives that have encryption they cannot be read outside the enclosure itself. you would have to format to use the drive. again this one is not encrypted.

Quote from piggychops :
yup, temp backup or a tertiary redundant (not primary redundant) external is a good idea. Having it as your only external hard drive, you are taking on unnecessary risk and best advised to look for something else.

If you still like the idea of having a WD RED in an external, You could just shuck it, put it another known external non encrypting case and be set.

this case does not have encryption.
Reply
Last edited by burner1515 April 20, 2017 at 03:22 PM.
Joined Dec 2015
New User
> bubble2 2,832 Posts
523 Reputation
burner1515
04-20-2017 at 03:09 PM.
04-20-2017 at 03:09 PM.
Quote from kwchan79 :
Any picture of how the encryption board look like? Can i remove or disable it to "bypass" the encryption feature?

I still want to re-use the enclosure and put in a smaller HDD

this is not encrypted
Reply
Joined Dec 2015
New User
> bubble2 2,832 Posts
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burner1515
04-20-2017 at 03:14 PM.
04-20-2017 at 03:14 PM.
Quote from LefterisJP :
One of the reviews on the page says it uses a proprietary connector instead of a standard SATA port. Is that true or not?

that has been proved false. the drive is new on their site. most likely they posted on the wrong product about a 2.5inch drive. those seem to be soldered directly to the SATA ports and the 3.5 are spared that fate
Reply
Joined Dec 2006
L5: Journeyman
> bubble2 896 Posts
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CalMan
04-20-2017 at 03:51 PM.
04-20-2017 at 03:51 PM.
I definitely didn't need another external drive, but I did need another slick deal. So I purchased one. Thanks OP.

I definitely don't want the Shutterfly promo code, so offering it to first taker in here. Please note by posting if you take it so no one else wastes their time.

Choose your gift. Your Best Buy® purchase qualifies you for $20 to use on Shutterfly products or a free 8x8 Photo Book.* Shipping, handling fees and taxes not included.

How it Works:
Sign up or sign in to Shutterfly
Enter the promotion code found below
Apply your code at checkout by August 1, 2017
Your Promotion Code:
BEAJ-5CAC-WZY0-G9TSHV

Reply
Joined Mar 2010
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> bubble2 400 Posts
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mektarus
04-20-2017 at 04:10 PM.
04-20-2017 at 04:10 PM.
Quote from burner1515 :
this is not encrypted.

on WD drives that have encryption they cannot be read outside the enclosure itself. you would have to format to use the drive. again this one is not encrypted.




this case does not have encryption.

Someone a couple of pages back did a test that shows this almost certainly has encryption. I just want to know if it activates when you first power up the drive or when you install the software.
Reply
Last edited by mektarus April 20, 2017 at 04:13 PM.
Joined Nov 2011
Rock Chalk
> bubble2 4,950 Posts
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JayhawkDeals
04-20-2017 at 04:37 PM.
04-20-2017 at 04:37 PM.
Quote from 2devnull :
But of course. Is there another type?
I have about 10tb of my bird-watching adventures. Plex always gets confused when it tries to play trailers before hand.
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Joined Apr 2008
L6: Expert
> bubble2 1,583 Posts
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2devnull
04-20-2017 at 05:22 PM.
04-20-2017 at 05:22 PM.
Quote from jayhawknative :
I have about 10tb of my bird-watching adventures. Plex always gets confused when it tries to play trailers before hand.
Same here, my bull riding ones takes up the most space.
Reply

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NewMaxx
04-20-2017 at 05:42 PM.
04-20-2017 at 05:42 PM.
Quote from mektarus :
Someone a couple of pages back did a test that shows this almost certainly has encryption. I just want to know if it activates when you first power up the drive or when you install the software.
From the My Book manual (older model which this drive is based on): "Click Set Password to save your password and enable hardware encryption for your drive." (via the WD Security software) However, there is also a manual for an unencrypted variant, and the drive I received from BB does not come with WD Security. People are simply confusing the different models available.
Reply
Last edited by NewMaxx April 20, 2017 at 05:48 PM.
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piggychops
04-20-2017 at 06:11 PM.
04-20-2017 at 06:11 PM.
As much as I`d like to go back and fourth with this whole encryption bit, I`ll leave this bit of advice for anyone who cares.

WD security is not supported on this device from WD support website. However from the WD community, the WD security enables a software level password-based encryption, while the PCB allows a hardware level encryption. Even without WD security, the pcb will still encrypt the device for security.

If you only have one of these (if you have 2, a RAID 1 setup test is posted above) and want to know about the PCB thing, all you need to is dump some files into the external via usb. Shuck the hdd, replug it via any other interface and see if disk manager/explorer can locate the files you initially transferred. If you can successfully do this the enclosure pcb is not encrypting anything. If however you cannot access said files, but are able to access them when you reattach the pcb, then encryption is present through the pcb. For what I have tested on my personal unit that I got, the latter is the case. On a side note even installed WD discovery which recognized the External when plugged but couldnt find the internal directly plugged in.

There are workarounds posted on the forum for those technically inclined who soley want an external. For those who want just the internal RED, shuck and enjoy
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truemark
04-20-2017 at 06:17 PM.
04-20-2017 at 06:17 PM.
Bought 2 to place inside 2-bay NAS (QNAP TS-251). This would be my first NAS. Does it matter if I powered them on first before removing the WD enclosure and adding the bare drive to the NAS? Is WD firmware update for the bare drive irrelevant once removed from the WD enclosure or is that still recommended? Thanks.
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Joined Aug 2016
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> bubble2 382 Posts
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Natycmd
04-20-2017 at 06:22 PM.
04-20-2017 at 06:22 PM.
Quote from truemark :
Bought 2 to place inside 2-bay NAS (QNAP TS-251). This would be my first NAS. Does it matter if I powered them on first before removing the WD enclosure and adding the bare drive to the NAS? Is WD firmware update for the bare drive irrelevant once removed from the WD enclosure or is that still recommended? Thanks.

Want to know this as well. Want to make sure i do the right procedure to put the red drives on my tvs-453. Thanks a lot
Reply
Joined Apr 2009
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> bubble2 456 Posts
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love_guru
04-20-2017 at 07:42 PM.
04-20-2017 at 07:42 PM.
Quote from piggychops :
As much as I`d like to go back and fourth with this whole encryption bit, I`ll leave this bit of advice for anyone who cares.

WD security is not supported on this device from WD support website. However from the WD community, the WD security enables a software level password-based encryption, while the PCB allows a hardware level encryption. Even without WD security, the pcb will still encrypt the device for security.

If you only have one of these (if you have 2, a RAID 1 setup test is posted above) and want to know about the PCB thing, all you need to is dump some files into the external via usb. Shuck the hdd, replug it via any other interface and see if disk manager/explorer can locate the files you initially transferred. If you can successfully do this the enclosure pcb is not encrypting anything. If however you cannot access said files, but are able to access them when you reattach the pcb, then encryption is present through the pcb. For what I have tested on my personal unit that I got, the latter is the case. On a side note even installed WD discovery which recognized the External when plugged but couldnt find the internal directly plugged in.

There are workarounds posted on the forum for those technically inclined who soley want an external. For those who want just the internal RED, shuck and enjoy
Ok, I did this test for giggles. My results:

3TB Seagate: Plugged into WD PCB, wrote some files, disconnect, connect directly via SATA, read back the files, success.

4TB WD Red (Original drive): Plugged into WD PCB, wrote some files, disconnect, connect directly via SATA, read back the files, success.

Again, No Encryption detected. Unless mine is a super-duper special one, then I'll sell it on Ebay for the big buck$$$.
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Joined Dec 2012
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> bubble2 988 Posts
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NewMaxx
04-20-2017 at 08:01 PM.
04-20-2017 at 08:01 PM.
Quote from love_guru :
Again, No Encryption detected. Unless mine is a super-duper special one, then I'll sell it on Ebay for the big buck$$$.
Thanks for posting your findings. They line up with my own. I bought a second drive when it went back on sale I'm getting next week, I'll likewise check that one, but I agree that this does not seem to have encryption.
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Joined Feb 2017
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> bubble2 26 Posts
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Clow1976
04-20-2017 at 08:06 PM.
04-20-2017 at 08:06 PM.
I have the 5TB of this WD model bought from a year ago, used in NAS running strong. Discounted due to onboard encryption that nobody seemed to like.
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worthmining
04-20-2017 at 08:12 PM.
04-20-2017 at 08:12 PM.
Quote from jayhawknative :
I have about 10tb of my bird-watching adventures. Plex always gets confused when it tries to play trailers before hand.
For you guys only want to use the usb external drive directly, really should consider the seagate SMR 8TB drive, that thing is cheaper and 2-3 times faster than this drive when read/write. Its 6TB is equally discounted. and no encryption.

I bought a few 4TB of that at $87 last week when it's discounted here at SD, but want to return it as the SMR drive is not good for used in NAS and I only want NAS which makes the WD easystore the ideal choice.

https://slickdeals.net/f/10057604-seagate-backup-plus-hub-8tb-external-desktop-hard-drive-storage-stel8000100-179-99-fs-at-bestbuy-amazon?src=SiteSearchV2_SearchBarV2Algo1
Reply
Last edited by worthmining April 20, 2017 at 08:22 PM.
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