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rainking12 20K Views
Apr 29, 2025 11:14 PM

Sam's Club Members: 5TB WD My Passport Portable Hard Drive (White)

$80

$140

42% off
+ Free S&H for Plus Membersat Sam's Club
Visit Sam's Club

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Deal Details
Sam's Club has for their Members: 5TB WD My Passport Portable Hard Drive (White, WDBPKJ0050BWT-WESB) for $79.91. Shipping is free for Plus Members, otherwise shipping costs will vary by location.

Thanks to Community Member rainking12 for finding this deal.

Features:
  • Slim design
  • Software for device management and backup with password protection
  • 256-bit AES hardware encryption
  • SuperSpeed USB port; USB 2.0 compatible
  • 3-year limited warranty

Editor's Notes

Written by johnny_miller | Staff
  • About this Store:
    • Don't have a Sam's Club Membership? Join today: Club Membership $50/yr. or Plus Membership $110/yr.
  • Additional Information:
    • Our research indicates that this offer is $40.08 lower (33% savings) than the next best available price from a reputable merchant with prices starting from $119.99.
    • Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars at Sam's Club cased on over 170 customer reviews.
    • Please see the original post for additional details and/or view the Wiki and forum comments for further helpful discussion if available.

Original Post

Written by rainking12
Community Notes
About the Poster
Deal Details
Community Notes
About the Poster
Sam's Club has for their Members: 5TB WD My Passport Portable Hard Drive (White, WDBPKJ0050BWT-WESB) for $79.91. Shipping is free for Plus Members, otherwise shipping costs will vary by location.

Thanks to Community Member rainking12 for finding this deal.

Features:
  • Slim design
  • Software for device management and backup with password protection
  • 256-bit AES hardware encryption
  • SuperSpeed USB port; USB 2.0 compatible
  • 3-year limited warranty

Editor's Notes

Written by johnny_miller | Staff
  • About this Store:
    • Don't have a Sam's Club Membership? Join today: Club Membership $50/yr. or Plus Membership $110/yr.
  • Additional Information:
    • Our research indicates that this offer is $40.08 lower (33% savings) than the next best available price from a reputable merchant with prices starting from $119.99.
    • Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars at Sam's Club cased on over 170 customer reviews.
    • Please see the original post for additional details and/or view the Wiki and forum comments for further helpful discussion if available.

Original Post

Written by rainking12

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34 Comments

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Expert
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Apr 30, 2025 2:22 AM
5.4K Comments
Joined Oct 2013
wherestheanykey
Expert
This user is an Expert in Home & Home Improvement
Apr 30, 2025 2:22 AM
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Quote from VictorB6150 View quoted comment :
Guys, is an sdd more durable than this? Or for backup would be same?
No. SSDs are mechanically more durable, but are less durable in every other way.

The average number of writes for an SSD in its total lifespan is rated for what a decent hard drive is rated to handle in just one year. And the mechanical operation for hard drives is rated in hundreds of thousands, if not millions of hours.

On top of this, an SSD can't be used for cold storage, as they require power occasionally to maintain data retention. Leave a mechanical drive on a shelf for 5 years and you'll still have data on it when you power it back up.

These are just some of many reasons why large data centers are still primarily using mechanical drives and even tape for storage.

For home backups, I'd advise the same.
3
Apr 30, 2025 2:24 AM
1.1K Comments
Joined Dec 2006
psharkauburnApr 30, 2025 2:24 AM
1.1K Comments
Quote from VictorB6150 View quoted comment :
Guys, is an sdd more durable than this? Or for backup would be same?
SSD is definitely faster, *probably* more durable as well (definitely less susceptible to shock/movement related issues). Mechanical drives are considerably cheaper per GB of storage, so they excel at things like backups, archiving, media streaming, etc... where storage capacity trumps raw speed every time.
Apr 30, 2025 2:24 AM
403 Comments
Joined Nov 2013
blinksteenApr 30, 2025 2:24 AM
403 Comments

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Quote from SuperBaloo View quoted comment :
My WD passport from 2018 is not working now
When I plug in to laptop it just makes "click" sound and the fan runs fast and nothing accessible

I have so much data in the 2TB passport and do not how to recover it

Check out DMDE software (DMDE.com), worked really well when I had the same issue. Free version can do the trick, but it's purposely limited by only allowing you to recover one file path at the same time, so it'll be tedious if you have a lot folders and subfolders. The odd file here and there was unrecoverable because of the damaged drive, but I probably recovered 96% of it.

FYI, if there's important stuff on it, I think the best practice is to try to clone the disc image of the damaged drive to another drive first and recover off of that instead of the damaged drive, but obviously that's not really practical in a lot of cases as most people don't have an equal empty portable drive hanging around.
2
Expert
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Apr 30, 2025 2:28 AM
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wherestheanykey
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Apr 30, 2025 2:28 AM
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Quote from psharkauburn View quoted comment :
SSD is definitely faster, *probably* more durable as well (definitely less susceptible to shock/movement related issues). Mechanical drives are considerably cheaper per GB of storage, so they excel at things like backups, archiving, media streaming, etc... where storage capacity trumps raw speed every time.
Don't forget, there's such a thing called bit rot with flash memory that doesn't exist with mechanical drives.

You can't leave them unpowered for years and expect to hold data.
2
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Apr 30, 2025 2:41 AM
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wherestheanykey
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Apr 30, 2025 2:41 AM
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Quote from SuperBaloo View quoted comment :
My WD passport from 2018 is not working now
When I plug in to laptop it just makes "click" sound and the fan runs fast and nothing accessible

I have so much data in the 2TB passport and do not how to recover it
If it's not spinning at all (you can tell by feeling for vibration) and the PCB is still being detected when you plug it in, the spindle motor may have gone out.

They can actually seize up over time.

If you feel like you have nothing to lose, you can try the freezer trick and run the drive in an orientation different from which it normally ran (if vertical, try horizontal or even upside down).

If you take it to a professional and they find that this is the issue, they'll typically just open the drive and work the spindle free.
1
Apr 30, 2025 2:44 AM
338 Comments
Joined Apr 2015
KorboApr 30, 2025 2:44 AM
338 Comments

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Quote from blinksteen View quoted comment :
FYI, if there's important stuff on it, I think the best practice is to try to clone the disc image of the damaged drive to another drive first and recover off of that instead of the damaged drive, but obviously that's not really practical in a lot of cases as most people don't have an equal empty portable drive hanging around.
Best practice is to have the data already backed up on that spare drive periodically Wink (And another backup located somewhere else. The 3-2-1 rule of thumb for backups: Three copies of your data, on two types of storage media, one of them kept offsite.)
1
Apr 30, 2025 3:47 AM
677 Comments
Joined Oct 2017
UK7Apr 30, 2025 3:47 AM
677 Comments
Quote from wherestheanykey View quoted comment :
No. SSDs are mechanically more durable, but are less durable in every other way.The average number of writes for an SSD in its total lifespan is rated for what a decent hard drive is rated to handle in just one year. And the mechanical operation for hard drives is rated in hundreds of thousands, if not millions of hours.On top of this, an SSD can't be used for cold storage, as they require power occasionally to maintain data retention. Leave a mechanical drive on a shelf for 5 years and you'll still have data on it when you power it back up.These are just some of many reasons why large data centers are still primarily using mechanical drives and even tape for storage.For home backups, I'd advise the same.
what's your recommendation on how best to store home backup data like photos and documents? I currently have just one drive and after reading this thread want to order 3-4 backups to store in different places... what would you suggest to do?

Total data amount is just around 1.5TB.

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Apr 30, 2025 4:16 AM
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Joined Jan 2009
cranstonApr 30, 2025 4:16 AM
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Attempted to check out ... and it's out of stock
Apr 30, 2025 5:33 AM
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JasonR9389Apr 30, 2025 5:33 AM
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Sold out
Expert
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Apr 30, 2025 5:33 AM
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wherestheanykey
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Apr 30, 2025 5:33 AM
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Quote from UK7 View quoted comment :
what's your recommendation on how best to store home backup data like photos and documents? I currently have just one drive and after reading this thread want to order 3-4 backups to store in different places... what would you suggest to do?

Total data amount is just around 1.5TB.
If your internet is solid, bite the bullet and pay for cloud storage in addition to any backups you retain locally. With good encryption, it's the safest option for off-site backups.

For local backups, just follow the N+1 rule (a backup isn't a backup unless it has a backup) as well as you can feasibly afford and maintain.

It wouldn't hurt to keep the really important stuff in a fire bag inside a decently rated fire safe.

And if you want to go really crazy, you could set up a networked drive in your car that syncs up with your devices whenever it's on.
Apr 30, 2025 7:15 AM
29 Comments
Joined May 2018
PurpleWallaby4982Apr 30, 2025 7:15 AM
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Quote from JoeJoeJonesin View quoted comment :
When it comes to hard drives on Slickdeals, there's no more favorite a word than shuckable
"Shuckable"? What does that mean towards a hard drive? Is that good or bad? Not trying to be argumentative, but I have learned more about electronics from Slickdeals then from the reviews on amazon. I had a stroke a year ago, so I lost a lot of power to think. I actually go here to re-learn things more than reddit which can be full of bots.
1
Apr 30, 2025 9:17 AM
22 Comments
Joined Feb 2021
EagerStraw787Apr 30, 2025 9:17 AM
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Quote from NMjack12 View quoted comment :
Anyone know of a place that will price match? Best Buy? Microcenter?
Best Buy does!
Apr 30, 2025 12:31 PM
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Joined Nov 2010
JusthathoughtApr 30, 2025 12:31 PM
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Quote from EagerStraw787 View quoted comment :
Best Buy does!
Not if OOS for matching
Apr 30, 2025 12:34 PM
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Joined Nov 2003
bestdealApr 30, 2025 12:34 PM
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not sell in store? online only?

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Apr 30, 2025 1:16 PM
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psharkauburnApr 30, 2025 1:16 PM
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Quote from wherestheanykey View quoted comment :
Don't forget, there's such a thing called bit rot with flash memory that doesn't exist with mechanical drives.

You can't leave them unpowered for years and expect to hold data.
Bit rot absolutely exists on mechanical hard drives. Now mechanical failure tends to be the first place failure winner, but bit rot 100% affects mechanical drives (magnetized coating loses its polarization).
2

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