I have two of these HDs and each one has about 100M tied up in crap from WD.
Dedoimedo has written an article about this problem.
I tried the Windows format and it doesn't get rid of the 100m.
I tried Partition Magic and it seems to get rid of the 100m.
But then the drive does not appear in Windows. SO I go back in Partition Magic
and create a partition of the full drive. Then the 100M of crap appears again.
I tried the program that Dedoimeno recommends from HP but that doesn't
solve the problem for me either. I'm really ticked that a company like WD would pull
a stunt like this.
hiya Jack
one of my internal drives is a WD 500 Gb
i am pretty happy with this particular drive, although it was a little pricey
i guess the 100 Mb you are refering to is part of the driver package ?
The extra partition may only be in ROM and not a real partition (it's just made to look that way for easy access) - so you can't use the extra space anyway. I presume it's read-only..?
Jack,
Usually with the Windows disk manager you have to completely delete the partition to get the original full size out of it. All my recent machines have WD Green disks in them and none of them have been problematic at all. Try deleting all of the partitions first then see what the unpartitioned size is them. I remember years ago that MS FDISK could not remove a unix partition but I don't think its a problem any longer from win2000 upwards. The alternative is use a Linux boot disk and use the Linux FDISK to delete all the partitions.
Thanks for responding guys.
Please read the article on Dedoimedos site about WD external drives as it explains it much better than I do.
"www.dedoimedo.com".
I have run Partition Magic and formatted the external drive. It then shows that the disk is empty but it is still hogging
about 100m. Then I have to create a partition for the external drive as it no longer shows up in windows.
This then shows the 100m is still there.
Dedoimeno says this is some kind of VD read-only type file (maybe Smartware). I have NOT been able to get it off the drive.
I don't have any problem with the drive itself, just don't like 100m being taken away from me for some
god knows what reason.
The extra data is NOT in Rom on the WD HD.
The 100m is NOT part of the driver package. It is called (I think) "system volume information".
according to that article, it is a real partition on the drive
the easy way to get rid of it is to unhide it
i use a program called MBRWizard
http://mbrwizard.com/download.php
he has a new GUI version, but i prefer the version 2.0b command line version (see bottom of download page)
with that program, you can view a list of all partitions present in the system
MBRWiz /list
notice the drive "type" values (i think it's actually called the drive type ID byte)
7h - normal NTFS
17h - hidden NTFS
you may also see a few other type values, for things like OEM recovery partitions, etc (all the ones i've seen are actually NTFS)
when you have identified the drive and partition you want to modify...
MBRWiz /disk=1 /part=0 /type=7h
changes disk 1 (second drive), partition 0 to normal NTFS
7h - the type has to be followed by h for hex (a little bug in the command line version)
reboot, and you may now delete the partition or do whatever you like, using standard partitioning software (i use EaseUS)
the partition will have a drive letter and show up on explorer, of course
EDIT - you may find that the partition is FAT32 or exFAT32 and hidden
just drop the 10h from the value to unhide it
Hi Dave,
Thanks for the help.
I tried your version of mbrwizard but I don't think it works on Vista. Anyway I got nowhere.
Possibly did something wrong.
Didn't try the latest version.
One thing for sure - this is my last WD HD!!!!!
for vista...
when you open the console window to run it
right-click on the console shortcut, then Run As Administrator
that should allow it work correctly
i think there is a way to permanently modify a console shortcut to open as admin
you can right-click - Properties - and poke around a little
I have always preferred Western Digital Drives. I have never seen one with this crap on it. That really stinks!
I'd be far more curious to know what it takes to modify the read-only drive image. I also don't really see the problem here; are you really mad that you're missing out on like 0.02% drive capacity? I personally would like hardware that has extra functionality (like being able to emulate a CD drive).
And are you really going to stop buying WD drives when they are arguably the most reliable brand and their internal drives aren't known for coming preloaded with junk? Of course brand-loyalty (and disloyalty) only hurt the consumer, so I guess always go with the right product for your $.
Queue
Queue. you seem to be missing the point. Go on the Dedoimedo site and read the article on WD external drives.
Smartware contains an autorun and from what I've read is a rootkit. Besides they have NO right to install their
goodies unasked on a HD that I paid money for. Don't take my word for it and do some more reading.
I will NEVER buy another WD HD.......
KB971029 restrict AutoRun entries in the AutoPlay dialog to only CD and DVD drives
I have the same experience as shankle with my recently bought 1TB WD external drive. I did all I know to remove the added "Virtual Disk Drive", but with no luck.
So out of frustration, I took the HDD inside and placed it on a different enclosure. To my amaze, using a different enclosure had reveled about 600MB extra partition instead of a virtual disk drive...this allowed me to remove that extra partition, and was able to format the entire drive., but sadly, that voids the warranty.
dedndave, the drive is faking a CD drive for the read-only image so it gets CD drive autorun capabilities. That's what interests me, as I could put my portable software menu on it to autorun when I plug the drive in if the read-only image can be modified.
shankle, I did read the article. Also, it's not a rootkit; a rootkit is software that's installed on your computer and uses ring 0 privileges and code to hide files (and on Windows, registry entries) from the OS itself and any other software.
Does the packaging mention the hard drive comes pre-loaded with software? If so, you got what you paid for. There's only an issue if the bundled software wasn't mentioned anywhere. Often software is included from other companies to subsidize your purchase; if it's software purely made by WD, then it's simply part of the product you bought.
Based on what gwapo said, modifying the read-only partition may be as simple as attaching the drive via some means other than its enclosure, changing the second partition, and putting it back.
Queue
To Queue:
Yes - I know what qwapo is talking about. On another site they gave warnings about doing that.
I could care less about the WD warranty. But I am no electronics expert and really hesitate
to pull a working hard drive apart for this.
If someone whats to bother giving very detailed instructions on doing this I would give it a shot.
the WD box is no fun to open :P
inside, you will find a SATA hard drive
if your computer supports SATA interface, you can temporarily install it as an internal drive
The same thing happen to me. Bought a 500GB portable hardisk with 600MB used for a partition that cannot be erased (because of the firmware). WD did provide a patch to HIDE the partition, but the only way to eliminate it requires to break the thing apart. Is good that I didn't bought the hardisk to mirror another 500GB disk, otherwise I would been pissed off with WD and their stolen 600MB.
I think I have found the solution.
Just as gwapo stated with one more goodie.
Thermaltake dock is an external device to connect 2.5 or 3.5 HDs.
I'll try to take out the HD from the MY BOOK without destroying the case.
If not use the Thermaltake dock.
There seem to be 2 different types of cases for these wd externals.
Some have a rubber tabs on the bottom of the front and a screw on the top.
My has nothing. I found a site with instructions for taking mine apart
without breaking it. But I don't have much hope with that.
Then I can get rid of the 100m of crap. :bdg
shankle,
Did the method described in the Dedoimedos article not work?
Here is another article on removing it.
http://superuser.com/questions/44318/how-do-i-remove-a-mybooks-wd-smartware-virtual-cd-from-my-desktop
Is it necessary to remove the drive from the enclosure to completely get rid of this?
To G. Lyon.
It didn't work for me but somebody else might get it to work.
The article you suggested uses a program from WD which I no longer trust.
It will never get on my puter.
This is really going to make me think twice about buying WD external HDDs. Even though I like the products. What a stupid thing for WD to do. People are really unhappy about this on the WD support forum etc.
Believe me they have lots of company :bdg
Jack,
It seems to be the trend these days with external storage devices to make them "SMART" which means little else than added software that is difficult to modify or control. Recently my brother bought a NetGear storage device that you could only access by connecting to their web site and to fix this he had to get Linux programs to bypass the requirement so he could access the device without having to connect through the internet.
Answer is to buy a normal HDD and put it in a can yourself.
S.M.A.R.T. is part of the drive's internal firmware
it can usually be disabled in BIOS, although you may have to hunt for it :bg
To Hutch;
This will be my last WD external.
Any new ones I buy will be internal drives that I can put in the Thelmaltake dock or similar.
Only problem with this is how to store it in a bank deposit box. Wrap it in a baggy I guess.
But I would think that would attract static electricity.
For a stunt like this WD should go out of business.
Sounds like some of the stunts that Microsoft pulls.
Disgusting
Jack,
To store a hard disk, just put it in a static bag and make sure it does not get dropped.
Dave,
What I intended with "SMART" was something like clever or pseudo-intelligent, where S.M.A.R.T. is just hardware for disk diagnostics. If its compatible with the BIOS there is no point in disabling it.
I have found from practice that "intelligent" in accessory hardware like external drives means "SLOW" in terms of data transfer rate. Connect a SATA disk to an ESATA cable and you get the same data transfer rate as an internal hard disk, these days about 100 meg/sec, stick it in an external can and it drops to user 50 meg/sec. Plug it into USB and it drops to less than 30 meg/sec.
My solution is 5 computers, gigabit ethernet and full drive speed beats plug in junk. Does not matter in many instances but try backing up 500 gig and data transfer starts to mean something.
i am no fan of USB drives, although I do have a little thumb drive that comes in handy now and then :bg
we have a new TV set that can access a USB drive, though - may be worth having one for that
I also won't be buying any WD external drives until they get rid of the SmartWare.
I think Hutch has the right idea, build your own from an internal drive and an enclosure, and go with eSATA.
For best results with the thumb drives, if they have U3 on them, get the 'U3 Removal Tool' and get rid of the U3. Then format the drive NTFS or FAT32, I prefer NTFS.
thanks for the U3 tip, Greg :U
for small drives, i use FAT32/exFAT32
not like i want the files indexed, nor am i concerned with quotas - free space is more the issue
just for the fun of it, i wanted to compare NTFS against FAT32 for my little thumb drive
the MS XP driver won't let me format the drive as anything but FAT32 :P
That's because you shouldn't format flash memory to NTFS. =P
Ideally, if you have a small enough flash drive, use FAT16; it's faster and more compatible with arbitrary devices that you can plug flash drives into.
Anything bigger than like 2 GB, use FAT32.
ExFAT is basically there to resolve max file size issues looking forwards, while still being an appropriate file system for flash memory, but compatibility is poor.
Don't use a journaling file system on flash memory; it shortens the lifespan of the memory and is far slower than a simple FAT-based file system.
---
U3 devices are another example where the default software on the emulated CD drive is dumb, but if you can hijack it to put your own software there, the added functionality is great. Now if I could only find a U3 device with a read-only switch.
Queue
Quote from: QueueThat's because you shouldn't format flash memory to NTFS. =P
I have heard arguments both ways.
Quote from: QueueAnything bigger than like 2 GB, use FAT32
I would say use NTFS.
Generally speaking the performance of NTFS on large volumes is higher than performance of FAT32. NTFS performance on small volumes is lower than performance of FAT/FAT32. I use large thumb drives with large files. NTFS supports the large (>4GB) files.
Windows will not allow formatting 32GB or larger drives with FAT32. I have a 32GB and a 64GB drive.
Quote from: QueueU3 devices are another example where the default software on the emulated CD drive is dumb, but if you can hijack it to put your own software there, the added functionality is great.
I say get rid of that damn U3 crap. I can't stand it.
Dave,
To enable NTFS on your drive, right click My Computer and select Manage. Open the Device Manager and find your USB drive under the Disk Drives heading. Right click the drive and select Properties, then go to the Policies tab and select the "Optimize for performance" option and Click OK.
Once you do that, open up My Computer and right click on the flash drive and select Format. There you will see that you now have the option to format to NTFS in the File System dropdown box.
-_- You're giving seriously bad advice, and what you know about NTFS is only relevant to traditional hard drives, and not storage based on flash memory.
Let me lay out the issues:
- Whenever you write to flash memory, a block of flash memory is erased first, then it can be written to. Erasure is slow; a journaling file system makes more separate writes than a simple file system. It's even worse when it saves last accessed times, as simply reading a file causes a write to occur.
- Optimizing for performance turns on file caching for that drive, which means it's extra unsafe to simply unplug the drive without properly ejecting it as writes don't necessarily occur immediately
- Flash memory has a limited number of writes that any given block of flash memory can withstand before it can no longer be written to. Journaling file systems write a lot more, and particularly are hard on the flash memory due to the journal that's kept. Wasteful writes due to last access times don't help.
Queue
ya know, Greg, I saw that setting - and dismissed it - lol
it works :U
tomorrow, i may play with a little comparison
as slow as thumb drives are, i doubt there will be much difference - assuming i can measure it without the affects of caching
Queue,
You still haven't changed my mind. What's the worst case scenario, my drive doesn't last quite as long.
What about SSD drives, are you saying we should format those FAT32 too? Greater than 32GB you can't.
You do it your way, I'll do it mine.
Dave,
As far as speed, the FAT32 will probably be faster. I like (and need) the other advantages of NTFS.
exFAT was designed precisely for the emerging flash-based hard drives. Microsoft would've loved if everyone threw out FAT and moved entirely to NTFS, but when flash-based hard drives suddenly became more and more common, they realized they needed a non-journaling file system for them and FAT32 was inadequate.
We're not talking about lasting for a little less time, we're talking about orders of magnitude. In the case of running an OS off of a flash-based hard drive, it was performance as much as lifespan.
Queue
See MSDN (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee681827%28VS.85%29.aspx) for a comparison of file systems.
Well, maybe exFAT is the way to go. I'll give it a try. I had never really looked into exFAT before.
Quote from: dedndave on July 10, 2010, 05:00:15 AM
as slow as thumb drives are, i doubt there will be much difference - assuming i can measure it without the affects of caching
After formatting as NTFS, I think you can turn off ''optimize for performance'' to turn off file caching to let you do a direct speed comparison.
With how flash memory works, the entire drive will need to be filled up entirely once before you can get accurate write speed data.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Write_amplification
Here's a comparison of FAT32, NTFS and exFAT used on flash drives that some nut-job did. It's pretty thorough:
http://www.testfreaks.com/blog/information/usb-flash-drive-comparison-part-2-fat32-vs-ntfs-vs-exfat/
Queue
i see in his comparison that he times 8 Gb file transfers on FAT32 :P
for these large files, FAT32 is slow
for smaller files (less than the 4 Gb that FAT32 actually supports - lol), FAT32 is a winner (FAT32 and exFAT32 are close)
he also mentions that exFAT is a vista+ thing, but can be made to work for XP
for those who are interested, KB955704 is the hotfix
i don't see support for win 2000, as it is beyond the support life-cycle for this kind of update
it's possible that the XP hotfix would work, i suppose
if not, it doesn't seem like it would be too difficult to extract the files from the hotfix and force it to work - lol
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/955704
He used a 350 MB AVI file for general copy speed testing.
The OPS/MINUTE comparison is specifically tailored to flash storage performance and tests 512 B, 32 KB, 256 KB, 2 MB and 64 MB file sizes.
Queue
gotcha - i interpreted the graph incorrectly
refering to the 13th graph, it mentions 8Gb on the last 2 tests - that is the volume size - not the file size
that particular brand is just slow with FAT32
Queue,
exFAT is working very well for me on my thumb drives. I'm sold.
me too :bg
Free Space on an 8 Gb thumb drive:
NTFS 7.42 Gb
FAT32 7.44 Gb
exFAT 7.46 Gb
Just keep in mind the compatibility limitations of exFAT. Would suck to have a demonstration to give and your files are on an exFAT flash drive, but the junker computer you have access to doesn't support it (WinXP without exFAT support, for example). Eventually it'll become ubiquitous though.
NTFS isn't totally worthless for flash drives obviously, if you're purposefully going to make use of some NTFS-specfic features; just for general use it's simply the worst choice. That was really all I wanted to point out.
Anecdotal evidence has all 3 file systems catastrophically failing if a drive is removed while a write is in progress; I've seen no evidence that any one is ''safer'' than another in that regard. You'd think that due to the journaling, NTFS would be safe, but there are cases of NTFS-formatted drives being corrupted to the point where Windows won't recognize the drive as being formatted / having any files. Data is erased in large blocks (256 KB) before being rewritten (including data present in that block that wasn't related to the new data being written); 256 KB is a lot of data if it's file system structure so an erase/write that occurs in the same block as critical file system structure could trash the file system if the rewrite fails (due to the drive being yanked out, for example). Wear leveling can cause the movement of blocks containing critical data (even if you aren't explicitly changing the data in said block) which puts the file system at risk in the same way. My point here is: always tell Windows to eject a flash drive before physically unplugging it.
Queue
QuoteMy point here is: always tell Windows to eject a flash drive before physically unplugging it.
that is the way i have always used it, anyways
although, i had it set for quick-removal in the event it was accidently pulled out or something
but that is a great piece of info
thanks Queue :U
One BIG problem, my WD TV HD doesn't recognize exFAT. So, it's back to NTFS on the flash drives I use with it.
At least I'm less ignorant about exFAT now, and I'll keep using it on the 64 GB flash drive I use for backing up my laptop. The backup goes faster BTW.
There are probably a couple of things involved with a restriction like this, FAT32 works on disks up to 28 or so meg, then with standard MS tools you must use NTFS for larger but from memory a USB stick is constructed to LOOK like a disk to a computer but it does not mean it acts like a disk. Many USB stick/pen drives etc .... will only format as FAT32. perhaps the larger ones may support NTFS.
with the exFAT hotfix applied, that option is available in format
it is wonderful, so long as all the computers that are to use it have the support hotfix (easy enough to install)
i have seen discussions about SSD's performance suffering if the partition does not start on a memory-aligned sector
which i find rather interesting - you'd think it would be more of a mechanical issue - not an electronic issue
Hutch,
To enable NTFS on your drive, open the Device Manager and find your USB drive under the Disk Drives heading. Right click the drive and select Properties, then go to the Policies tab and select the "Optimize for performance" option and Click OK.
Once you do that, open up My Computer and right click on the flash drive and select Format. There you will see that you now have the option to format to NTFS in the File System dropdown box.
Like Dave said there is a hotfix (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=1cbe3906-ddd1-4ca2-b727-c2dff5e30f61&displaylang=en) to enable exFAT on Windows XP. exFAT is not supported on Windows 2000.
The problem I have with FAT32 is the maximum file size is 4GB.
exFAT is the best file system for flash drives, I just wish more devices, like my video player, supported it.
yes - a shame they don't provide updates for win2000, as well as win95/98 for that matter
i extracted the hotfix to see what was involved
one would think it is a simple driver, but they update shell32.dll :'(
EDIT - ahhhhhhhhh
i tried my flash drive with my TV and it did not recognize it
i was thinking it was a speed issue, but now that you mention it, i bet it wants to see NTFS
Yes, I think Microsoft should at least release a hotfix for exFAT for Windows 2000. But I'm not holdin' my breath.
Dave,
Looks like you're going to have to use NTFS too, unless you can get by with < 4GB files.
file size is not an issue, really
not sure i want to use NTFS on it, though
i may just get a drive
a much cooler solution would be to write a driver that makes my USB port appear to be a drive to the TV :8)
I have decided to use my external HDDs for the video files and leave the thumb drives formatted exFAT or FAT32. Use the right tool for the right job. The thumb drives are just so handy.
Quote from: Greg Lyon on July 12, 2010, 04:09:30 PM
Yes, I think Microsoft should at least release a hotfix for exFAT for Windows 2000. But I'm not holdin' my breath.
Microsoft would only release for supported systems. For example, windows xp rtm is not supported, you needed sp2 or sp3 to put the hot fix on.
Exfat is currently only supported on Microsoft systems, tuxera will oem drivers for Linux soon but Linux and Mac are currently out of luck. This also means no current support for most TVs, blurry, ps2 and I guess even xbox right now.
There are some rouge driver projects out there to produce exfat drivers, many are read only.
Some exfat blogging at rshullic.wordpress.com and a detailed technical paper on exfat internals at the forensics section in the sans reading room.
Note that fat32 will support up to 2 tb but has to be formatted using non-Microsoft utilities if larger than 32gb.
t has been the case where Microsoft prefer to have their later OS versions use their preferred disk formatting options and this has been from Win2000 upwards which is a pest in that FAT32 was always faster than NTFS when it was maintained properly. Its a control/compatibility issue where if you end up locked into some weird option of dynamic striped spanned disks it cannot be transported to anything else. I long ago learnt to format most disks to the basic level with no wierd options so I can rescue the disk and its contents if a computer fails.
Depending on the board and its built in support I occasionally stripe 2 disks as RAID0 for IO speed gains but don't put anything important on them.
Got my Thermaltake dock today.
Put in the wd disk from the MY Book and ran "Partd Magic" on it:
Formated the drive and here are the results:
298.09 total size
73.76 MB used
298.02 Gb unused
Seems that WD has put the junk on the drive with super glue.
Once but NEVER twice.
GOOOOOODBY WD.
no Jack - that looks perfectly normal for an empty NTFS formatted drive
it takes some space for the index tables etc