Western Digital releases new dual-drive My Book World Edition II network storage system

Today Western Digital announced a new twin-drive My Book World Edition II Network Storage System. Offered in configurations up to 4TB, the My Book World Edition II can be used as a reliable method to backup for multiple computers attached to a network, and keep it safe through internal RAID 1 data mirroring. Prices start at $399 for the 2TB version and $699 for the 4TB version.

For more information on the new Western Digital My Book World Edition II, read our full review on DesktopReview.com.

 

This sounds pretty cool if it works, but doesn't Acer have an actual Windows computer for that price, running Windows Home Server, with like an Atom CPU and four drive bays? That sounds ideal to me.

 

Funny you should mention that, Wolfpup. We just got that in for review as well!

 

I smell conspiracy!


If they sold this with no drive I would be tempted, but as of now.... no thank you.

 

I've been out of the Desktop scene for a long time now... but if they use RAID 1 then that means they have 2x4TB Hard drives in there
I didnt even know they made 4TB hard drives yet

Off to newegg for research

 

This drive enclosure contains 2x2TB drives(there are no 4TB 3.5" drives on the market as yet ).
The 4TB raid 1 setup means that you have about 2TB of recordable space that’s backed up (mirrored) to another drive so that if one drive fails, you don’t lose any data. Now if you wanted more speed/space, you could reconfigure the drive to raid 0 (Striped) mode allowing you to access all 4TB. It is for this reason that WD gets away with calling the drive 4TB because you could theoretically reconfigure the drive to get all 4TB usable.

This same reasoning (but with 1TB drives instead) will also hold true for the 2TB version as well.

 

$700? Wow, thats hard to swallow does anyone think its worth the money?

 

Heck no, you can buy 2TB drives for like $200 so your paying $300 just for the enclosure and the NAS/Raid function it has.

If your going to pay that much, may as well get the DROBO - http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000PDLZ1A/?tag=googhydr-20&hvadid=3727415729&ref=pd_sl_1811xgjw5f_e

Holds 4 drives and its hot swappable, it has a smart raid system similar to how windows home server works, and also since you would be using your own drives they usually have longer warranties than external enclosures.


As an alternative solution I would do this:

4x 1TB Western Digital Green - $89 shipped http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...le-_-Hard+Drives-_-Western+Digital-_-22136317
1x Drobo $326 http://www.eworldsale.com/data-robo...-array-external-enclosure-usb_5760_26037.html

Reason 1 - 1TB drives have shown to be much more reliable than 2TB drives when it comes to failurre rates,
Reason 2 - Hot swappable and upgradable
Reason 3 - Warranty
Reason 4 - Smart Raid

Total Cost - 90x4+326 = $686

But before I would get the drobo, I would probably just build my own Windows Home server since it has even more to offer and can be done for about the same cost, just would be bigger as it would be a whole computer and not this neat little box.

though the HP prebuilt home servers are very compact but would cost you more.

HP Home Server w/ 500gb included $379, just add more HDDs, has all hardware/software and its small and awesome.
http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/product_detail.do?product_code=GG795AAR%23ABA&aoid=20715&ci_src=14110944&ci_sku=GG795AAR#ABA

Me personally I am building my own home server with a midtower that holds 8HDD's so I can have 16TB of storage but cut it in half to 8TB due to redundancy, I have a lot of files. I am waiting for 2TB HDD's to become cheaper/better.

 

It's closer to an extra $200 instead of $300 when you factor in the drives. Still, for the money I think I'd rather have a WHS, or heck, something running Unraid. I like Drobos, but they're slow (the new 8-bay one is fast, but crazy expensive, too).

 

Never head of unraid before, looks interesting.

If you were to pick would you go WHS or Unraid?

I assume WHS is more feature packed but at the same time maybe not as streamline/specialized.

The new WHS version comming with the HP units is supposed to be great, but you cant get the same HP only features with the generic disk I dont think.

Also since I finally started my own site I like the idea of hosting my site from my server, as I think it will be far better than the hosting I use currently.

 

I never heard of unraid either until now lol.