Remove the VCD from my drive.

[GeePeaEl]

I have bough many Western Digital internal and external hard drives, but apparently I have bounght my last.

After giving the SmartWare software a really good chance, I really, really hate it, it took forever to load the software, and tried to remove the VCD so I had a 'simple' hard drive, and found that WD did an amazingly user-unfriendly thing to try to force us to use it anyway, and not get rid of the VCD.

So now this is my 'deep backup' disk that I use once a year perhaps, and just bought a compettor's portable disk that works just fine and will get my business in the future.

WD, if you are reading this, why would you think we would like the slow, annoying SmartWare?

Goodby, no reason to answer now.

GeePeaEl

[WhataDisaster]

Well done, WD -  you've managed to bastardize something as simple as a removable drive into a frustrating, time wasting incompatibility nightmare. This is some kind of achievement; Please give the monkey in charge of R&D a banana for his or her effort.

All I wanted was a portable drive and what I got was an hour of head scratching/Googling as to how a Vista PC I'm trying to back some files up from (with no Net connectivity) is asking for drivers and thus refusing to mount the NTFS partition I know is there. Well I've sorted it but hell, talk about over-complicating things via needless junk.

Seriously, I thought I knew what to expect when buying a HDD + controller + box to house it all and a cable to connect it to something but you've managed to change all that. Now I have to read reviews to see what I'm getting into ...

Oh wait, no I don't -  I just won't buy WD again (lesson absolutely learned).

I'm pleased to report that after reading all about the VCD partition and the inability to remove it, I returned the drive for a full refund, despite the scratches I managed to put on it cleaning it with a microfibre cloth! Incidentally another great idea: Making a portable drive -  likely to be carried around a lot, finishing it in a non scratch resistant high gloss and not selling it with a carry-sleeve. Give the Marketing Monkey a banana, too.

/facepalm

[manwald]

Maybe this is, what you all waited for:

Remove/delete VCD permanently

Enjoy it!

Best regards and good luck

manwald

[greenmick]

that seems to have worked for me manwald , thanks mate

[GerryO]

Just curious, is the HP format utility is what you had luck with?  The article at www.dedoimedo.com  also linked to a "U-3" utility, Iwas not able to open the link ...  I have run the HP utility twice with no luck in removing the  "Smartware" partition.  Just looking for what I may have missed?? 

Soon I'll give up and use it with the partition there, I'm disappointed to have to spend time fooling around trying to get rid of something I didn't expect  to be there in the first place ... This is probably my 3rd Passport I've acquired, The others I was able to format and lose the useless junk without any problem.

 Like lots of others, I just wanted a empty storage drive ... surprise, surprise! 

Thanks in advance, Gerry 

[JustMe]

GerryO, the article is not the solution, look the older post!

[JCF2009]

There's no fix for this, the only fix that can be available is the one that Western Digital don't care to do, a simple firmware update that remove the partition.

[greenmick]

GerryO ,

 I have no vcd showing in my manage / disc management , and my hd is showing the same size as my wd10ears .

I can move it from my win7 pc to a xp pc with no issues , and it works fine with my wdlivetv .

i *only* used the hputil linked to by manwald .

*edit*^

[Hixbot]

Hiding the VCD is all well in good, but that doesn't remove the prompt for SES drivers.  If you have chosen not use the features of the VCD, then obviously one doesn't not want the SES drivers.  I can install the drivers on one PC to remove the annoying prompt, but it the prompt will be back on another PC.  This is a portable external drive, and thats what the consumer wants.  WD needs to listen to this feedback, and give us a firmware that treats it as a simple external drive.  No prompts for SES drivers, no VCD crap, just and external storage device.

I can't believe all this time has past and WD continues to ignore the feedback from consumers.  I will never buy another WD product again, and I will tell everyone I know the same thing.

[GuyPicks]

Oh no... I bought a WD external drive and can't get rid of the VCD. I've tried everything.
Good Lord, what's up with that?

VCD shows 668MB UDF space taken and the system shows 133MB taken.

Isn't there a way to get this space back?

Please help.