understanding the size of the new Traveling Terabyte

[hexjunkie]

Re: understanding the size of the new Traveling Terabyte

Thank you D.O. you have just saved me from wasting the $180 I was going to use to upgrade my laptop's hard drive to 1TB... invaluable service sir :)

Sending e-mail as soon as I'm home to do so.

I'll do some testing and see if there isn't a way to work getting rid of the hard coded "features".

Thank you for all your hard work sir, I'm spreading the word as best I can..

[Deviant Ollam]

Re: understanding the size of the new Traveling Terabyte

great job D.O.

thanks, man. i keep saying, it's truly the least i can do, compared with those who willingly leave the comforts of hearth and home for ever-extended periods of time.

i did notice on the spec sheet that the TB version is slightly thicker, obviously an extra platter.

this is correct. the drive is 11mm in thickness, more than the usual 9mm that has become the standard nowadays. and yes, it is due to a third platter in the drive.

It looks like a WD Passport. I have the 500GB version. It rocks.

there is an important distinction that everyone should know. Western Digital has gotten more and more idiotic with respect to their Passport model, and i'm making a plea to anyone here that if my comments resonate with you... consider please contacting them and complaining.

the following things should be known by all...

1. the WD passport revolutionized the portable storage field when it came out. if i recall, it was one of the first bus-powered drives that would work reliably on a single USB port (not requiring those "dual head" cables with a pair of A connectors in order to draw twice the juice)

2. the original passports were proper 2.5" hard drives attached to a USB-to-SATA adapter inside of a plastic shell. this is not the case anymore. now, if you crack a passport housing apart you will not find yourself holding a standard 2.5" SATA drive that you could insert into a laptop (even if the laptop's bay was large enough for the 11mm models, etc)

WD now uses a proprietary bus adapter built directly into the hard disk's housing. is is only USB capable. i'm relatively certain that it's still a SATA drive at the circuit board level... but if you want a drive that you can drop into a laptop, you have to buy their models exclusively for that purpose. this is annoying.

3. the above point is not NEARLY as annoying, however, as their completely retarded "software bundle" that is standard (as far as i can tell) on all new Passport drives. something i've referred to before... there is a ridiculous SanDisk-type "virtual CD drive" that attempts to auto-play and load all manner of unnecessary drivers and software features.

again... in a bit of non-standard implementation, Western Digital does not run this "feature" from a partition on the drive platters (neither standard or hidden) but, in fact, has incorporated their "virtual CD", as they call it, directly into the drive circuitry.

you can use a special utility from WD (downloadable, not included by default, i believe) to "hide" the virtual drive features... but they cannot (to the best of my understanding) be removed. even with the Virtual Disc "hidden" any connection to a PC still causes the operating system to attempt to find a driver for an "SES Device" whatever the hell that is. the non-installation of said driver has zero effect on the operation of the drive... whatever purpose it serves is apparently immaterial to normal functionality. still, it can not be removed.

it pains me to send the TTBs now into theaters of war and other military posts, wherein the first goddamn thing the unit will do when plugged into a machine is attempt to auto-play and load software. i have contacted WD and complained, as have some other folk... but for now it appears to fall on deaf ears.

only if enough people hammer them with gripes about security will they possibly change their minds and develop drives without all this crap. let people who can't figure out how to back up their computer download and install such software on their own instead of having it bundled (inextricably embedded, in fact) into the drive.

[xor]

Re: understanding the size of the new Traveling Terabyte

[joke]

D.O. you are the man. Just what every soldier in the field needs, 5000 hours of pr0n. If worst comes to worst they can throw it at the enemy, and they will be too preoccupied to fight.

[/joke]

Seriously great job D.O.

xor

[bascule]

Re: understanding the size of the new Traveling Terabyte

I do believe so. I recently bought the 250GB version, and if it's the same interface, it's bus powered via micro USB

It looks like a WD Passport. I have the 500GB version. It rocks.

[sintax_error]

Re: understanding the size of the new Traveling Terabyte

Is that a bus-powered USB drive?

I do believe so. I recently bought the 250GB version, and if it's the same interface, it's bus powered via micro USB. i did notice on the spec sheet that the TB version is slightly thicker, obviously an extra platter.

[bascule]

Re: understanding the size of the new Traveling Terabyte

Is that a bus-powered USB drive?

[Deviant Ollam]

Re: understanding the size of the new Traveling Terabyte

That's two decades in the future

heh... thanks, man. don't know how i mixed that up.

But that's a very cool case, great job!

thanks so much. i hope with the new under $200 price to build them that we'll see some more donated hardware and new TTBs starting to make their way around the globe.

[streaker69]

Re: understanding the size of the new Traveling Terabyte

can you just sit an imagine for one moment how much content that is? if someone walked up to you in 1990 and said that it would be possible to put this much material on this small a device a mere decade in the future... how would you have reacted?

what do you think storage technology will be like in the next five or ten years?

That's two decades in the future. :)

But that's a very cool case, great job!

[Deviant Ollam]

So, with the completion of the new TTB case (all data has been transfered and i'm printing out the new instruction notes now for inclusion within the logbook that lives in the case) i did a little side experiment. I wanted to see if any of my media players would be able to load a full playlist of all the material on the drive.

Heh, it took quite a while (and i had convinced myself at least twice that things had either totally hung or crapped out) but after 15 minutes or so, i had a full playlist loaded. Do you know how long all the material on there would be if you played it end to end? 5,000 hrs.

you read that right... five thousand hours.

Some highlights from these figures...

the audio section is actually the largest (which is good, since MP3 players take up less power in the field and are generally more conducive to being enjoyed in deployed areas than the viewing of videos) with my music archive exceeding 1300 hours. some notable large blocks of material in there are nearly 50 hours of Pink Floyd, nearly 50 hours of Nine Inch Nails, over 80 hours of Dave Matthews concerts, nearly 30 hours of Grateful Dead concerts, and 20 hours of the Ramones (which, when you think of how fast their songs are played, is like 40 hours or more from a typical band, ha!)

my audiobooks (and other spoken content) exceed 1800 hours of playtime. (heh, 325 hours of that is a massive collection of Star Wars novels that someone dumped in my upload directory at some point. an additional 75 hours in the audiobook section is an unabridged version of the bible. i may not be the slightest bit religious, but i recognize something that can be appreciated by many in desolate places with a lot of time on their hands so i wanted to include that on there. and for all those who might disagree... hey, i have Bill Maher's latest film and Christopher Hitchens' new book on the terabyte, as well)

men and women in uniform could spend 303 hours just learning new languages. some of the lessons on the TTB drive include typical ones like Spanish, French, and German, but also tactically useful ones such as Arabic, Chinese, and Russian.

there are full archives (all now completely up-to-date) of 23 television shows on the TTB, including such animated classics as The Simpsons, Family Guy, Futurama, Sifl & Olly, South Park, Robot Chicken, and Cowboy Bebop. there are political dramas that deal with war and statehood such as Band of Brothers, Generation Kill, and The West Wing. there are laugh-out-loud comedies like Chappelle's Show, Monty Python, and In Living Color. there are compelling dramas that make you think such as Firefly, Mad Men, The Prisoner, and -- our newest addition -- True Blood. and for those who want a break from scripted material, there are even reality and/or educational programs... MythBusters, Deadliest Catch, Tiger Team, and Penn & Teller's Bullshit! again, these are all full and complete archives of all episodes ever broadcast (and sometimes ones that never made it to air, ha!)

there are over 230 movies on the TTB, totaling to a length of 470 hours. action, drama, suspense, horror, comedy, and more. there is even a separate directory just called "knowledge" featuring documentary films and lectures (some from DEFCON and other conferences!) that adds an additional 91 hours of material.

stand up comedy, music videos, and the DEFCON Filler make for over 180 hours of additional material that can be watched diligently, or just used as background fill-in content while someone is servicing machinery or cleaning firearms.

and all of this, in something the size of a few packs of cigarettes...

... those are 5.56 rounds, for size comparison.

can you just sit an imagine for one moment how much content that is? if someone walked up to you in 2000 and said that it would be possible to put this much material on this small a device a mere decade in the future... how would you have reacted?

what do you think storage technology will be like in the next five or ten years?

[UPDATE: fixed my bad calendar math thanks to streaker]