WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review

We look at another bus-powered Thunderbolt solution. Enter the Passport Pro from WD. Follow on as Tyler gives us a rundown on this new portable device.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage
Comment IconFacebook IconX IconReddit Icon
In Loving Memory
Published
Updated
Manufactured by WDC
3 minutes & 45 seconds read time

Introduction & Pricing, Availability and Specifications

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 01

For the longest time, the WD My Passport line-up has been one of the most popular portable storage solutions. To further this, WD has now advanced the line-up with a Thunderbolt enabled solution dubbed the My Passport Pro.

The My Passport Pro is, like I said above, a Thunderbolt enabled storage solution. Internally, you will find dual 2TB 15mm 2.5-inch HDDs, and even though they chose to go for capacity over top-tier performance, WD has managed to make this solution bus powered as well.

Compatibility of the My Passport Pro extends to OS X 10.7+.

Pricing, Availability and Specifications

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 02

MSRP for the 4TB My Passport Pro is set at $429.99 with a three-year warranty. Availability is high at this point, and many online retailers have the unit in stock.

PRICING: You can find the WD My Passport Pro for sale below. The prices listed are valid at the time of writing but can change at any time. Click the link to see the very latest pricing for the best deal.

United States: The WD My Passport Pro (4TB) retails for $429.00 at Amazon.

Canada: The WD My Passport Pro (2TB) retails for CDN$385.41 at Amazon Canada.

Australia: The WD My Passport Pro (4TB) retails for $657.99 AUD at Mighty Ape Australia.

New Zealand: The WD My Passport Pro (4TB) retails for $699.99 NZD at Mighty Ape NZ.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 02

Packaging for the 4TB My Passport Pro is rather extravagant. Here we have a double box package.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 03

Opening up the box, we found the drive elegantly packaged inside.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 04

Scope of delivery includes the drive and reading materials.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 05

Here we put our My Passport Edge next to the Passport Pro.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 06

The side of the Passport Pro carries a small fan to cool the drives inside. Also notice the Thunderbolt cable is attached directly to the unit and tucks into the side.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 08

Here you can see the backside of the PCB and the ASMedia controllers used for the SATA connection.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 09

Internally, the Passport Pro uses two WD20NPVX HDDs.

Test System Setup

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 100

In testing the performance of Thunderbolt storage solutions, we utilize the Apple MacBook Pro Retina Late 2013 model, which, as of this article, is running OS X 10.9.1. Full system specifications are available above. To create RAID volumes in OS X, I use Apple Disk Utility with 64K stripe size for RAID volumes.

Black Magic Design Disk Speed Test

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 99

Disk Speed Test is an easy to use tool to quickly measure and certify your disk performance for working with high quality video. Simply click the start button, and Disk Speed Test will write test your disk using large blocks of data and display the result. Disk Speed Test will continue to test writes and reads from your disk, so you can evaluate both performance and readability over time.

AJA System Test

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 98

Check the performance of any drive on your system to ensure it is tuned for the performance you need.

Benchmarks – Black Magic Design Disk Speed Test and AJA System Test

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 19

In testing the My Passport Pro, we decided to test just RAID 0 to get an idea of the maximum performance of the unit. As you can see, in Black Magic, the Passport Pro was able to hit 211 MB/s read and 194 MB/s write.

Benchmarks – AJA System Test

All testing with AJA System Test is done with a 16GB file size.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 20

In our first test with AJA, we test 720p, and the Passport Pro came in at 230 MB/s read and write.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 21

Over on 1080p RAID 0, we found the drive hovering around 230 MB/s read and write with spikes up to 250 MB/s read.

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 22

With 4K in RAID 0, the Passport Pro showed similar results to what we found during 720p and 1080p. Here we have 230 MB/s read and write with some spikes towards 240 MB/s.

Final Thoughts

WD My Passport Pro 4TB Thunderbolt Portable Storage Review 200

The WD My Passport Pro is one of the better Thunderbolt storage solutions for those that want top-notch capacity. With the unit being bus powered, it takes the pain away from carrying around a large power brick and adds to the portability of the unit. On the other side of things, the WD Passport Pro is a hefty unit and does take up quite a bit of space for a portable solution. Of course, being an OS X storage solution, the Passport Pro is Time Machine compatible and should allow for rather quick backups.

Performance of the Passport Pro was quite good, touching 240 MB/s read and write in our AJA testing. Over on Black Magic, we found the drive capable of 211 MB/s read and 194 MB/s write.

The WD My Passport Pro in the 4TB capacity carries an MSRP of $429.99 with a three-year warranty.

PRICING: You can find the WD My Passport Pro for sale below. The prices listed are valid at the time of writing but can change at any time. Click the link to see the very latest pricing for the best deal.

United States: The WD My Passport Pro (4TB) retails for $429.00 at Amazon.

Canada: The WD My Passport Pro (2TB) retails for CDN$385.41 at Amazon Canada.

Australia: The WD My Passport Pro (4TB) retails for $657.99 AUD at Mighty Ape Australia.

New Zealand: The WD My Passport Pro (4TB) retails for $699.99 NZD at Mighty Ape NZ.

What do TweakTown.com awards mean? Click for details!

In Loving Memory

Email IconX IconLinkedIn Icon

Tyler joined the TweakTown team in 2013 and reviewed 100s of new techy items. Growing up in a small farm town, tech wasn't around, unless it was in a tractor. At an early age, Tyler's parents brought home their first PC. Tyler was hooked and learned what it meant to format a HDD, spending many nights reinstalling Windows 95. Tyler's love and enthusiast nature always kept his PC nearby. Eager to get deeper into tech, he started reviewing. Sadly, Tyler lost his battle with cancer on October 17, 2024.

Right of Reply

We openly invite the companies who provide us with review samples / who are mentioned or discussed to express their opinion. If any company representative wishes to respond, we will publish the response here. Please contact us if you wish to respond.

Related Topics

Newsletter Subscription