WD Blue Solid State Drive

It is an excellent upgrade from a traditional hard drive. I now have my operating system and important software on this SSD, and my games and other non-essentials on a 1TB HHD. My system now boots up in 15-20 seconds (previously 1.5-2 minutes on my HHD), from BIOS (Quick Boot disabled) to login (Windows 10). It would boot much faster if I still werent using my Q9650 processor (nine years old and still kicking!). Depending on your computer, you might need a 2.5 adapter to make this fit, if you dont already have a spot for it.

Installed in a I3 driven Acer 4830T with 6gig ram. It cost $20 dollars to get the Win7 recovery disks from Acer. I started to worry that the drive wasnt working right because the reinstallation took about 2 hours. After the install/updates were done all I can say is wow! Dont forget to go to the WD website and download the dashboard software. You dont need this for the drive to work but it does verify it is working. Power up takes 20 seconds and a complete restart is only 1 minute. Now if I could just remember why I need a computer at home with my tablet and phone being so fast.

This SSD is connected to an older motherboard with SATA 2, this will give only about 60 % of the possible speed increase. However, still more speedy then my normal hard drive. Cloned the OS, but does not work as booth device because of apparently corrupted files. Maybe will do a clean re-install of Windows 10. For now I use it to store games who benefits from faster loading times and smoother game play. Installation is simple after purchasing an adapter for an 3.5 disk bay. Currently prices are still too high for SSDs. I assume they will come down more over time.

The drive installed easily. However, Western Digitals cloning software corrupted my Windows software and I had to reinstall Windows. Of course, because I never thought I needed it, I didnt make a reinstall disc when I purchased my Dell desktop. After using Western Digitals software, I spent about 5 hours trying to diagnose the corrupted drive through Dells utilities, only to give up an have to to a factory data restore of my whole computer. I would have lost all my data, had I not backed it up before installing Western Digitals SSD. Do not buy this product. Spend money on another SSD from another manufacturer

** UP DATE FROM PREVIOUS POST, THIS IS STILL GOOD PRODUCT FOR THE PRICES $279.00, AFTER I REMOVE FRPM MY PC AND THEN USED AN EXTERNAL HD TO REFORMAT IT FROM OTHER PC THEN RECONECT IT BACK WITH HP FACTORY DEFAULT WINDOW THEN IT WORKED & RUN LIKES PRO. 4 STARS BECAUSE I HAD TO REMOVED IT OUT MY PC, AND TOOK ME COUPLE HOURS TO REDO THE WINDOW.**

The WD Blue M.2 500GB works well. When formatted the capacity is not 500GB, it is more like 480GB. The SSD seems fast enough. I am using the SSD in an Intel NUC I5 that I use as a media server. I have no disk problems. I use the Resource Monitor to monitor the CPU and disk activity a lot while recording TV programs. I havent done any speed tests. It is just a lot faster than a hard drive.

It is fast booting. This drive fixes one of my pet peeves after getting in to Windows sitting there for 2 mins for icons etc to load. Now it is secs not mins, It works flawless in Windows 10. I got this after my Acer V3-731 hard drive died. I was able to restore using Acer software I ordered off their site and got back up and running in a couple hours UPDATE:.I notice after 4 month when I download the WD Dashboard software that on my Acer laptop the the WD drive is at 99%. If I lose a % every 4 month this sucker s going to last a long time. This is still the best upgrade ever.

In recent years I have tried several different brands of SSDs, and I think this is the best one yet. On my newest Windows 7 computer (refurbished HP Compaq Elite 8300 SFF PC) I try as much as possible to keep my data (that changes quite often) on the D: drive, so my C: drive (the WD SSD) remains as lean as ever may be. I also carefully monitor which programs and services start up automatically with Windows. As currently configured, the C: drive has a total of 57GB occupied of the reported 232GB available. When I restart my computer, it is back up and ready to go in about 50 seconds from the time I initiate the restart. That kind of performance, and my years of happy experience with WD products, give me confidence that this WD SSD will prove to be a very worthwhile investment.

I initially ordered a Crucial 525MX300 SSD and had nothing but problems trying to clone my W10 drive. The WD website gives you Acronis software which actually works and has several links to read for any problem you might be having. There is nothing in the box that tells you they provide the software free, so go to the WD support website. The WD support site has docs that walk you step by step through the cloning process. I spent 8 hours trying to get the Crucial to work with the Acronis 2014 software they link you to and somehow messed up my system to where I had blue screens and problems on my old drive and had to reset Windows 10 and do a fresh install on my old drive (lucky I made a back up and restore USB drive before all this). The WD drive took 30 minutes and I was cloned and running.

Update: With regard to the WD Blue SSD.. Zero Noise compared to any platter hard drive. But that would be applicable to any SSD. Speed is as promised. I think once you go SSD, there is no turning back.. If anyone has the intention of imaging their current PC to a new PC with this drive, I would recommend the problem free EaseUS backup and system transfer. I unfortunately have tried the top 5 recommendation and all failed or had several learning curves which became to time consuming. For $29 the home version is all you need..