This is the western digital smartware logo you may see on your computer when connecting your external drive.
You can view the instructions from Western Digital on this link, or on this page below! Note that these instructions may change in the future; If newer editions of the drive come out, then I’ll be making an update to the page. This should work for the next year at least:
Mac instructions will come first, and Windows users look further down the page.
IMPORTANT
The following precautions must be performed before installing the firmware update:
- All AntiVirus software MUST be disabled.
- All Anti-Spyware software MUST be disabled.
- ANY and ALL programs that would require drive access during the update MUST be disabled.
- Failure to perform these precautions may cause data corruption/loss and/or drive failure.
Mac STEP 1:Firmware Update: Release 1.032 (11/19/09)
Western Digital's portable 'Passport drive'
This update is recommended for Mac OS X 10.4.11, Mac OS X 10.5.8 and any version of Mac OS X 10.6.
- Disconnect all other external drives from the computer except for the My Book or My Passport hard drive you want to update.
- Ensure that the My Book or My Passport drive is connected to a USB port on your computer.
- Download Firmware Updater for Mac. (mirror here)
- Unzip the Firmware Updater and double click WD Essential and Elite Firmware Updater for Mac.
- Verify the attached drive’s serial number located on the back of the drive.
- Select the drive displayed.
- Click Update Firmware.
- Drag both My Book Drive and WD SmartWare Virtual CD icons to Trash bin.
- Click OK.
- Click Accept the End User’s License Agreement (EULA).
- Click Yes.
- Once the updater is finished, click Exit.
- Turn off the drive – For My Passport, disconnect the USB cable. For My Book disconnect both USB and power cables.
- Wait 10 seconds. Reconnect the USB/power cables.
Mac STEP 2:Download and run the VCD Manager
- Download VCD Manager VirtualCDManager_v1003.zip for Mac to your desktop. (mirror here)
- Unzip the utility and double click to open.
- Click Continue to disable the VCD.
- Click Accept the End User’s License Agreement (EULA).
- Click Drive to configure and select your drive.
- Verify desired Virtual CD setting.
- Once the utility has found your drive, click Configure Drive.
- Once the Virtual CD setting is finished, click Exit.
- Power cycle the drive – For My Passport, disconnect the USB cable. For My Book disconnect both USB and power cables.
- Wait 10 seconds. Reconnect the USB/power cables.
- Verify that the VCD no longer appears.
PC STEP 1:Firmware Update: Release 1.032 (11/16/09)
Western Digital's External 'MyBook Drive'
- Disconnect all other external drives from the computer except for the My Book or My Passport hard drive you want to update.
- Download the Firmware Updater for Windows. (mirror here)
- Unzip the file and double click to open the Firmware Updater.
- Click Continue to update the firmware.
- Verify the attached drive’s serial number located on the back of the drive.
- Click Update Firmware.
- Click Accept the End User’s License Agreement (EULA). The updater will scan the drive; this may take a few minutes.
- Once the updater is finished, click Exit.
- Turn off the drive – For My Passport, disconnect the USB cable. For My Book disconnect both USB and power cables.
- Wait 10 seconds. Reconnect the USB/power cables.
PC STEP 2:Download and run the VCD Manager
- Download VCD Manager WDSmartWareVirtualCDManagerforWindows-v1.0.7.4.zip for Windows to your desktop. (mirror here)
- Unzip the utility (Extract the file using an extraction utility.)
- Double click WDSmartWareVirtualCDManagerforWindows-v1.0.7.4.exe.
- Click Continue to disable the VCD.
- Once the utility has found your drive, click Configure Drive and then click Exit.
- Turn off the drive – For My Passport, disconnect the USB cable. For My Book disconnect both USB and power cables.
- Wait 10 seconds. Reconnect the USB/power cables that have been disconnected in the previous step.
- Verify that the VCD no longer appears.
And there you have it, good riddance!
credit to Western Digital for the instructions:
http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/updates/?family=wdsmartwareutilities
http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/updates/?family=wdsmartwareutilitiesmac
Thank you! Thank you! It worked! I cant stand these companies having this crap on the disk and making it so difficult to remove!! Thankyou! Good instructions! Daron
my pleasure :]
Thanks, was driving me crazy!
WDSmartware is causing major grief with my new MacBook Pro running Snow Leopard — if the machine goes to sleep then I cannot wake it without a force shutdown and restart. Also, machine is really slow when WDSmartware is installed. The log indicates all sorts of problems with WDSmartware…
I cannot believe that Western Digital screwed up this badly. This is a really awful piece of software to force on people. I have used MyBook drives for two years now but will not do so ever again.
DON’T BUY THESE DRIVES!!!
I think the drives are great, you just need to disable this garbage so that it’s out of your way. I’d be interested to hear what you would be buying as an alternative however…
I just want to precise that this DOES NOT removed the partition of this disk.
Especially, if you want to use it for XBox or else, you’re still fucked.
I didn’t read any real trick to remove totally the partition which is included in this bloody firmware.
If someone knows…
THANK YOU!!! For these instructions. Just picked up a Wd passport for a client this weekend. Spent several hrs this weekend trying to figure out how to get rid of that junk. I must have reformatted the drive a hundred times. lol.
Now it’s gone and everybody’s happy. Thanks again!
This hides the software, but does not delete it….
I REALLY THANKS FULL TO YOU, THIS WAS A HEADACHE BUT YOU SOLVE THIS FOR US.
THANK-YOU AND GOD BLESS YOU.
It is NOT REMOVED. You’ve gone and hidden it! this IS a headache! you’ve only got a 999GB drive they stole your 1GB and FORCED this trash on you. Unless they release a solid fix I believe this is going back to the store. Seagate wouldn’t do this, Samsung wouldn’t and even Hitachi wouldn’t. Not even the worst 3rd party trash went so far as to put backup software onto an external as a rootkit!
The best alternative if you’re a western digital fanboy is the just a internal drive and buy and external casing
3to5 year warranty vs 2 years. might cost 10-20$ more thought. but you’ll get firewire and Esata too.
Oh god thank you it was killing me! What a horror of design engineering.
Well I followed the steps and after the firmware update the drive no long mounts… so I can do anything now, not even run the VCD step….dead in the water….
Now the WD website says:
Software Update for Mac Users
Windows users click here
We have temporarily suspended downloads of release 1.2.1.25 for Mac while we investigate a recently discovered issue with the software. We will restore download capability as soon as we have resolved the issue.
Well that explains why it did not work I guess and now no back up drive!
I downloaded and followed the steps that “hide” the software but my machine still seems to be running super slow. Am i screwed out of my money and time or is there a way to fix this? Even when the drive is not connected I still have the wd smartware icon in the lower right hand corner of my screen. when i try to click exit smartware nothing happens. Any help would be huge.
I have bought a 320GB drive and it arrived today…but the capacity claims to only be 297GB once connected! Should this WD Smartware really take up 23GB?!
And will it really not work with an Xbox 360? What a waste of money!
Xhefri, that’s strange, have you reached a resolution?
Justin, you’re not giving me much information to help you out, “My machine is slow” is like telling your doctor “I don’t feel well”
Tess, TYPICALLY drives that are sold as XXGB capacity are usually XX less a small amount, I have a 1TB drive that’s only 931GB, a 500GB drive that’s only 475GB, so on and so forth. The only time I’ve ever purchased a drive that was actually what was advertised is my 2TB G-Drive. I can’t say for certain (although I’m sure Google has an answer) but I believe different file system formatting will steal a little bit of space from you. You’re not alone.
I’m not familiar with xbox360 interfacing so you’ll need to explain that as well :]
Ok, I understand that they want you to use their bullshit software, but I fail to understand the reasoning behind why they want to make it so difficult to remove. Surely they must be aware that the vast majority of computer users don’t like having stuff forced upon them. At least with the older external drives it was possible to delete the crap. I have been using western digital hard drives for a while now and have always found them OK, but I shall be looking for something different next time i need more hard drive space. Recommendations anyone? I’m using a Macbook pro.
I called WD and the tech said the software was on a flash card. That’s why you can’t delete it. I still don’t know where the extra 50GB went. Oh well.
thanks! just used this and it worked perfectly (for the PC)
Thanks a lot! Worked perfect. I think WD should reconsider this software talibanism if they like to have returning customers
Followed the WD firmware update and their latest removal update. The CD icon is gone, but every time the hard drive is attached the Smartware software launches automatically. Can this be stopped?
please help! i followed the instructions and now my passport elite’s lights are just on and the it’s not mounting on my desktop
what should i do?
i’m using a mac btw
I have bought WD drives for years, but I will never buy another one! Not only do they infect your computer with this BS – WD SmartWare rootkit that you can’t really remove (you can only hide it from yourself… it’s still on the physical harddrive and still takes up that space), it appears that they have a serious reliability issue with their MyBook external drives.
In the last two weeks I have had two 500 gig MyBooks fail with the infamous “click of death” and tried everything (including freezing them) to get them to work long enough to do a final backup before they croaked completely. No go… they’re dead, dead, dead… so I lost a few gigs of music, photos, and videos that I hadn’t backed up in the last month!
i’m fairly mac savvy, and after step one the drive no longer shows up anywhere, not in disk utility or in the step two software, got any solution to this?
thanks for the help
The smart ware is gone, but it still wont show up on my PS3 via usb. My Toshiba 500gb worked fine, but this wd 1tb wont show up at all. I hate it.
Best advice for this issue. Almost gave up and returned my drive. Thanks very much!
Anybody got any advise for this PS3 issue?
It seems that everyone has forgotten the basics of computers…always needing some special software to fix a problem! Simply go to the command prompt in the windows start menu, change the drive to the WD harddrive (expample–type f: to change to the f drive if that is how your computer has recognized it) then type format f: You will then be prompted to confirm that you want to format and that all data will be lost. Now, because WD has played this trick with the virtual CD you will see the following message:
“Format cannot run because the volume is in use by another process.
Format may run if this volume is dismounted first. ALL OPENED HANDLES
TO THIS VOLUME WOULD THEN BE INVALID. Would you like to for a dismount
on this volume? (Y/N)”
Enter y and return. You will see: “Volume dismounted. All opened handles to this volume are now invalid.” At this point the formatting will begin. Once complete all WD VCD problems will have been removed.
Back to the WD Smartware issue….. I followed the above instructions by Marc on Windows XP for getting rid of the WD Smartware package. At first I thought it was still there but when I checked my corresponding G: drive (the main drive) and it had jumped from available space of 298G’s up to 319G’s which is 1G short of what is advertised on the box. I’m okay with that…. Thanx Marc.
m00FER thanKS For THE INFo!
Hi,
I bought one of these today, (500gb) and their stupid software takes 35Gb!!!!
I ran the firmware thing as suggested, it simply hid it, I still am 35Gb down.
TR, I tried what you suggested and it just kicks up an access denied, and nothing else. (windoze 7)
I can’t even see the drive in acronis disc director….
If I can resolve this I’m taking it back in a couple of days.
R
Thank you!!!!!!!! The wd smart ware is gone and with it the annoying mac message that tells you that data migt be destroyed or the disk fucked up. Now I might start to like this little 500 gb WD beuty…
Roy you have to run the cmd prompt as administrator…… Then do what TR said to do…
Right click on icon and run as administrator…..
Still, does not work. Apparently I have it “locked” yet I have never set a password. I have used windows to do a full format of the drive and its still popping up when I connect the drive.
I sorted it, I just had to install then uninstall. Strange! Next time i’m buying 2.5 WD internal and case.
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