(I’m in a double NAT situation because there’s no retail alternative to AT&T’s U-verse gateway/router combo).
Installing the My Cloud is pretty much a plug-and-play affair: It even detected my double-NAT’d router and configured itself to work under those circumstances without any intervention on my part. I just wish my digital camera was smart enough to support an app that could do that (yes, I should buy a Wi-Fi-enabled storage card).
#WD MY CLOUD DESKTOP APP INSTALL#
Install the apps onto your smartphones and tablets, and you can send all your media files over the Internet to your My Cloud.
#WD MY CLOUD DESKTOP APP ANDROID#
WD offers mobile apps for the Android and iOS operating systems, which helps solve another problem many of us face: data fragmentation caused by having stored files on multiple devices. You connect a digital camera directly to the My Cloud’s USB 3.0 port, or add an additional drive to expand its storage capacity. If you’d like, you can mirror these backups on a public cloud service. And unlike some NAS manufacturers that limit the number of free client licenses you get, Western Digital will back up as many computers as you’d care to connect to it (there are practical limitations, of course, based on the amount of available storage). And the drive supports Apple’s Time Machine technology, so you can back up Mac clients, too.
Alternatively, you can connect a stand-alone USB hard drive into this port and expand the My Cloud’s storage capacity.Īs with the My Book Live, you can also back up your PC to the My Cloud over your network. But there’s one My Cloud feature you won’t find on any My Book Live: a USB 3.0 port that can host a digital camera for direct file transfers. My Cloud sounds a lot like WD’s My Book Live product line, doesn’t it? As it turns out, the My Cloud series is replacing the My Book line, and the new desktop and mobile apps WD is launching alongside My Cloud will also work with the older drives. Robert Cardin WD’s My Cloud NAS box delivers all the convenience of a cloud-storage service in a device that’s completely in your control. I can also transfer files between the My Cloud and cloud-storage services, such as Dropbox. And I can create user accounts with passwords to allow family, friends, and colleagues to access specific folders, so we can share information (or media) and collaborate. But I can access it from the Internet-from a PC, smartphone, or tablet-just like a cloud service. It’s a hard drive that connects to my home network, so it’s as secure as I can make it. WD’s My Cloud delivers the best of both worlds.