New WD® Portable Storage Drive Wirelessly Connects To Smartphones, Tablets, Cameras And More

IRVINE, Calif., Sept. 3, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- WD^®, a Western Digital (NASDAQ: WDC) company and a world leader in connected storage solutions, today unveiled My Passport^® Wireless, an easy to use Wi-Fi™ enabled storage drive that allows consumers to save, access and share stored content wirelessly with any smartphone, tablet, computer or other device. For the frequent business traveler to the family on a road trip or creative professional working in the field, the My Passport Wireless drive is a simple way to connect all computing and mobile devices to content without any wires or Internet connection. Additionally, when users need to transfer large amounts of data, the My Passport Wireless drive provides the option of using a high speed USB 3.0 connection.

"As we celebrate its 10^th anniversary, the success of WD's My Passport^® line of portable hard drives is unprecedented," explains Jim Welsh, executive vice president, WD Content Solutions Business and worldwide sales. "Our new My Passport Wireless drive continues the evolution, resolving a common problem for today's mobile consumer; too many devices with limited storage and no way to offload their content and free up space on-the-go. Now, consumers will have one drive to easily store content from all their devices and enjoy that content anywhere they go."

The My Passport Wireless drive broadcasts its own wireless network that allows up to eight devices to connect at the same time and access any content stored on the drive. Available in 500GB, 1TB or 2TB models, users now have the ability to store and access up to hundreds of hours of movies and music, as well photos and other digital files, from their smartphones and tablets that are typically limited by minimal storage capacity.

The portable wireless drive features Wireless N with MIMO technology for enhanced wireless performance so that users can access and transfer files quickly, as well as stream up to four HD videos simultaneously. The built-in rechargeable battery provides up to six hours of continuous streaming and up to 20 hours of standby power making the drive a perfect travel companion.

With the My Passport Wireless drive users have anywhere, anytime access to their favorite digital content by using WD's award winning WD My Cloud® mobile app for iOS® or Android™ mobile devices. The WD My Cloud mobile app easily connects to a My Passport Wireless drive for simple product setup, and once setup the mobile app provides intuitive navigation, sharing and playback of the drive's content. The WD My Cloud app also helps unify all of a users' content under a single app and user interface, by allowing access to content on the My Passport Wireless drive, the WD My Cloud family of personal cloud storage, and on major public cloud services such as Dropbox™, OneDrive™ and Google Drive™ from just one app.

In additional to mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets, the portable wireless storage drive is an ideal companion for cameras with its integrated SD card slot. Whether shooting large commercial photography and video production or just taking photos and videos of the family while on vacation, the My Passport Wireless drive will never let you miss a moment because your memory cards are full. The built-in SD card slot lets users copy their content from the SD card to the My Passport Wireless drive to make room for more memorable moments. Additionally, with integrated FTP, the drive connects to compatible wireless cameras so that users can automatically transfer photos from their cameras to the drive as they are taking them.

Price and Availability

The My Passport Wireless drive is currently available for advance order online at the wdstore.com and will be available at select U.S. retailers later in September. MSRP is $129.99 USD for 500GB, $179.99 USD for 1 TB and $219.99 for 2 TB. The WD My Cloud mobile app currently is available for download for free from the App Store™ and Google Play™.

About WD

WD, a Western Digital company, is a long-time innovator and storage industry leader. As a storage technology pacesetter, the company produces reliable, high-performance hard disk drives and solid state drives. These drives are deployed by OEMs and integrators in desktop and mobile computers, enterprise computing systems, embedded systems and consumer electronics applications, as well as by the company in providing its own storage products. WD's leading storage devices and systems, networking products, media players and software solutions empower people around the world to easily save, store, protect, share and experience their content on multiple devices. WD was established in 1970 and is headquartered in Irvine, Calif. For more information, please visit the company's website at www.wd.com.

Western Digital Corp. (NASDAQ: WDC), Irvine, Calif., is a global provider of products and services that empower people to create, manage, experience and preserve digital content. Its companies design and manufacture storage devices, networking equipment and home entertainment products under the WD, HGST and G-Technology brands. Visit the Investor section of the company's website (www.westerndigital.com) to access a variety of financial and investor information.

Western Digital, WD, My Passport, My Cloud, WD My Cloud and the WD logo are registered trademarks of Western Digital Technologies, Inc. in the U.S. and other countries. Android, Google Play and Google Drive are trademarks of Google Inc. Onedrive is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. IOS is a trademark or registered trademark of Cisco in the U.S. and other countries and is used under license by Apple Inc. Dropbox is a trademark of Dropbox Inc. All other brand and product names mentioned herein are the property of their respective companies.

As used for storage capacity, one gigabyte (GB) = one billion bytes, and one terabyte (TB) = one trillion bytes. Total accessible capacity varies depending on operating environment. 

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SOURCE WD