WD 3TB My Passport Wireless Pro Portable External Hard Drive, Wifi USB 3.0 - WDBSMT0030BBK-NESN

(Changing my review)Ok, all of my problems stemmed from my PC. I'm not sure why, but that particular PC will corrupt the WD disk somehow and prevent the onboard OS from functioning correctly after I transfer files over USB.Spent a good deal time with WD support before I figured out what caused the problem. As long as I avoid connecting the drive to that computer with a USB cable, everything works as advertised.I like this enough now that I went ahead and purchased the replacement that Amazon sent me, so now I have two.(Previous)I received my WD 3TB My Passport Wireless Pro yesterday, and I spent a few hours struggling to get it to work. I'm a gadget guy, and usually I don't have any issues with new tech.The first thing I did was hook it up to my PC, which might have been a mistake. The drive showed up right away in the computer, but one of the driver's didn't automatically install. I found it in one of the folders already on the drive, so it installed without issue. The drive storage size was as expected on my computer.Then I tried setting up the drive's other features. I quickly realize that you need a WiFi enabled computer to set it up, but my desktop is wired. Ok, it says I can use a mobile device to set it up. I downloaded the app in my iPad and started it up.Right away I started having issues with it. The WiFi password is printed on a label on the drive, but it wasn't taking. I tried both access points, and both were telling me that the password was incorrect. I flipped it over to make sure that the password on the label matched the serial number (last 8 digits) and it did. I rebooted the drive, rebooted the iPad, and eventually I was able to connect. I thought it might have been an iPad issue, but it happened again later on while using a notebook with WiFi.I went through the setup procedure on the drive, but when it was finished, it said that there was only 688MB free on the drive, and the app was identifying it as a 0.5TB drive.Now that it was attached to my home network, I tried going to its webpage on on the desktop. It also displayed the incorrect information on the desktop browser. Since it read 3TB over USB, I thought that maybe it was an app issue since it's a new product. While I was looking at these pages, I was getting popular that said that there was a problem with the database.I went to the tab to install Plex, but when I tried to do this, it was unsuccessful after several attempts. I checked the Firmware tab and saw that there was a new firmware update, so I tried that, only to get a popup that said that I didn't have enough free storage to do the update. What the heck?In the Admin tab, there are options to reset the drive, either settings only or settings and disk. I tried the settings only reset, and after going through the whole process again, it still had the same issues. I finally got to,the point where I was going to call support, but they were closed for the day.I decided to do the full reset, including the disk, so I backed up the drive contents to my computer and hit the button. After a few minutes it was completed, and I went through the setup process again. This time, it seemed to work! The drive size was reported correctly, and I was able to install Plex and update the firmware. When it was finished, I copied all of the backed up files back on over USB, then tried the wireless out again. To my dismay, it was back to the no-free-storage, 0.5TB state again.I went through the whole process again, this time omitting copying the backed up files again. I copied a movie over, set it up in Plex, and tried watching it on my iPad. Worked great.Thinking that it was all good now, I copied about 30GB of movies over. After that was done, I checked Plex and only three movies were in the library. I check the browser, and it's back to the 0.5TB nonsense again.I'm going to try contacting support today, maybe I've just got a lemon. Seems to work just fine as a USB external drive, but I'd like the other features to work...

UPDATE (06.22.18):I finally solved streaming to my TV’s without internet. I have two TVs in my RV. Most of the commercial Plex players like Apple TV and Fire TV won’t function at all without at least a minimum internet connection for authentication. I frequently don’t have even cell signal in my RV when camping. I setup two Raspery PI’s with the Plex player on them. Downloaded from Plex. You need to connect the the first time with an internet connection available. The WD acts as the access point. Also, make sure you ANALYSE your entire movie library. This little unit doesn’t have enough horsepower to transcode so pay attention to your streaming settings. I use the same HD 1080p movies on this that are in my home library. You don’t analyse some of the 1080p movies will give you an error saying it doesn’t have the horsepower to play it. I stream full 1080p. No mobile settings. If you know how to use Plex server you can get this thing working great. I suspect that most of the bad reviews are from people who a) expect this to work like a 3ghz quad core Plex server. It doesn’t. Don’t expect it too. Or b) they don’t understand how to configure Plex. There are lots of tutorials and help articles out there. Use them and you will be happy.———————I purchased this drive specifically for steaming video as a Plex server. I was a little concerned with the number of reviews that said it didn't work well streaming for Plex but I figured I could return it if it didn't live up to its advertising. I did, however, take this reviews seriously and spent some time researching how to get it working well with Plex. WD has some great articles on their support site. They tell you exactly what to do to get this nifty little device to stream Plex. I recommend you read and follow them. Don't take any short cuts and it will work well, even streaming 1080p content, which is much of my content. Here is how I set mine up:1) Follow the quick start instructions2) connectto the unit via the WEB interface and immediately upgrade the firmware if a newer version is available. It was for mine. This takes a while so be patient. Don't do this from the mycloud app as it doesn't give you any warnings to not shut off the unit during upgrade.3) after you've upgraded the firmware change all your passwords.4) in the media sections of the drive there is a video that tells you how to setup Plex. Follow it exactly. You MUST download the latest version of Plex as instructed.5) as part of the Plex Installation some of the services that are incompatible with Plex will be shut off. Verify that they are. This is in the instructions.6) at one point I read that connecting using the 5ghz wifi connection make streaming 1080p work better. Honestly I tried both and both seemed to work for me but I choose to connect at 5gz just in case.So far I've had a great experience with this little device. I've tested it with FireTV, FIreTV stick, browser, iPad,and iPhone PLEX. All worked great. I could only get WEB iPhone/iPad working when no internet connections are available, FireTV's don't function at all without at least some internet connection. This s is a pain as this device is meant for my RV. I'm upgrading a couple of CODY media servers to this. I like Plex much better but haven't found a way around the requirement for the TV based players to have an Internet connection. When going straight from iPad to Plex on the WD isn't seems to work fine without an Internet connection.