WD My Book Duo: Use device raid/encryption or Disk Utility?

[Ace McLoud]

Hey there,

just got a WD My Book Duo.
I'd like to set it up as a RAID 1 and use encryption.
Question is, do I use WD's utility to set up RAID and encryption? Or just use Disk Utility?
The drive has Hardware Encryption, which I guess won't be used if I enable encryption via Disk Utility?
Same with RAID level, though I'm not sure if the drive has RAID hardware built in.

Thanks!

 

[shevans]

Did you ever get an answer to this.

Just bought one for my Mac mini M1 and the drives keep disconnecting even though its set to not power off. Also the WD Drive utilities keep telling me there is an "Error in RAID configuration" but the Utility shows its all good.

Set mine up using DiskUtil

 

[chabig]

I ever use vendor provided software because I don't want to be dependent on them. Use Apple's Disk Utility and FileVault.

 

[shevans]

I ever use vendor provided software because I don't want to be dependent on them. Use Apple's Disk Utility and FileVault.

Only wanted to use the vendors app to set the time out but starting to suspect it's the WD app that is the issue.

 

[Ace McLoud]

Did you ever get an answer to this.

Just bought one for my Mac mini M1 and the drives keep disconnecting even though its set to not power off. Also the WD Drive utilities keep telling me there is an "Error in RAID configuration" but the Utility shows its all good.

Set mine up using DiskUtil

I did a few tests myself, with these conclusions:

- Doing both RAID and encryption via Disk Utility was slower than WD Raid and DU encryption
- Doing a DU Raid wouldn't let me partition the disk via DU
- So WD RAID it was. WD encryption was marginally slower than DU encryption, I went with DU for convenience.

Tested performance by creating an encrypted volume and copying 5GB of mixed files onto it, DU encryption was faster.
Designating one partition as an encrypted TimeMachine backup worked fine, however it's been "encrypting" for > 24h. Not stuck but slow progress. Not sure what's going on there, thought encryption was happening on write.

When you say "drives keep disconnecting", is this while the Mac is running? Or over the Mac running, sleeping, waking up, etc.? I'm only turning on the My Book when I'm moving files or making a backup, it's turned off most of the time.

 

[shevans]

Sorry... missed your reply.

I have an M1 Mini so decided to load the utils on an older machine / OS. Created a raid partition, turned off drive sleep and moved the Duo back onto the M1. Then I uninstalled the WD utils and and the “error in raid config” went away....

Its on 24/7 as it’s connected to an M1 Mini, every few days the drive goes into power save mode and the drives naturally get ejected. I then have to reboot the mini to get them mounted again.

Waiting to see if the Big Sur update (hopefully soon) helps.

 

[Ace McLoud]

Hmm, sorry, can't say anything about that as I'm using the drive differently. I want it not running as much as possible ;-)

Unplugging and replugging USB doesn't bring them back to life? Or mounting them via Disk Utility? As opposed to a full restart.