As Cloud Computing grows more and more popular, Western Digital has also expanded its WD My Cloud family of personal cloud storage solution. WD recently released the WD My Cloud EX4, a high performance 4-bay NAS (Network Attached Storage) solution that is geared towards creative professional, pro-consumers or workgroups, SOHO, and anyone who is looking for a highly reliable storage system, where you can easily save, back up, share, stream and manage large amount of data. Check more details below as well as its price and where you can buy.
In a gist, the WD My Cloud EX4 is a 4-bay NAS enclosure that can accommodate capacities up to 16TB. It features Dual Gigabite Ethernet, Dual USB 3.0 expansion ports and is powered by a 2.0GHz processor paired with a 512MB of system memory. It is fully compatible with a PC or Mac system and supports RAID 0, 1, 5, 10, JBOD and spanning configurations. The WD My Cloud EX4 are fully optimized for the WD Red NAS drives with WD’s exclusive NASware technology. Drives can easily be installed and hot swappable. It also Twonky 7.2 DLNA 1.5 and UPnP certified media server. It also features dual power and network redundancy.
According to Jim Welsh, Executive Vice President and General Manager of WD’s branded products and consumer electronics groups, “The reception for our WD My Cloud personal cloud platform was extremely positive,” “Our single drive WD My Cloud system is the perfect solution for users that want an easy and private way to store all of their data at home and then share, save and manage it from anywhere in the world, on any device. Expanding our WD My Cloud platform to a four-bay system delivers the advanced features, customization capability and capacity that many of our customers are looking for.”
WD My Cloud EX4 Features and Specifications
Featuring the category leading WD Red™ line of hard drives specifically designed for home and small office NAS systems, WD My Cloud EX4 customers enjoy ultimate reliability from the trusted name in storage. WD Red drives are powered by NASware™ 2.0 technology, which improves drive reliability and protects customer data in the event of a power loss or disruption. Additionally, WD Red hard drives feature 3D Active Balance Plus, an enhanced balance control technology that significantly improves overall drive performance and reliability.
WD My Cloud EX4 provides several capacity options, allowing customers to choose from a drive-less enclosure that allows customers to customize their capacity and add additional drives as their library of digital content grows, or an 8 TB, 12 TB or 16 TB model1. With Easy-Slide-Drive technology, WD My Cloud EX4 allows customers to easily install or hot-swap drives in seconds, without the need for a screwdriver, toolkit or trays. Additionally, customers can attach a compatible USB 3.0 hard drives to the USB expansion ports on the WD My Cloud EX4 to instantly expand their storage capacity.
Ultimate Data Protection
WD My Cloud EX4 arms users with multiple options to secure digital data from a potential loss by providing RAID 0, 1, 5, 10 or allowing users to select from spanning and JBOD modes for even more options to manage data. Customers can also use their WD My Cloud EX4 to back up all of their computers and devices with WD SmartWare™ Pro software for PC users. Mac users can utilize all the features of Apple® Time Machine® backup software to protect their data. The WD My Cloud EX4 can also backup itself, either to another WD My Cloud EX4 in a different location, or to cloud services such as Amazon S3 and ElephantDrive. To ensure 24/7 data protection and reliability the WD My Cloud EX4 includes redundant power supplies and Ethernet ports.
Advanced Streaming and Serving
WD My Cloud EX4 serves as a home’s digital entertainment hub, configurable for up to 16 TB of movies and music that can then be streamed to any DLNA®/UPnP® certified multimedia device such as gaming consoles, smart TVs and WD TV® Live™ media players. The Twonky 7.2, DLNA-certified 1.5 media server and iTunes® server make for simple streaming of large movie and music libraries. Additionally, the integrated file server, FTP server, backup server and P2P download server provide advanced data serving options for WD My Cloud EX4 users. Customers can also customize their NAS, monitor system health, manage users and energy saving features with the WD My Cloud EX4 dashboard, as well as use a suite of third party apps, including aMule, Icecast, Joomla!®, phpBB®, phpMyAdmin and SqueezeCenter.
Anywhere Access to WD My Cloud EX4
Available for iOS® and Android™ devices, the WD My Cloud mobile app allows users to view photos, stream video and share, save and manage files from anywhere on their smartphones or tablets. The mobile app makes file sharing and collaborating simple, allowing customers to easily email files, share files as a link, and print and open files with third party apps. The WD My Cloud mobile app integrates major public cloud services so that customers can easily transfer files from their Dropbox™, SkyDrive® and Google Drive™ public cloud accounts .
WD My Cloud EX4 Is Ideal For…
If you still don’t know what exactly the WD MY Cloud EX4 is for, or what it can do for you, below is a check list for you:
- Centralizing and organizing your data in one secure location
- Securing your data from loss with customizable disk management and multiple RAID options
- Backing up files automatically from all the PC and Mac computers on your network
- Streaming all your media files on your network
- Quickly installing drives with ease
- Saving, backing up and sharing your stored content from anywhere
- Accessing and saving files securely from any computer, tablet, and smartphone
- Uploading photos and videos directly to your personal cloud to free up space on your mobile devices
- Transferring files between your public cloud accounts and My Cloud EX4
Compatibility
WD My Cloud EX4 is compatible with Windows® 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista®, Windows XP, OS X Mavericks™, Mountain Lion™, Lion®, Snow Leopard®, as well as DLNA®/UPnP® enabled devices.
Price and Where to Buy
The WD My Cloud EX4 is now available both in local and online stores. In fact prices has already gone down since it was first listed online. You can get a diskless My Cloud EX4 for only $349 USD, 8TB for $749, 12TB for $899 and 16TB for $999. WD My Cloud EX4 comes with a two year limited warranty. You can order one from B&H here.
