Can a WD my Book 4 TB be formated to EXT4 or EXT3?

[ZooManFL]

Title says it all.
Thanks

 

[ParanoiA]

If you are on Windows you can use easeus partition master to to ext file systems or a Linux live cd

 

[joegreat]

Title says it all.
Thanks

Hi,

Yes, it can!
This answer says it all.

I have it on my Linux Homeserver with 2 partitions and EXT4 formated since long time.
Before you start doing the Linux formatting, I would suggest to update the Firmware of the WD myBook to the latest version to avoid any problems.

All you need is a small Linux machine to do the job!

1. Either you use something like one of our ASUS routers (NOT recommended as it will take ages!!!), or
2. you boot Linux (simpliest would be Ubuntu) on your PC, with attached WD myBook and you do the job.

On the internet (Google is your friend here) you will find plenty of How-To's on this topic!

With kind regards
Joe

 

[ZooManFL]

If you are on Windows you can use easeus partition master to to ext file systems or a Linux live cd

Thanks for the info. I will look for a Linux Live CD online, I did some searching and saw there are many Linux Live CD's. Any recommendations?

http://livecdlist.com/

Also my boot drives are mirrored and stripped so I can just remove them from the Cmos as a boot drive?

RT-AC68U is my router with Asuswrt-Merlin's latest firmware.

I'm running win7 64 on Asus P7P55D-E PRO quad at 2.8ghz with 4gigs

Thanks again

Ken

 

[ParanoiA]

I would recommend ubuntu since it is pretty user friendly

 

[ZooManFL]

Hi,

Yes, it can!
This answer says it all.

I have it on my Linux Homeserver with 2 partitions and EXT4 formated since long time.
Before you start doing the Linux formatting, I would suggest to update the Firmware of the WD myBook to the latest version to avoid any problems.

All you need is a small Linux machine to do the job!

1. Either you use something like one of our ASUS routers (NOT recommended as it will take ages!!!), or
2. you boot Linux (simpliest would be Ubuntu) on your PC, with attached WD myBook and you do the job.

On the internet (Google is your friend here) you will find plenty of How-To's on this topic!

With kind regards
Joe

Thanks Joe for your help.
I have searched till I was blue in the face. I could not get a definitive answer on the WD myBook since it can not be separated from the case. I'm also hoping that I can use Merilyn spin-down on this drive?

I just set this up and did a firmware check and it was up to date. I want to do this with a Linux live cd or MiniTool Partition Wizard ?
Thanks again

Ken

 

[rodak]

Why not gparted live cd? Simple and light

Sent from my LG-D802 using Tapatalk

 

[cornflake]

Make sure that you know how Linux names its drives. sda will be your primary internal hard drive. If you have a second hard drive installed, it will be sdb, otherwise your external drive will be sdb. You don't want to wipe out your primary hard drive by mistake.

Also, plug in your external HD after Linux boots up. I had a situation a few years back where I booted from a CD with the external HD plugged in, and the kernel assigned the names backwards, naming internal #1 sda, external sdb, and internal #3 sdc. I ran mkfs.ext4 on sdc, thinking that it was the external one.

 

[ZooManFL]

Why not gparted live cd? Simple and light

Sent from my LG-D802 using Tapatalk

Thanks, that's what I will use.

Will let you know.

 

[ZooManFL]

Spin down

Any ideas how the spin down will work for this drive, Western Digital does it from a utility in Widows. Is this hard coded in the unit ? Better to set before formatting? or Disable and use Merilyn's.

 

[ZooManFL]

Make sure that you know how Linux names its drives. sda will be your primary internal hard drive. If you have a second hard drive installed, it will be sdb, otherwise your external drive will be sdb. You don't want to wipe out your primary hard drive by mistake.

Also, plug in your external HD after Linux boots up. I had a situation a few years back where I booted from a CD with the external HD plugged in, and the kernel assigned the names backwards, naming internal #1 sda, external sdb, and internal #3 sdc. I ran mkfs.ext4 on sdc, thinking that it was the external one.

Thanks, I have one raid drive setup as my boot drive for windows and non raid one as a dumping ground, all ntfs.

Ill also need to see if there are any formatting options that might help for EXT4 on the router.

 

[DrTeeth]

Personally, I hate Ubuntu due to the unique interface and Gnome 3.

There are graphical tools to format a drive but I find the command line eaier and more satisfying.

Linux Mint (any flavour) would be my advice.

 

[Lotta Cox]

Any ideas how the spin down will work for this drive, Western Digital does it from a utility in Widows. Is this hard coded in the unit ? Better to set before formatting? or Disable and use Merilyn's.

Just got this Mybook 4TB drive yesterday. Connected to a 68R. Spin down works with Merlin just fine.

 

[ZooManFL]

Just got this Mybook 4TB drive yesterday. Connected to a 68R. Spin down works with Merlin just fine.

Is your drive re formated to EXT4 or stock NTFS? If it's stock NTFS and your spin down is set out of the box from WD to 30 minuets. You have to connect it to a PC and run the utility that's on the disk. You can set it to Never stop spinning and then see if Merlyns spin down will work.

Ken

 

[Lotta Cox]

Is your drive re formated to EXT4 or stock NTFS? If it's stock NTFS and your spin down is set out of the box from WD to 30 minuets. You have to connect it to a PC and run the utility that's on the disk. You can set it to Never stop spinning and then see if Merlyns spin down will work.

Ken

NTFS.
I never used any WD software. Deleted it.
It is set to 300 seconds in Merlin and it works.
Same with a 2TB WD My Passport hard drive.
Both spin down as specified in Merlin.

 

[ZooManFL]

NTFS.
I never used any WD software. Deleted it.
It is set to 300 seconds in Merlin and it works.
Same with a 2TB WD My Passport hard drive.
Both spin down as specified in Merlin.

Try this. Turn off Merlyns 300 sec spin down and see if your Mybook 4TB drive spins down after 30 minuets.

 

[Lotta Cox]

Try this. Turn off Merlyns 300 sec spin down and see if your Mybook 4TB drive spins down after 30 minuets.

Okay.

Disk spindown idle time (in seconds)
0 = disable feature

Set to 0

 

[ZooManFL]

Okay.

Disk spindown idle time (in seconds)
0 = disable feature

Set to 0

check it in 3o min or more...have to go out now. will check back.
Ken

 

[Lotta Cox]

check it in 3o min or more...have to go out now. will check back.
Ken

The My Book and My Passport are sleeping after 30min.

 

[ZooManFL]

The My Book and My Passport are sleeping after 30min.

Thanks, I will disable my spin down via the WD utility and use Merlin's. I have to get this right before I format the drive to EXT4, not sure how WD utility will handle an unsupported format. you might want to get the utility from WD, there was a firmware update from WD for my drive, I also just purchased this drive this past week.
Thanks

Ken