Western Digital unveils stylish My Passport Ultra USB storage drive

Embracing cloud storage is a smart move -- it ensures your data is safe even if your computer fails or if there is a disaster that impacts your home. Quite frankly, it helps me to sleep better at night knowing my precious family photos and videos are stored in the cloud.

When you keep your files exclusively in the cloud, however, you lose control. If the storage company goes out of business or gets hacked, you could potentially lose everything. That's why it is wise to embrace a redundancy strategy of storing files both in the cloud and locally. Today, Western Digital launches the My Passport Ultra for that exact usage case -- it comes with free specialized software for cloud backups. With capacities up to 4TB, it should meet the needs of many consumers.

"To ensure peace of mind that valuable digital memories and files are backed up quickly and easily, the My Passport Ultra drive also comes with easy-to-set WD Backup software, allowing users to schedule automatic backups directly from a computer to the drive. In addition, the My Passport Ultra drive features 256-bit AES Hardware Encryption with WD Security software built in to help keep private content secure. With a personalized password, users can activate hardware encryption and data protection," says Western Digital.

The company also says, "The My Passport Ultra drive's stylish design is an extension of the new My Passport industrial design that was launched in October 2016 and formed from its partnership with award-winning industrial design and branding firm, fuseproject and its lead designer Yves Behar. Designed with metallic and matte finishes, the My Passport Ultra drive is available in two color combinations, either black-gray or white-gold. The drive comfortably fits in the palm of a hand, pocket or purse, so people can confidently back up all of their favorite content wherever life takes them."

The bus-powered USB 3.0 mechanical hard drive should be available starting July 11, but can be pre-ordered today with four capacity choices -- 1TB ($80), 2TB ($100), 3TB ($130), and 4TB ($140). As you can see from the image above, there are two color options too -- white/gold or black/silver. It comes with a USB Type-A cable in the box.

What is your backup strategy? Tell me in the comments below.