Free tool for your SSD
Western Digital created this free tool for Windows users to monitor and maintain their SSD. Although it's possible to manage your SSD within Windows, the WD dashboard provides a more user-friendly interface. As well as being able to check the characteristics of your SSD, you can perform additional functions such as updating the firmware or wiping it completely.
If you're concerned that your SSD may be underperforming, or if you just want to keep an eye on it, the dashboard provides an easy way to do so. Other apps for keeping your SSD running smoothly include SSD Fresh and SSD Booster.
User interface
The SSD dashboard has an extremely clean UI (user interface). There are status indicators in the upper area. They show your drive's model number, whether its firmware is up to date, health and security status.
The main part of the lower UI is divided vertically into two areas. On the left, you have the drive utility menu and the advanced information menu. The larger area that shows your drive's model and serial numbers, and the functions within each selected menu item are to the right of that.
Compatibility
The WD SSD dashboard supports Windows 7, 8.1 and 10 in both 32-bit and 64-bit versions.
Performance monitoring
The dashboard provides real-time information on two aspects of your drive's performance. Disk read and write speeds are shown in the monitoring charts with green and blue indicators. Input and output transfer speeds are shown with orange and purple ones.
Firmware updates
When checking for firmware updates, the dashboard acts independently of the Windows OS and communicates directly with the cloud to obtain the latest firmware version for your SSD.
SSD management
The Western Digital SSD dashboard makes it simple to monitor and manage your SSD. Its user interface is clean and well laid out, so it's easy to find the tool or metrics that you need. Although it works independently of the Windows OS, the UI contains useful links to related Windows functions such as Windows Device Manager and Disk Management.
We highly recommend the dashboard because of how it helps users maintain peak performance of the Western Digital SSD in Windows operating systems.