G-Technology G-DRIVE Q 1TB External Hard Drive w/ eSATA, USB 2.0, Firewire 400, Firewire 800 Interfaces 0G00199 Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)With my 300GB drive too small I went shopping for a new 1 TB drive (the first time in 3 years). Over the years, I've bought several Seagate/Lacie externals and Seagate/IBM (now Hitachi) internal drives. Some drives are certainly faster and quieter than others; some are downright annoying but you just can't tell from the specs alone which I why I rely on reviews.

To my dismay, I discovered through my research that every brand/model of drive has received poor reviews. There wasn't a clear choice to make. It would seem that computer reliability has increased to the level that the hard drive is the weak link in the system now. Since my existing external was a Seagate 300GB firewire, I went with a 1TB FreeAgent from Seagate. Boy was that a huge mistake. Users are very unhappy with that product and so was I: it appears that Seagate doesn't build their firewire drives for mac compatibility anymore. If you need firewire, avoid Seagate.

Having a reliable backup drive is more important than ever so I crossed my fingers and went with G-Tech based on its feature set and my previous positive experience with Hitachi drive mechanisms (they own G-Tech).

Enclosure Pros:

- eSATA/FW800/FW400/USB2
- every kind of cable included (a rarity now and a great value for the money)
- large on/off button
- sturdy metal case
- no annoying fan
- the drive mounts to sled with a heat-sink that protrudes from bottom of case for improved cooling
- hundreds of ventilation holes at front and sides of case
- combo power/activity light
- attractive case

Mechanism Pros:

- very quiet drive
- fast 69MB/s read, 58 MB/s write (over FW800 w/ MacBook Pro 2007) - haven't tested eSATA yet
- HFS+ formatted for instant use on Macs

Cons:

- none to date

Some people have complained that the enclosure is larger than the typical upright design (5" x 9 1/4" x 1 3/4"). There are easily larger units to be found out there so I guess the complaint comes down to the fact that the drive is designed to sit horizontally on the table. I've seen the Seagate FreeAgent drives with their flimsy stands forcing you to lay the drive down on the desktop. The WD case seems to have the best design for vertical orientation but I don't think that's important as other features.

I'm very happy with the enclosure (G-Tech: please don't change a thing!). My advice to those that take issue with the size, is to get a G-Tech mini or other tiny USB2 based 2.5" drive. All 3.5" based externals tend to take up desk space one way or another.

Summary:

After buying this unit, I may never buy a drive in a plastic enclosure again. This is a solidly made unit compared to the flimsy offerings on the store shelves today.

This product is a winner: fast, quiet, reliable and cleverly designed. An excellent value.

PS. Why companies like WD even conceive of stuffing two already hot drives into the same raid enclosure with no fan is beyond me. G-Tech has a much better design for a raid enclosure.

Click Here to see more reviews about: G-Technology G-DRIVE Q 1TB External Hard Drive w/ eSATA, USB 2.0, Firewire 400, Firewire 800 Interfaces 0G00199

Product Description:
Professional External Hard Drive. G-DRIVE high-speed interface external storage systems offer the ultimate in flexibility by providing 3Gbit eSATA, FireWire 800 (FireWire 400 via included cable) and USB 2.0 ports. G-DRIVE is the perfect high-performance solution for storage intensive applications including audio/video editing, digital photography, MP3 libraries and high-speed data backup. The system features a fan-less cooling system and the latest technology 7200 RPM SATA II hard drives with up to 2TB in storage capacity with up to 32 MB of cache. G-DRIVE supports professional music production tools including Pro Tools, Logic Studio, Cubase, Nuendo, Digital Performer, and many more. Easy to Setup - Time Machine ready.G-DRIVE is formatted at the factory HFS+ with Journaling and is Time Machine ready right out of the box. A simple initialization is all it takes to prepare G-DRIVE for use with Windows systems. The Best Warranty & Support in the Business-G-Tech's 3-Year WarrantyG-DRIVE is backed by a standard 3-year factory warranty and unlimited free technical support by representatives experienced with the latest content creation applications.

Get 19% OFF

Want to read more honest consumer review about G-Technology G-DRIVE Q 1TB External Hard Drive w/ eSATA, USB 2.0, Firewire 400, Firewire 800 Interfaces 0G00199 now ?