Can I use the G-Tech G Drive USB on a PC with Windows 10?

This drive looks ideal for me as an external back up drive, so I Will have an archive drive in the pc, and an external one to put in the safe:-
http://www.g-technology.com/product​s/g-drive-usb
7,200 rpm, external power supply, USB3.0, and hopefully the rumour it uses the HGST NAS drive inside is true , and will match my internal HGST archive drive which is the 7,200 rpm 4TB HGST NAS drive.

My concerns are:-
1. It really seems geared for MAC users, and only talks about support for Windows 7, 8, and 8.1 - will it work GPT NTFS format with Windows 10?
2. Will I need a new driver, or will there be one in Windows 10?
3. Does anyone know if it does use the HGST 7,200 rpm drive inside?
4. Some external drives have some kind of soldered on controller - and if that fails you are stuffed. Ideally I would like it, if all fails, that I Can canibalise this toy, and connect a sata power and data cable and mount it in the PC. Does anyone know how this is built?
5. G-Tech do have a section on converting it to Windows (albeit Windows 8.1). I Right that all this is, is a basic hard drive, and therefore can easIly be reformatted? Or will there be complex power management stuff for the external power supply. ?
I have been burnt twice with cheap external USB drives; that should use the external power supply - but in reality blue screen, after overloading the 0.9amp USB3.0 ports power supply!
6. Has anyone here used this drive and if somwas it with Windows
7. Any views on G Tech G Drive quality.

Hope its a good one as it looks well built (albeit from the pictures) and ticks all the boxes .... If it works ... And works with Windows 10 and is relieable.

Any help advice or other recommendations welcome
But it seem great value at £148. I paid £122 for just the raw HGST 4TB 7,200 NAS drive.

Would there be a market in the UK for my WD Passports 3x 1TB and 2x 2TB. Only used to back up my stuff and then left. So not a lot of disc thrashing?

I don't have that one. I have this one: http://www.g-technology.com/product​s/g-drive

I can't answer any of your questions, but I can tell you that the one I have is not quiet. It is noisy when it is spinning. It isn't really loud, but it is noticeable and annoying: especially at night when my Time Machine backups are running. It isn't suffering from the Click of Death . . . it just audibly whirs, and it has since day one.

As long as you are using the provided power supply it should work fine. I would not expect the power pin to be connected on the USB bus internally within the enclosure. USB memory devices are pretty ubiquitous these days so I would just expect it to work. Since it comes preformatted for the Mac, then yes you would need to format it using NTFS if you want to use it on Windows. I don't think there are any significant differences between formatting the drive for any of the Win versions. Actually the last time I formatted a drive on Win 7 the dialogue window looked pretty much identical to the one that you got when doing the same on Win 3.11. Sometimes I think you really overthink a lot of this stuff.

Alan

The datasheet is here...http://support.g-technology.com …B__Datasheet_08​14_web.pdf and unfortunately it doesn't list Windows 10. The "mobile" does so I would give the vendor a call or email. Websites are often not up to date.

"Mobile" datasheet is at http://support.g-technology.com …tasheet_r4_EN_0​116_LR.pdf

I have not ventured away from WD for the last few years. I would tend to stick with what
works well in your application, so here is a list of hard drives and failure analysis data from multiple manufactures.

https://www.backblaze.​com …rive-reliability-q3-2015/

Hope this helps,

110yd

USB is universal. If it's aimed at Mac you may need to reformat. Just buy a Western Digital, Seagate, or HGST drive - HGST are very reliable.

All hard drives fail. Test your backups regularly, and have more than one copy of all data.

neacail wrote in post #18001219
I don't have that one. I have this one: http://www.g-technology.com/product​s/g-drive

I can't answer any of your questions, but I can tell you that the one I have is not quiet. It is noisy when it is spinning. It isn't really loud, but it is noticeable and annoying: especially at night when my Time Machine backups are running. It isn't suffering from the Click of Death . . . it just audibly whirs, and it has since day one.

Thanks, yours is the same as my proposed one - only mine has only got USB.
Extremely usefUl hearing about the noise.
I have heard they use th HGST drive inside. I just bought one, well the NAS version , so will see if that makes a noise.

My backups to this will be infrequent - so noise aint too critical but personally quiet machines are generally happy machines so useful to know.

BigAl007 wrote in post #18001751
As long as you are using the provided power supply it should work fine. I would not expect the power pin to be connected on the USB bus internally within the enclosure. USB memory devices are pretty ubiquitous these days so I would just expect it to work. Since it comes preformatted for the Mac, then yes you would need to format it using NTFS if you want to use it on Windows. I don't think there are any significant differences between formatting the drive for any of the Win versions. Actually the last time I formatted a drive on Win 7 the dialogue window looked pretty much identical to the one that you got when doing the same on Win 3.11. Sometimes I think you really overthink a lot of this stuff.

Alan

Thanks Alan
Yeah you are correct I do overthink things, well regarding my first build the 3rd replacement motherboard came and despite a personal commitment from the UKs MD , that it would have the latest Bios, and the very problematic latest ME Firmware ( basically upgrading that caused the system to crash every 3 minutes ) .
Guess what it had the latest Bios but not the latest ME Firmware ..... WTF
So 3 months later the issue is back where it started.
So please forgive my Overthinking.

So where I was worried my lack of skill would prevent me building it. The only issues I have had is getting working components!
Even my heath robinson design has worked brilliantly - very quiet fans at 320 to 390 rpm and individual core temps at 29C to 33C, even stressing it. So way under the max cpu temp. And when it runs it runs like lightening.

John from PA wrote in post #18002663
The datasheet is here...http://support.g-technology.com …B__Datasheet_08​14_web.pdf and unfortunately it doesn't list Windows 10. The "mobile" does so I would give the vendor a call or email. Websites are often not up to date.

"Mobile" datasheet is at http://support.g-technology.com …tasheet_r4_EN_0​116_LR.pdf

Hi
Thanks, just phone GTech, straight through competent operator, confirmed Windows 10 is fine and they do have HGST drives inside ߙ

110yd wrote in post #18003106
I have not ventured away from WD for the last few years. I would tend to stick with what
works well in your application, so here is a list of hard drives and failure analysis data from multiple manufactures.

https://www.backblaze.​com …rive-reliability-q3-2015/

Hope this helps,

110yd

Thanks
Interesting read ... Glad I got HGST 4TB looks like the best.
That said any drive can fail any time eh and

tim wrote in post #18003222
USB is universal. If it's aimed at Mac you may need to reformat. Just buy a Western Digital, Seagate, or HGST drive - HGST are very reliable.

All hard drives fail. Test your backups regularly, and have more than one copy of all data.

Thanks Tim, yep I went with HGST 4TB for the online archive drive.
Just pondering wether to get another and back up and disconnect or to go the GDrive route. Only advantage of that is I can put it in the safe.
But hell this workstation weighs a Ton - not to easy to steal. That said ..... In the safe is safer.

Submariner wrote in post #18003298
Only advantage of that is I can put it in the safe.
But hell this workstation weighs a Ton - not to easy to steal. That said ..... In the safe is safer.

Flood, fire, earthquake, tornado, bad case of mold, etc... Stealing is not the only thing to consider. Having an online copy means that it is an offsite backup. I have like 3xHDD (2 internal and 1 external) which means nothing if a flood, fire or tornado hits my home. Even in my safe, water and fire could destroy it. I keep telling myself if I don't pay for a "cloud" backup, i need to just get a copy onto a HDD and send it with my mom to another state when she visits (TX -> CA), so that way i have 2015 and before all saved if something goes bad at my house.

Just additional food for thought.

I don't really believe there's such a thing as a fireproof safe, or a computer that a thief can't steal.

tim wrote in post #18003822
I don't really believe there's such a thing as a fireproof safe)

Nope. There isn't. I had consulted with a fireman friend of mine about them when I was trying to figure out how best to store my ammunition. Specifically, I was concerned about minimizing the risk to firefighters and rescue personnel in the event we had a bad house fire and my ammo exploded on them (interestingly, he said that kitchens are the scariest place to be in a hot fire, as canned goods explode and shrapnel files all over the place).

There are apparently two things to consider with a safe: how long the safe can withstanding being directly in fire, and how long it takes for the ambient temperature inside the safe to rise. The ambient temperature inside the safe can raise to really high levels without the safe being directly in the fire.

In the end I just bought cheap safes that could withstand about a 1/2 hour in the flames and an hour or so before they got crazy hot inside (not in direct flame). To invest a huge amount in safes didn't make much sense to, as I figure if we have a fire that bad we'll have much more pressing things to worry about than documents, ammunition, and hard drives. And, when it comes to photo storage, online storage has gotten pretty cheap. I don't even store hard drives off site anymore.

Bleufire wrote in post #18003649
Flood, fire, earthquake, tornado, bad case of mold, etc... Stealing is not the only thing to consider. Having an online copy means that it is an offsite backup. I have like 3xHDD (2 internal and 1 external) which means nothing if a flood, fire or tornado hits my home. Even in my safe, water and fire could destroy it. I keep telling myself if I don't pay for a "cloud" backup, i need to just get a copy onto a HDD and send it with my mom to another state when she visits (TX -> CA), so that way i have 2015 and before all saved if something goes bad at my house.

Just additional food for thought.

Very good points.
In the safe at least I would get up to £40K ref theft.. And its too high for water damage, but fire is fire.
I hear the download to the cloud is a pain.
Yemleaving an HDD at a relatives is probably the way I will go.