Home > Consumer Reviews > 500GB G-drive Mini Triple

500GB G-drive Mini Triple is a solid product. The drive works without any issues with my FW800, something I could not say about competitors' products. Solid, elegant and practical enclosure. Nice carrying case. I especially liked cable storage band on the case. Highly recommended.

i've had this little beast for a few months. i store my music on it. it mounts to my Mac almost immediately whereas my Hitachi Easy Drive does not.
it makes no noise. never heats up. and the transfer rate -- which, admittedly, i don't use all that much -- was blazing fast.
that said, not sure it's worth the extra hundred bucks over the Lacie. Or $175 over the Western Digital Passport. I have one each of those, too. the mini-USB receptor/board went south on me on the Lacie, so I can't recommend that heartily ; the WD works just fine.
still, i just get the feeling that this little G-drive will do me fine for a long time. gives me peace of mind. And considering the value of what I have on it, it gives me the warm fuzzies just the right way.
apologies for the techno-speak here. hope it wasn't too hard to follow.

This isn't my first Gdrive product. All have worked very well. This one is being used as back up drive from my mac book. I recently replaced the internal drive with a 500 GB drive and needed something portable for my "Time Machine" drive. To date the 500GB G-drive mini Triple has done this with distinction.

An outstanding high quality drive. All metal construction and an exposed heat sync mean quiet operation and long life. I own several, and will continue to buy these as my favorite portable external drive, after owning and using products from more than 5 other manufactures (including LaCie and Iomega)

That being said, there are two potential drawbacks you need to be aware of:

1) The finish on the metal feels weird to me, a little like a dusty chalkboard. I don't enjoy touching it. It is not a big deal. My priority is quality and reliability, not aesthetics. If you are different, try one before you buy a bunch

2) It is formatted with GUID not MBR form. What does this mean for you? It is pre-formatted properly for Intel Macintosh's. Vista computers will need to reformat it. Windows XP computers CANNOT READ IT AT ALL, even to reformat it, unless you have specialized software installed. This is undoutedly the problem that the 1 star reviewer ran into.

Just to emphasize, my overall rating is a full 5 out of 5 stars, because I'm looking for quality and reliability.

My daughter needed a back-up drive for her studies in Europe(8/09-1/10. As of now(9/13/09),
she writes that it is working flawlessly. Unless any gremlins get in, I recommend it highly.
It's small, sturdy, has great capacity and FireWire AND is Mac compatible.