PRODUCT MANUAL g-technology.
Table of Contents Welcome to G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt Table of Contents Safety & General Use Safety Precautions.................................................... 4 Backup Your Data..................................................... 5 About Your G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt Introduction............................................................... 7 What’s in the Box ..................................................... 8 System Requirements.............................................
Safety & General Use Safety Precautions ......................................... p.4 • Backup Your Data ........................................... p.
Safety & General Use Safety Precautions The warranty on G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt may be void as a result of the failure to respect the precautions listed here. If you detect a problem with your drive, please contact our Technical Support department. Please read our Limited Warranty. •S ervicing: Your drive contains no user-serviceable parts. If it appears to be malfunctioning, have it inspected by a qualified G-Technology Technical Support representative.
Safety & General Use Backup Your Data The disk drive contained in your G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt device is a delicate electronic instrument and is susceptible to damage due to excessive physical shock. Under no circumstances will G-Technology be held liable for the recovery or restoration of lost data. Any loss, corruption or destruction of data while using a G-Technology drive is the sole responsibility of the user.
About Your G–DRIVE with Thunderbolt About Your G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt Introduction ..................................................... p.7 • What’s in the Box ........................................... p.8 • System Requirements .................................. p.9 • Overview of the Drive .................................. p.
About Your G–DRIVE with Thunderbolt Introduction Thank you for purchasing G-DRIVE® with Thunderbolt™ from G-Technology.® G-DRIVE hard drives are the ideal storage solutions for content creation professionals who work with data-intensive applications—like audio/video editing, digital photography and music libraries—and need high-speed backup. We designed G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt to be a stylish, high-performance storage solution featuring ultra-fast Thunderbolt and USB 3.
About Your G–DRIVE with Thunderbolt What’s in the Box The following items are included in the box: • G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt hard drive • (1) Thunderbolt cable • (1) USB 3.0 cable, (backward-compatible to USB 2.0) • Universal AC Power Supply • Quick Start Guide • 3-Year Limited Warranty If any items are missing, please contact G-Technology at support@g-technology.com or call (888) 426-5214. p.
About Your G–DRIVE with Thunderbolt System Requirements G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt supports the following Operating Systems. The drive is set up at the factory for use with Mac OS® systems, and formatted as ‘HFS+ with Journaling’. • Mac® OS 10.7 + • Windows® 8, 7 NOTE: G-DRIVE models larger than 2TB are not supported by Windows XP and older 32-bit operating systems. These OS’s are limited to a maximum volume size of 2.2TB.
Using Your Drive on Mac® Using Your Drive on Mac Easy Installation for Mac .......................... p.11 • Optimize Performance .............................. p.11 • Use with Time Machine ............................ p.12 • Disconnect the Drive .................................. p.
Using Your Drive on Mac® Easy Installation for Mac G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt attaches to your computer via the Thunderbolt cable or USB 3.0 cable, which is backward-compatible with USB 2.0. Choose the connection appropriate for your system and connect your drive with the matching supplied cable. Connect the power cord to the unit and plug the other end into a surge protector or wall outlet. Turn on the power switch. The drive will automatically mount on the desktop if you are running Mac OS. USB 3.
Using Your Drive on Mac® Use with Time Machine G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt works perfectly and easily with Time Machine—the application that ships with your Mac and provides automatic backup for your files. Use the following steps to quickly set up your drive with Time Machine. 1. When you attach your G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt for the first time, the Time Machine dialog box should appear automatically. Click the Use as Backup Disk button. 2.
Using Your Drive on Mac® 3. In the dialog box that appears, select G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt. Click the Use for Backup button. 4. Make sure the Time Machine switch is set to ON. You can set its options by clicking the Options button. Do this to choose volumes, folders or files you do NOT want to backup. G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt will now automatically back up your important files with Time Machine. It’s that easy! p.
Using Your Drive on Mac® Disconnecting the Drive A great feature of G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt is its ability to be connected and disconnected while your computer is running. To prevent failures and/or data loss, it is important to follow the steps below when disconnecting or ‘unmounting’ the drive from your computer.  1. Before powering down and disconnecting your G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt, unmount the drive by simply dragging the G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt icon to the trash located in the dock.
Maintenance for Your Drive Initialize Drive for Mac .............................. p.16 • Restore the Drive Icon .............................. p.19 • Reformat with Partitions .......................... p.
Maintenance for Your Drive Initialize Drive for Mac G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt was factory-formatted, or ‘initialized’, for use with Mac OS. You can reinitialize if you would like to quickly erase the contents of the drive. Here are the steps. 1. First, open the Disk Utility program. This application is located on your hard drive under Applications/Utilities/Disk Utility. The window shown below will appear. Your G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt will be displayed in the left-hand column. 2.
Maintenance for Your Drive 4. Choose the Format option that you prefer. • Mac OS Extended (Journaled) Option: Use this format if you intend to use the drive for Time Machine or to create a separate bootable installation of OS X®. • Mac OS Extended Option: Use this format for best performance and media storage. To select, click the Format pop-up and its option to Mac OS Extended. 5. C lick the Erase button in the lower right corner of the window.
Maintenance for Your Drive WARNING: THIS NEXT STEP WILL ERASE ALL DATA ON YOUR DRIVE. 6. Click the Erase button to continue. A progress bar in the lower right corner of the window will show the progress of the disk’s reformatting. 7. After the drive is reinitialized, the Time Machine dialog box should automatically appear. • Click the Use as Backup Disk button if you want to use the drive with Time Machine. For more about using the drive with Time Machine, go here.
Maintenance for Your Drive Restore the Drive Icon If the G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt icon was erased during the reinitializing process (see the previous section), you can restore the icon by following these easy steps. NOTE: This process is not required for the operation of G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt. However, it will make your drive’s appearance on the computer desktop look cleaner and more accurate. 1. To get the G-Technology icon package, go to g-technology.com/support and navigate to your product.
Maintenance for Your Drive 4. Select the G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt icon on your desktop and press Command+I. This opens its Get Info window. (below left) 5. Select the default icon in the Get Info window. (below left) 6. Press Command+V to paste the custom G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt icon into the Get Info window. (below right) The icon for your G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt has been restored and you can close the Get Info window. Your drive is now fully ready for use! p.
Maintenance for Your Drive Reformat with Partitions ‘Partitioning’ a hard drive is the process of dividing a hard drive into separate, discrete sections called ‘volumes’. Each volume works like a separate disk. You can create up to 16 different partitions on a hard drive in OS X and each partition can be a different size and format. With hard drives getting bigger, it is useful to partition your hard drive so sections of its space can be used for different purposes.
Maintenance for Your Drive 2. Select the FireWire or USB icon—not the G-Technology drive icon—by clicking it in the left-side column. 3. Click on the Partition button in the main window. 4. Select the number of partitions you would like from the Volume Scheme menu. p.
Maintenance for Your Drive 5. Click on the first partition in the Volume Scheme area. Your partition will be highlighted by a blue bounding box. • In the Name field, type a name for the partition. • From the Format menu, choose your desired disk format. If you will use your drive primarily on Mac OS, it is recommended to use Mac OS Extended or Mac OS Extended (Journaled). For info about formats, go here. • In the Size field, type in a size for the partition.
Maintenance for Your Drive 8. Click on the Partition button to continue. A progress bar in the lower right corner of the window will display your disk’s reformatting progress. 9. When partitioning is complete, the multiple partitions will be displayed in the left-hand panel of Disk Utility. 10. Quit the Disk Utility program. After reinitializing the drive, the custom icon for the G-Technology drive has been erased. You can optionally restore this icon to each partition with the steps this page. 11.
Using Your Drive on Windows Windows Use ................................................. p.26 • Cross Platform Use ..................................... p.
Using Your Drive on Windows® Windows Use Although your G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt has been set up at the factory for use with Mac OS systems, a simple initialization will prepare your drive for use with Windows 7 and Windows 8 systems. For helpful information on configuring and using your drive with Windows, please visit g-technology.com/windows p.
Using Your Drive on Windows® Cross Platform Use You can set up G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt for use on both Windows and Mac system by formatting the drive as ‘Fat32’. To do this, use the Disk Utility application and format the drive to MS-DOS (Fat), also known as Fat32. 1. First, open the Disk Utility program. This application is located on your hard drive under Applications/Utilities/Disk Utility. The window below will appear. Your G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt will be displayed in the left-hand column. 2.
Using Your Drive on Windows® 4. Select MS-DOS File System from the Format pop-up menu. This will format to Fat32. NOTE: You may need to rename the drive because Fat32 does not support more than 11 letters in the drive name. 5. Click the Erase button in the lower right corner of the window. A dialog box will appear asking if you want to erase the G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt partition. p.
Using Your Drive on Windows® WARNING: THIS NEXT STEP WILL ERASE ALL DATA ON YOUR DRIVE. 5. Click the Erase button. A progress bar in the lower right corner of the window will show the progress of the disk’s reformatting. Your drive will be formatted to its full capacity as Fat32. 6. Quit the Disk Utility program. You are finished! 7. After reinitializing, the custom icon for the G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt will be erased. No icons are available for Fat32.
Support & Warranty Support & Warranty Technical Support ....................................... p.31 • Limited Warranty ......................................... p.32 • Copyright ........................................................ p.
Support & Warranty Technical Support Thank you again for purchasing G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt—if you have any comments or questions about this manual or the product, please let us know! At G-Technology, we appreciate and value our customers, and strive to give you the finest quality products, service and support. If you encounter any difficulties while installing or using G-DRIVE with Thunderbolt, please contact G-Technology Technical Support at www.g-technology.com/support.
Support & Warranty Limited Warranty HGST, a Western Digital Company (“HGST”) Including G-Technology for External Hard Disk Drives What does this limited warranty cover? This Limited Warranty applies to new HGST products purchased from an authorized HGST dealer by the original purchaser for normal use and not for resale. HGST warrants that a covered product is free from defects in materials and workmanship, with the exceptions stated below.
Support & Warranty What must you do? If you are having trouble with a product, before seeking limited warranty service, first follow the troubleshooting procedures that HGST or your reseller provides. To obtain limited warranty service, you must first obtain a Return Materials Authorization (RMA) and ship-to address by contacting G-Technology at g-technology.com/support. Please follow the instructions found on the website.
Support & Warranty CAPACITY DEFINITION AND DISCLAIMER For G-Technology products 1TB or greater: “One gigabyte (GB) is equal to one billion bytes and one terabyte (TB) equals 1,000 GB (one trillion bytes). Accessible capacity will vary from the stated capacity due to formatting and partitioning of the hard drive, the computer’s operating system, and other factors” For G-Technology products less than 1TB: “One gigabyte (GB) is equal to one billion bytes when referring to hard drive capacity.
