Review: G Drive mobile USB hard drive

Short Version: It’s an external USB hard drive for your Mac. It’s white.

Features

• Pre-formatted in HFS+ for OS X
• Time Machine compatible
• Bus-powered
• Color matches MacBooks
• $139 MSRP

Pros

• It’s white like your MacBook

Cons

• Bigger and heavier than most other bus-powered 500GB external hard drives
• Questionable build quality

Review

So this is just another external hard drive. Yeah, there isn’t anything special about it besides the white case. That’s not to say it’s a bad drive because from what I can see, it’s fine. But it’s clearly meant for those MacBook owners who must have matching accessories. You know who you are.

The drive comes formatted in OS X-friendly HFS+. This always means that it’s ready for Time Machine making it a solid, out-of-the-box backup solution. Or Windows users always have the option of formatting the drive in NTFS.

Speed-wise, the USB 2.0 5400 drive is on par with Seagate’s 1TB bus-powered drive. Both drives took 0:50~ to transfer a 970MB file. Not too shabby in my book.

The drive clearly tries to replicate the MacBook’s premium feel and look, but actually fails. While the G Drive mobile is sleek, clean, and feels solid, the drive’s only seam partly protrudes from the top, reveling a harsh edge. The whole package is also a lot larger and heavier than other 500GB options from Seagate or Western Digital.

Bottom Line
The G Drive mobile USB is a fine drive even with the questionable build quality. The only real strike against it is that it’s somewhat pricey with a $139 MSRP for only 500GB of storage. A quick search online will reveal a dozen 500GB drives for $99 or less that are the same speed but also physically smaller. Still, if you must have a drive to match your new MacBook, this is probably your best option.

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