Review: G-Technology 500GB G-DRIVE slim SSD USB-C Portable Drive

Recently, I purchased a 15-inch Late 2016 MacBook Pro with Touch Bar, but I was faced with a conundrum — what external drive should I use for my backups? I own a WD Passport Ultra, which has faithfully served me in the past for backups, but it isn’t a native USB-C drive. I mean, sure I could use my USB to USB-C dongle that I purchased from Apple for $19, but that found its home on the tail end of my Yeti microphone and honestly, I like it there. And while I do carry the Apple USB-C Digital AV Multi-Port adapter whenever I use the MacBook, the decision as to what external drive I would be using for backups hinged more on allowing myself to move forward into the dongle-free world of the future.

At the time of purchase, my options at the Apple Store were limited to USB-C external drives manufactured by LaCie or G-Drive. Both companies offer external drives that look sleek and are extremely slim and portable. I was also eyeing the Samsung T3 but in the end I bought G-Technology’s just released 500GB SSD G-Drive that sports USB-C (USB 3.1 Gen 2) and retails for $172.

Why did I go with the G-Drive?

Well for starters the G-Drive is slightly cheaper than the 500GB Samsung T3, which retails for $199. And even though the T3 series by Samsung has a 6 ft drop proof enclosure and the drive is about the size of a credit card, it still can’t overcome the speed benefits of the G-Drive slim SSD. The G-Drive is optimized to take advantage of Apple’s use of Thunderbolt 3/USB-C port technology in the new MacBook Pro’s, providing users with a USB-C capability of 10/Gbps (USB 3.1 Gen 2), meanwhile the Samsung T3 is rated for 5/Gbps (USB 3.1 Gen 1)

In terms of real world usage, my G-Drive was able to do a fresh backup of 91GB of encrypted data in well under an hour. That’s fast. I never have had a drive this fast. I wanted to see what kind of sorcery was occurring, so I fired up Blackmagic Disk Speed Test.

My results were impressive. On average I was getting about 300MB/s for write speeds and about 520MB/s on read speeds.

Overall I am glad I chose the 500 GB G-Drive slim SSD and I highly recommend it.