I have a G-Raid 8TB (2 x 4TB) with removable drives (thunderbolt 2) that I purchased in August. I formatted the drives according to the user manual, using the G-Raid with Thunderbolt configurator. I now have 2 x 4TB JBOD drives and the enclosure is set up for JBOD. I’m running a MacBook Pro with OS X 10.11.6.
The problem I am having is that the drives take at least 10-15 minutes to mount when switching on the for the first time every day. The unit powers up and the disks spin up but then it goes silent and the light on the drive flashes blue. It then just sits there for ages and does nothing until it eventually mounts on my mac. I have two more enclosures with 26TB worth of removable drives and I don’t have any of these problems.
I tried the new drives in the old enclosures and they mount instantly. I also switched thunderbolt cables and power supplies and that didn’t help.
This led me to believe that it was the new enclosure that was faulty and not the drives themselves.
I contacted G-Tech support and they have been very helpful and sent me a replacement full kit. As I am in the middle of a project I can’t erase the data on the drives (approx 1.5TB) so I replaced the old enclosure with the new one and set it to JBOD by reformatting the replacement drives in accordance with your user manual.
Now I have the replacement enclosure set up as JBOD but when I insert the old drives and power up the unit it STILL takes a very long time to mount on my mac in the mornings and it does the same thing with the blue light flashing on the drive. I’m concerned that this problem might get worse and could result in data loss on the drives.
Please could you give me any advice? I’m still in contact with customer services and whilst they are being very helpful I still don’t have a solution and this has been going on for nearly three months now. Any advice would be gratefully received.
Does the replacement unit we sent you with the full kit work and boot up fast? If so then use the full replacement and send back the old drives and enclosure based on the RMA you received.
I’ve just tried the replacement unit again with the replacement drives inserted and it does exactly the same. I’ve tried it on two MacBook Pros, one running El Capitan and the other running Yosemite.
What happens is the drives spin up briefly, the enclosure shows a white light on the front and the drives flash blue. Interestingly the drive in the top slot does not have a light on, only the bottom flashes for a while and then it goes solid blue and the unit just sits there and does nothing for 10mins until eventually both drives flash blue and I can hear them reading data. Then the drives mount on my mac. After this point everything is fine and when I turn the unit off and on again throughout the day the drives mount instantly.
Is there a reason why the enclosure seems to take a while to ‘warm up’?
Hello, I am having a very similar problem. I just bought the 12TB G Raid with Thunderbolt & USB 3.0 and every time I turn on the drives every day, it takes maybe 5 or 10 minutes or so to mount. Is this normal? Should I not be shutting down the drives every night?
Have you tried it on USB 3? After weeks and weeks of troubleshooting it seems that the problem only exists on Thunderbolt.
Bizarrely I have also found that when the drive is kept in a cold room overnight then it takes longer to boot. I warmed mine up on a radiator and then it worked immediately. Don’t ask me why, but it works. It’s far from ideal and I’m looking into getting a G Raid Studio because I think the plastic enclosure will be less susceptible to cold temperatures than the aluminium chassis.
The only solution I have found is to physically warm up the unit before use. I’m still not convinced that this is actually the solution or if it’s just coincidence. Either way it’s not really acceptable.
Confirming the cold temperature issue with the G-Raid enclosures, I have just flown for 7 hours with an empty enclosure in a Peli case in the hold of the aircraft. Upon arrival the unit was very cold to touch, but the drives were carried in hand luggage so were room temperature. When inserting the drives and powering up the unit, it chugged away for about 15 minutes before mounting with Thunderbolt.
After the unit had been sitting on my desk in the hotel overnight (at room temperature), I plugged it in and it mounted immediately.
This is not the same enclosure or drives that I had tested this on previously, this is an entirely new kit.
It is therefore my opinion that the temperature of the aluminium enclosure has a direct effect on the functionality of the Thunderbolt bus in the unit. I am no IT expert, I am a video editor, so I can’t explain why it is like this but I can confirm that the colder the enclosure, the longer it takes to mount. I have been in contact with WD support who have been exceptionally helpful and even sent me a full replacement kit, however I was able to replicate the problem with the new kit as well. According to WD support, the kits have undergone extensive testing at a range of temperatures and according to them, the colder the unit the better it performs.
What’s interesting is that this only seems to happen with recent purchases. I have at my disposal approx. 188TB of removable G-Raid storage and 12 enclosures. The problem only exists with enclosures that were purchased this year as the ones purchased previously mount immediately, even at colder temperatures.
The next step would be to purchase an infrared thermometer to try to replicate the problem and measure the exact temperature at which Thunderbolt stops working. Or perhaps WD/G-Raid could do this and post the results?
In the meantime I will have to continue drinking tea while I wait for my G-Raids to warm up.
In the meantime @aaronlam can you verify if the unit is heated up as @editshed has mentioned do your drives mount immediately over Thunderbolt as they do with USB at any temp?
I don’t think the heat really affects mine. At room temperature, the aluminum chassis always feels cool to the touch. After I get it successfully mounted, I can unmount it, turn it off, turn it back on… and it will still fail to mount. It usually takes some dance of unplugging/replugging, turning it off/on to get it mount.
I can confirm that this enclosure was purchased this year… March.
I’ve been having similar problems on a number of G-RAID units over the past few months, with them either taking an age to mount or they won’t mount at all on Thunderbolt. Usually, restarting the drives and MBP would solve the issue - though this obviously isn’t ideal.
However, I had no such luck doing so today with 3 seperate drive cases when using Thunderbolt. As soon as I switched to USB 3, they mounted first time.
Incredibly frustrating, especially as run about 12 of these units.
I’ve had a lot of editing over the holidays so did some testing.
FOR ME – the ambient temperature doesn’t do anything. The room is toasty from the heater. I’ve set the drive close to the radiator for a couple of hours before plugging in. It still doesn’t mount via Thunderbolt right away. USB 3 works perfect.
What I have found though, is if I leave the Thunderbolt in for 20-30min, it mounts. Then mounts immediately if I remove it and plug it in again. Even if I swap a drive out of it. So maybe the INTERNAL are warmed up or something.
Whatever it is, it’s absolutely frustrating. G-Tech has been nice about contacting me trying to figure out what’s wrong and offered to take my unit for testing. I said yes but never heard back. I’m hesitant to send the unit back for a warranty replacement until they have fixed the issue.
I just purchased a G-Tech 8TB G-Raid drive with Thunderbolt 2 and USB3 interfaces. I reconfigured the drive to two 4TB JBOD drives using the G-Raid Utility. I connect the G-RAID drive enclosure to my MacBook Pro (late 2013) via the provided Thunderbolt 2 cable. Now I am experiencing the same symptoms as outlined in the previous post. Is there a firmware update that will fix this issue? Connecting this drive enclosure via USB3 is NOT an option for me. Thanks!
Has there been any update on this? I’ve been struggling with this issue for 7 months now and it’s infuriating me! It takes several re-boots of both my Mac and the G-Raid to get it to mount via Thunderbolt. USB is not an option as I need to be able to daisy chain.
I’ve had no updates. Mine still behaves the same way. I don’t reboot anymore – I just leave it plugged in for 15-20min and it connects via Thunderbolt. But yes, super annoying.
Yeah I get too frustrated waiting and end up re-booting just to give me something to do. I think it ends up taking the same amount of time so I guess it’s not actually the re-booting that’s helping and there’s something fundamentally wrong with these drives/enclosures. I have colleagues with the same issue who are equally frustrated.
After using solely G-Tech products for the last decade apart from the odd LaCie Rugged, I won’t be recommending these units to anyone in the future.
We have not been able to recreate this issue. In the event you have an issue with mounting and have changed cables and it does not affect it then you will need to send the drive in under warranty replacement.
Hi Rydia, as you know I’m already on my second unit as I had a replacement from you in September 2016. I’m very surprised you can’t recreate the issue as my colleagues have been reporting the same problem on all recently purchased enclosures.
