The drive is pre-formatted in exFAT (cross-compatible with macOS and Windows) and should automatically be recognized without the need to initialize and format before use. If the drive has been reformatted after purchase with a file system not natively supported by your operating system, it may need to be mounted manually. Click here for instructions on reformatting drives if desired in Windows. Click here for instructions in macOS.

Installing the latest Thunderbolt 3 and BIOS firmwares from your system manufacturer is strongly recommended. Some systems with outdated firmware may not be compatible with this (and other) Thunderbolt 3 devices. (Note: This only applies to Windows systems. Apple Thunderbolt 3 systems automatically receive firmware updates during macOS upgrades.)

The only host platforms with Thunderbolt 3 to be confirmed as incompatible at this point are the Dell Latitude 7275 and ASUS ProArt Station PA90.

Boot Camp with Windows 10 (version 1809 and up) is supported.

Transfer speed is affected by many factors. While this Thunderbolt™ 3 NVMe drive is capable of sequential transfer speeds of 2400+ MB/s read and 1800+ MB/s write, results will vary depending on the program being used, OS, and workload.

Some Thunderbolt 3 ports support a 2-lane PCI Express configuration (PCIe x2), and some support a 4-lane PCI Express implementation (PCIe x4). Performance will depend on the specific workload. The maximum throughput of the drive be reduced in some scenarios on systems with a PCIe x2 implementation. In our testing, the maximum R/W results on an x2 system were ~1400MB/s R and 1200MB/s W.

Most system manufacturers list these details in their online system specifications. For example, Dell has this information available for most of their popular hosts in a handy single document: here.

Yes! The screenshot below is from a 2019 MacBook Pro 15″ with a PCIe x4 implementation.

Our NVMe SSD drives must be connected to a Thunderbolt™ 3 equipped USB-C port. On systems which have a mix of Thunderbolt™ 3 and non-Thunderbolt™ 3 USB-C ports, please ensure the device is connected to a Thunderbolt™ 3 port. Most systems with a mix of ports will have a Thunderbolt symbol next to the Thunderbolt 3 ports.

With Windows 10 version 1809 the default removable storage settings are set to have write caching disabled in favor of quickly removing the drive vs needing to “safely remove”. This setting can be changed in the Device Manager. See here for instructions: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4495263/windows-10-1809-change-in-default-removal-policy-for-external-media

A solution for this issue was found here: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8262732

• In Disk Utility, switch the View option to “Show All Devices”.
• Select the entry named “PCIe SSD Media”, with “TBT3_SSD” indented below it.
• Click on Erase.
• Change the Scheme to “GUID Partition Map”. The Format choices will then expand to include several APFS choices.
• Set the Format to “APFS”.
• Press Erase.

New hard drives and SSDs, including NVMe SSDs, need to be partitioned and formatted before the first use.  Windows will not prompt to format a blank drive when connected.

Start by installing the hard drive or SSD (referred to as "drive") into the Plugable hard drive dock or drive enclosure and connect it to the computer using the provided cables and power supply if applicable.

With the drive connected to the computer, we can create a partition table, and at least one partition, then format the partition.

1. Right-click on the start menu and select Disk management from the pop-up menu
2. If this is a new, blank drive, the system will prompt to initialize the drive by writing a partition table to the drive with the Initialize Disk dialog
   1. Uninitialized drives are listed under the Select disks: section, check all that apply
   2. For drives over 2TB GPT is required to access the full storage capability of the drive, we also recommend GPT for SSDs and drives used with other Windows 10 systems, MBR can be used for drives that need to be used with legacy Operating Systems, for example Windows XP
   3. Select OK to continue
3. The drive currently has no partitions, right-click on the Unallocated space and select New Simple Volume... from the drop-down menu to start the New Simple Volume Wizard
   1. At the introductory screen, select Next to continue
   2. At the Specify Volume Size screen, select Next to continue with the default value
   3. At the Assign Drive Letter or Path screen, select Next  to use the default values, this will assign the next available drive letter to the new partition
   4. At the Format Partition screen, select the File system from the drop down menu, NTFS is the default and works well with Windows computers, exFAT is also compatible with macOS and Linux*.  A Volume label can also be entered on this screen, this is the name of the drive.  We recommend leaving the other options at the default values, Quick Format should be checked
   5. Select Finish to start the formatting, it should complete within a few seconds to a minute depending on the drive
4. The drive should now be accessible within Windows explorer under My Computer

New hard drives and SSDs, including NVMe SSDs, need to be partitioned and formatted before the first use.  macOS will normally prompt you when a blank drive is connected with the option to Initialize the drive.

Start by installing the hard drive or SSD (referred to as "drive") into the Plugable hard drive dock or drive enclosure and connect it to the computer using the provided cables and power supply if applicable.  macOS will normally prompt you when a blank drive is connected with the option to Initialize the drive.

1. Either select the Initialize button on the prompt, or select Go > Utilities > Disk Utility, either option will open the Disk Utility
2. Select the external drive in the left column, then the Erase button to start the formatting process, please be sure this is the correct drive before formatting
3. The Erase Drive dialog drop down lets us name the drive and select the file system format from a list, the defaults are recommended
4. Select the Erase button to format the drive, this will take between a couple of seconds to minutes depending on the drive
5. The newly formatted drive can be used as a Time Machine backup, or used as a standard storage drive.

Originally authored by: Jeff Everett, March 21, 2013

This post is intended to offer detailed technical information for troubleshooting issues affecting new “Advanced Format” 512e SATA disk drives. 

Plugable’s full-size 3.5″ hard drive docks, the USB3-SATA-UASP1, USB3-SATA-U3 and USBC-SATA-V; these feature support for these new 512e Advanced Format drives. Our Plugable Storage System “PSS” products also support 512e large volumes (as soon as 2.5″ drive capacities increase and these drives become available in smaller sizes than 3.5″).

Some docks have a non-standard sector emulation feature that enables using capacities above 2TB on Windows XP 32 bit. But this requires that drives initialized and formatted in a special way, and NOT be used with other SATA controllers in desktop PC’s or other drive docking stations, unless those units also have a matching firmware version and support for this feature.

Plugable USB SATA docks do not support sector emulation for XP.   Rather, we’ve chosen to support 3TB+ Advanced Format drives in the standard way without any emulation.

Background

The storage model used by disk makers for the last 10+ years is changing, and this post is an effort to explain how these changes work in detail. In case of issues moving drives between different systems, or when encountering issues using USB attached drives to host enterprise application data, the details here can help understand what factors are at play.  

Data is stored fundamentally in bits (bits with a little b). Busses like USB often measure throughput in bits, like USB 2.0’s 480 Megabits per second (480 Mbps) or SATA III’s Gigabits per second (6 Gbp/s). Eight of these individual bits of data make up one of the capital-B “Bytes” that we usually measure data in, be it kilobytes (KB) in a document, MegaBytes (MB) in an MP3, or GigaBytes (GB) of data on a storage volume like a hard drive or SSD.  Generally speaking, transfer rates industry-wide are measured in bits so transfer rates appear higher than if they were measured the same way the data is actually stored, in Bytes.

On modern solid state drives and traditional hard or even floppy disks, these bytes are grouped into sectors for actual read/write operations. Over the last decades, almost all storage drives used 512 Bytes per sector to store data since addressing individual bits and Bytes would be impractical.

Having all drives at 512 bytes per sector was nice, as there were few compatibility issues to think about when moving drives between systems or SATA docks, or when cloning them.

Evolution

512 byte sectors present problems with larger capacity drives (3TB+)- to make way for larger drives, sector sizes had to grow.  This presents challenges throughout the “software stack” from the SATA hardware controllers and their firmware, their drivers, the operating system, and even to how applications may sometimes assume certain sector sizes or where sectors will start.  Resulting issues are numerous and will take time for the industry to fully work out. 

Over the past few years, Advanced Format Drives (512e, AF) drives reporting 512 Bytes/”logical” sector while actually using physical sectors of 4096 Bytes/”physical” sector have gained in popularity due to their higher data density potential, and resulting larger capacities. For more on how these drives work and why the industry switched, read this great ZD net post.  Soon, we’ll be seeing drives that use 4096B logical and physical sectors.  

*from Microsoft support policy for 4K sector hard drives in Windows

As you can see from the table above, determining whether you have a 512n (drive with reported and physical sectors of 512 bytes), 512e (the 512 emulation 4096 “Advanced Format” drives with physical 4096B clusters), or 4Kn (drive with both reported and physical sectors of 4096B) is crucial to determine which Windows operating systems will be able to recognize the drive.

On OS X, large volume support is somewhat better, with effectively no limits on volume size in modern OS X versions:

*From Mac OS X: Mac OS Extended format (HFS Plus) volume and file limits

How to check your drive’s sector size

To determine if you have an 512e Advanced Format Drive, open an administrative command prompt and run the following command on the NTFS formatted volume:

fsutil fsinfo ntfsinfo [your drive]

[your drive] will be the letter of the disk you’re testing, so c: or d: etc.

The output will look like this, with the bold portion below being the relevant information. Bytes per Sector of 512 and bytes per Physical Sector of 4096 indicate a 512e drive:

C:\Windows\system32>fsutil fsinfo ntfsinfo h:
NTFS Volume Serial Number : 0x8a0c5e820c5e68e9
NTFS Version : 3.1
LFS Version : 1.1
Number Sectors : 0x00000001d1bcafff
Total Clusters : 0x000000003a3795ff
Free Clusters : 0x000000003a3671d7
Total Reserved : 0x0000000000000000
Bytes Per Sector : 512
 Bytes Per Physical Sector : 4096
Bytes Per Cluster : 4096
Bytes Per FileRecord Segment : 1024
Clusters Per FileRecord Segment : 0
Mft Valid Data Length : 0x0000000000040000
Mft Start Lcn : 0x00000000000c0000
Mft2 Start Lcn : 0x0000000000000002
Mft Zone Start : 0x00000000000c0000
Mft Zone End : 0x00000000000cc820
Resource Manager Identifier : DB59D441-7AD6-11E2-BEE8-00027232D73D’

If your drive reports:
Bytes Per Sector : 512
 Bytes Per Physical Sector : 512
This one of the 512n volumes commonly used over the last decade. Support for these drives is universal.

If your drive reports:
Bytes Per Sector : 512
 Bytes Per Physical Sector : 4096
The volume is operating in 512e mode, and should be recognized by most Windows Vista (SP1 and later) systems, as well as by newer Windows 7 and 8 PC’s. Windows 7 and Server 2008 users who do not have Service Pack 1 installed need a system update for 512e compatibility.

Macs should also be able to see the volume with no issue, however do not have native NTFS write capabilities, so they may only be able to read the drive.

If your drive reports:
Bytes Per Sector : 4096
 Bytes Per Physical Sector : 4096
Then the drive has been formatted with non-standard sector emulation, in order to support 3TB+ drives on Windows XP.

A special release of firmware for the Plugable USB3-SATA-U3 (firmware v12092681f600) is available by special request that uses this non-standard emulation strategy. However, it is not the default and is generally not recommended as it limits moving the drive to other docks with the same emulation strategy.

How to clean and re-initialize a volume

Moving volumes initialized with 4096B sector re-emulation to other SATA controllers (other drive docks or PC SATA connections) may result in drives that are visible in disk manager but with no partitions, and no option to re-format the drive since the “new” (non U3) SATA controller doesn’t support the 4096B sector re-emulation.  In this case, wiping the drive is necessary to use it on the new controller. 

Wiping a misaligned drive’s partition table will allow the volume to be re-initialized as though it were new, and a new partition table may be written when the disk is re-formatted.

Performing the following steps will destroy all data on the disk selected, so these steps must be performed with extreme caution. 

To check for all attached volumes, open an administrative command prompt and enter diskpart, then enter the list disk command as shown below, and select the disk of your choice to clean. After selecting whichever disk number you want to wipe, the clean command will destroy the partition table and allow you to re-initialize the volume.

C:\Windows\system32>diskpart

Microsoft DiskPart version 6.2.9200

Copyright (C) 1999-2012 Microsoft Corporation.
On computer: GRANDCENTRAL

DISKPART> list disk

Disk ### Status Size Free Dyn Gpt
——– ————- ——- ——- — —
Disk 0 Online 111 GB 1024 KB
Disk 1 Online 1863 GB 0 B
Disk 2 No Media 0 B 0 B
Disk 3 No Media 0 B 0 B
Disk 4 No Media 0 B 0 B
Disk 5 No Media 0 B 0 B
Disk 6 Online 1862 GB 0 B
Disk 7 No Media 0 B 0 B
Disk 8 Online 465 GB 0 B

DISKPART> select disk 8

Disk 8 is now the selected disk.

DISKPART> clean

DiskPart succeeded in cleaning the disk.

DISKPART>

From here the disk is blank and can be re-initialized and formatted with whatever partitions are desired.  Most consumers will not need to be aware of the other issues that can arise with Advanced Format volumes in enterprise applications.

Partition Alignment

If the performance of your 512e large volume has degraded when being moved from system to system, partition alignment issues may be the cause.  Issues with non-bootable cloned volumes may also be due to improperly aligned partitions. Western Digital and Hitachi offer drive alignment utilities for affected operating systems. Seagate drives should not require alignment. Customers with other brands of drives will need to check with the manufacturer of their drive to determine if an alignment tool is available and/or necessary.  Partition alignment issues often affect older Windows Vista and Windows XP systems where drives are frequently accessed on other operating systems.

Before initializing a new drive, using a large volume with Windows XP, or especially before cloning an Advanced Format Western Digital drive, please check the chart below to determine if aligning your drive is necessary for maximum performance and compatibility with your software environment.

Using your WD Advanced Format Hard Drive with a Windows Operating System may require you to run the WD Align Windows software utility after you install your operating system or partition and format the drive as a secondary drive. The WD Align software aligns existing partitions on the Advanced Format drive to ensure it provides full performance for certain configurations. (Please see table for configuration details)

Running Hitachi’s “HGST Align” tool may be necessary for Windows XP or Windows Vista users. Windows 7 and Windows 8 users should not need to use this utility.

Windows support in the enterprise

Most end-users won’t need to worry about drive sector sizes, partition alignment, or any of the details above. Due to the specific issues documented by Microsoft with some of their enterprise applications, thorough planning for drive purchasing and migration is crucial in enterprise environments leveraging the following technologies:

• Hyper-V: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2515143
• Microsoft SQL Server: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/psssql/archive/2011/01/13/sql-server-new-drives-use-4k-sector-size.aspx
• Windows Home Server v1: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2385637
• Microsoft Exchange Server: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee832792.aspx#Phys
• Third-party applications and hardware: Applications and hardware devices may have reliability and performance issues when they are connected to these new drives. Contact your application and hardware vendors about their support policy for these drives.

*from “Microsoft support policy for 4K sector hard drives in Windows.”

For more details on 512e and 4Kn Advanced Format support across Windows versions, application specific issues, other known issues, and unsupported scenarios, read Microsoft support policy for 4K sector hard drives in Windows.

Further details on the evolution from 512n to 512e and 4Kn drives are available in this presentation from IDEMA (International Disk Drive Equipment and Materials Association).

Deeper technical details for driver developers are available in Microsoft’s “Advanced format (4K) disk compatibility update (Windows)” article.

Often it can be helpful to have access to a folder or external hard drive from two computers.  Instead of unplugging an external hard drive and physically moving it to the second computer it may be more efficient to share the driver over the network.

Windows file sharing includes password based authentication and can be easily configured to share specific folders or entire drives over the network, providing access to the same data from multiple computers, while slower than a directly connected USB 3 hard drive it can be more convenient.

This article will demonstrate how to share the file system from an externally connected SATA SSD over the network for access from other Windows workstations.  We will use the computer's local user account and password for authentication.

Definitions:

• Server - The server will be the computer with the USB attached SSD, this can have Windows 10 or 11 with an administratively privileged user account
• Client - The computer connecting to the shared driver over the network, this can have Windows 10 or 11

Hardware to replicate this setup:

• 2x Windows computers, the process is very similar for Windows 10 and Windows 11 to act as Server and Client
• 1x SATA Vertical Hard Drive Dock with USB-C connection USBC-SATA-V ( https://plugable.com/products/usbc-sata-v )
• 1x SATA SSD or Hard Drive
• Network with both Server and Client - recommended a wired network for best performance, however wireless also works

Setting up the file server

1 - Connect the hard drive to the Server, if not already formatted the partition and format the drive with an NTFS file system, ensure the file system is detected and accessible under your user account.

2 - Open Windows File Explorer, holding down the Shift key, right-click on the drive or folder to be shared, hover over “Give access to” and select “Advanced sharing…” to open the “Advanced Sharing” window

3 - Under the “Advanced Sharing” subsection, select the “Advanced Sharing” button, this requires local administrative permissions

4 - Under the “Settings” subsection, select the “Share this folder” checkbox", then select the “Permissions” button to open the “Permissions for <sharename>” window.

5 - Under “Group or user names:” subsection, select the “Add…” button to open the “Select Users or Groups” window

6 - In the text box in the “Enter the object names to select (examples):” heading, type in your user account name, in this example “plugable”, then click the “Check Names” button to automatically complete the field, the first part of this name is the computer's host name ending before the back slash “\”, noted this down for connecting to this computer, when done select “OK” button

7 - On the “Permissions for <sharename>” window, under the “Group or user names:” subsection, select your username, then under the “Permissions for <username>” subsection, check the “Allow” boxes to provide both read and write permissions to the shared drive, click on “OK” when complete

8 - The drive or folder should now be shared and available for any Windows host connected to the same network - one note, this does require the computers to be on the same subnet ( for example connected to the same WiFi or same Ethernet switch/router ) and for the Windows Firewall to be set to a Private network - additional details here ( https://kb.plugable.com/2600495 )

Connecting to the share for quick access

1 - Connect the Client to the same network as the server if not already connected

2 - Use the keyboard shortcut Windows + r to open the Windows Run dialog ( Press and hold the Windows Flag key, then tap the ‘r’ key, and release the Windows Flag key )

3 - In the Run dialog, type in two back slash characters “\\” then type in the name of the Server, in this example “HP-22-ELITEG9” ( from Step #6 in the file server setup above )

4 - Enter your user account credentials when prompted, these are the credentials for the Server not the Client computer

5 - Windows File Explorer should be open with the shared folder or shared drive accessible now.  You can drag and drop items into and out of this folder, however if you would like to save files to this folder from within applications you will need to mount the share as a drive letter

Assigning a drive letter to a network share

1 - Complete the “Connecting to the share for quick access” section above, then right-click on the share name in Windows File Explorer and select “Map Network Drive”

2 - Make any changes you see fit and Select the “Finish” button to use the default settings, by default network drive assignment starts with “Z:” and works backwards through the alphabet.

From here you can save files directly to the “Z:” drive and they will be saved onto the shared folder or drive for access from either the Client or Server computers.

Additional notes

This method of network file sharing requires the Server to be active and on the network for the Client to access the shared files.  If the Server is set to enter sleep mode or hibernation when idle the network share may become inaccessible.

Network file systems also have reduced performance compared to a directly connected USB external hard drive, depending on the network, drive type, and connection to the Server this can be anywhere from 1/10th the speed to nearly the same speed.

Overview

For most modern Windows and Mac systems, Thunderbolt devices are automatically approved and will ‘just work’ once connected.

The main exception is Apple Mac laptops with Apple CPUs running macOS Ventura (13) or newer, where you’ll be prompted to manually approve the device the first time you connect it.

The summary table below provides the specific details at a glance, and the text that follows explains the table in more detail. 

Thunderbolt Approval / Authentication Summary Table

Why Authentication Exists

To expand further, Thunderbolt 3, 4 and 5 are in essence external connections to the host computer’s internal PCI Express bus.  This type of low-level and high speed connection warranted security protocols to prevent unauthorized access to user data.

Windows: From Intel Software to Native OS Support

When Thunderbolt 3 Windows systems were first introduced in late 2015 it was necessary to use Intel Thunderbolt software to manually authenticate and approve external Thunderbolt devices.

With the introduction of Thunderbolt 4 Windows systems in 2020, it was still necessary to have Intel Thunderbolt software installed on the host computer. However, in most cases the authentication and approval process would happen automatically greatly simplifying the process. 

Starting with Windows 11 version 21H2 released in October of 2021, Microsoft integrated support for both USB4 and Thunderbolt into the Windows operating system → LINK

This means that with most modern Thunderbolt 4 and Thunderbolt 5 computers running the latest version of Windows 11 it is no longer necessary to install Intel Thunderbolt software on the host computer in order to manage Thunderbolt devices. In most cases, the authentication and approval process will still happen automatically.

macOS: From Intel CPUs to Apple CPUs

When Thunderbolt 3 Mac systems with Intel CPUs were first introduced in 2016, the authentication and approval mechanism was built-in to macOS and was transparent to the end user.

Apple introduced Mac computers based on Apple CPUs in 2020. Macs based on Apple CPUs running macoS 11 Big Sur or macOS 12 Monterey would automatically approve and authenticate Thunderbolt devices when connected.

macOS 13 Ventura was released in 2022 and for portable Macs with Apple CPUs Apple introduced a feature known as ‘Accessory Security’ (also known as ‘Restricted Mode’) →  LINK

By default, portable Macs (i.e. laptops) with an Apple CPU running macOS 13 Ventura or newer version of macOS will require the end user to authenticate and approve a Thunderbolt device when initially connected.

Stationary Macs (i.e. desktops) with an Apple CPU running macOS 13 Ventura or newer version of macOS do NOT implement the ‘Accessory Security’ feature. As a result, Thunderbolt devices will be automatically approved and authenticated when initially connected.

Apple Macs with Intel CPUs (both laptop and desktops) running macOS 13 Ventura or newer do NOT implement the ‘Accessory Security’ feature. As a result, Thunderbolt devices will be automatically approved and authenticated when initially connected.