User Guide & Owners Manual
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Table of Contents 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS 1.1.1 Mac Requirements 1.1.2 PC Requirements 1.1.3 Supported Hard Drives 1.2 PACKAGE CONTENTS 1.3 ABOUT THIS MANUAL 1.4 PORT VIEW & CABLE CONNECTIONS 1.5 DETAILED VIEW 1.5.1 LED Indication & Buttons 1.5.2 RAID Selector Switch 1.5.3 Smart Fan 1.5.4 Buzzer 1.5.5 2TB Switch 1.6 RAID MODES 1.6.1 Disk Spanning 1.6.2 Disk Striping (RAID 0) 1.6.3 Disk Mirroring (RAID 1) 1.6.4 Disk Mirroring with Striping (RAID 10) 1.6.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 1 - Introduction 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 System Requirements 1.1.1 Mac Requirements •Minimum PowerPC G4 Processor, 128MB RAM •eSATA interface, Mac OS X 10.3 or later (OR) •FireWire interface, Mac OS X 10.2 or later (OR) •USB 2.0 interface, Mac OS X 10.2 or later 1.1.2 PC Requirements •Minimum 500MHz Intel Pentium 3 Processor, 128MB RAM •eSATA interface, Windows XP / Vista (OR) •FireWire interface, Windows 2000 / XP / Vista (OR) •USB 2.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 1 - Introduction 1.4 Port View eSATA F W400 F W Ports 800 USB 2.0 A-B Switch On/Off Switch Power Input A=Over 2TB B=Restrict to under 2TB Security Lock Cable Connections: Attachment of the cables is simple on any platform. 1. Plug the power input cord into the wall and to the OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2. 2. Connect the eSATA, FireWire 800, FireWire 400, or USB 2.0 cable - appropriate for the interface your computer supports, into the drive and computer.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 1 - Introduction 1.5 RAID Configuration 1.5.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 1 - Introduction 1.5.3 Smart Fan The OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 utilizes a smart fan which automatically regulates the fan speed according to internal temperatures. It starts at low speed, gradually increasing fan speed up to maximum when internal temperatures reach 140 degrees Fahrenheit. 1.5.4 Buzzer If the internal fan fails, an alarm buzzer will sound alerting you to the problem. 1.5.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 1 - Introduction 1.6.4 Disk Mirroring with Striping (RAID 10) (also known as RAID 1+0) (4 Drives) The drives show up as one volume, but only 50% of the total capacity can be used, depending on the drive with the smallest capacity. RAID 10 creates an exact copy (or “mirror”) of a set of data but also uses a RAID 0 Stripe for speed. When one hard drive fails, it can be replaced and the data rebuilt automatically. Storage Capacity Data Safety Performance 1.6.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 2 - System Setup 2 SYSTEM SETUP 2.1 Hard Drive Assembly The hard drives can be installed at any position, there is no specific order required. If you’re only going to use 2 hard drives to begin, insert them in the first 2 slots, A & B. ➁ ➂ ➃ ➀ ➄ ➅ ➆ ➇ ➀ Insert the key into the lock on the top left of the front door. ➁ Turn the key to the right and pull the top of the front bezel towards you.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 2 - System Setup 2.2 Replacing Hard Drives When one of the hard drives fails, the Rebuild LED will light up orange and the corresponding HDD LED will light up or flash red. If only one drive is defective and the RAID mode is set to RAID 1, RAID 5, or RAID 10, the data can still be accessed but it is required that you replace the faulty drive mechanism with an identical model (including the same firmware revision) immediately to assure continued backup and data safety.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 3 - Formatting 3 FORMATTING 3.1 Formatting your Qx2 on a Macintosh with Mac OS X IMPORTANT NOTE: This procedure will erase all data on your hard disk drives in the OWC Mercury Elite Qx2. Back up any important data before proceeding! ➀ Click on the “Initialize” button. ➁ Select the device with no volumes attached to it; in this picture, that would be the 4 TB OWC device. Click on the picture of the drive icon next to the text.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 3 - Formatting ➂ Once you’ve selected the OWC device, you will notice the above change in the Disk Utility application. Click on the “Partition” tab in this picture. ➃ You then need to choose how many partitions you wish your Qx2 to have. For ease of use we’re selecting one partition here but of course you could select more if you wish to have multiple volumes created. Simply use the pulldown menu under Volume Scheme to create more partitions.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 3 - Formatting ➄ Choose a name for the volume. You will need to repeat this step for each volume if you selected multiple partitions. Click Apply to finish. ➅ After a few moments, partitioning will complete and the OWC Mercury Elite Qx2 volume will mount on your desktop.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 3 - Formatting 3.2 Removing the GUID Partition Scheme Only for XP, 2000, ME and earlier. (XP 64-BIT, Vista & Windows 7 can continue to the next section) If you purchased a preconfigured solution from OWC, it comes preformatted using the Mac OS HFS+ file system on a GUID drive partition. Unfortunately, this is not readable by Windows without special software.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 3 - Formatting 3.3 Formatting your Qx2 on Windows 2000 and later Instructions for other operating systems can be found at http://www.macsales.com/format. ➀ With the drive connected to the computer and powered on, right click on the “My Computer” icon and select “Manage” from the menu. The “Initialize and Convert Disk Wizard” window should appear. If the Wizard does not appear, expand the Storage menu by clicking on the plus (+) sign.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 ➃ Your drive will appear similar to how Disk 1 does below. Notice that the space on the lower right reads as “Unallocated.” Right click in this space and choose “New Partition.” ➄ The “New Partition Wizard” will launch. Click “Next” to continue. ➅ Specify your partition type as “Primary,” and click “Next.” ➆ The wizard will display the maximum partition size for your drive. It is strongly recommended that you do not change the default value.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 3 - Formatting ➇ If you like, you can specify the drive letter designation for your new drive. Otherwise, one will automatically be assigned. Click “Next.” ➈ Before you can use the drive, it must be formatted. On most systems running Windows 2000 or later, it is advisable to specify the file system as NTFS. Leave the Allocation unit size as “Default,” and feel free to give the drive whatever name you prefer. Be sure to check the box “Perform a quick format”.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 ➀➀ Once you have finished with the formatting wizard, you will see that your new drive (represented as “Disk E” in this case) will display a message of “Formatting.” This should only take a couple of minutes if you chose the quick format option. ➀➁ After a mo- ment or two, the drive’s status will change from “Formatting” to “Healthy.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 3 - Formatting ➀➂ At this point, you may close the Computer Management window. Your drive is ready to use and can be found in “My Computer.” Using your new Storage Solution on both Macs and PCs? MacDrive takes the guesswork out of sharing files. Whether you are transferring files between home and the office, a class room lab and your dorm room or even on the same computer, MacDrive makes it painless. In fact, you’ll hardly know MacDrive is working.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 4 -Troubleshooting & Tips 4 TROUBLESHOOTING & TIPS 4.1 Troubleshooting Some of the most simple problems can be traced to power, or connectivity issues. Begin your troubleshooting by verifying that power is plugged into the external storage solution, and if connected to a power strip. Make sure that the power is turned on at the switch on the strip. Then, simply verify that your cables (both ends!) are properly plugged into the computer and storage solution.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 5 - Appendix 5 APPENDIX 5.1 FAQ Q: How do I format my storage solution? A: OWC has detailed instructions online for most popular operating systems, located at: http://www.macsales.
OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Chapter 6 - Customer Service 6 CUSTOMER SERVICE 6.1 Before Contacting Customer Service •Read this manual and review Chapter 4: Troubleshooting & Tips. •Try to confirm the problem is with the hard drive. If you have a second computer, move the enclosure to that system and verify that the solution does not function with that machine. •Visit our tech center for more support suggestions, including FAQs. http://eshop.macsales.com/tech_center/index.
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