low data transfer rate on alienware m17x r4

i just bought a new hd and im doing some heavy file transfers

the transfer speed according to dbox = 17.8 mb/s

this seems super low and im paying for it

trying to transfer 1T of data is gonna take my machine 24 hrs

the spec for usb 3 is 10g/s ie, 1000x faster

anyone have any ideas on whats up?