Toshiba 3TB Partitioned As All MBR?

[Big_Al_C]

3TB's Partitioned As NTFS With MBR Out There?

Guys,

Windows 7 Pro SP1 64-Bit with an ASRock P67 PRO3 (B3) MoBo

that has a UEFI BIOS, i5-2500K and Corsair Vengeance 16 Gigs.


My C, D and E partitions are on a 120 GB NTFS SSD with a MBR.

My present STORAGE HDD is a 2TB Toshiba with a MBR.


I recently purchased a Toshiba PH3300U-1I72 3TB to replace the 2TB.


I always Ghost with DOS Bootable CDs I make with custom

Autoexec.bat files I write, never Windows.

I found out from Symantec that Ghost has issues with GPT.


I found a way to make my 3TB FULLY accessible and set as MBR.

It's Acronis True Image, aka Seagates DiskWizard aka WD's version

of DiskWizard. It puts an "Extended Capacity Manager" in the boot

sector so you get one 2.1TB and one 700+GB partition, BOTH MBR.

See: Seagate DiscWizard CloneDisc for drives larger than 3TB_Part-2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCLGfj1LSmI


The reason that I'm posting this is to get feedback from anyone who

has used these programs to see if the 3TBers work as any other HDD

would or are there any quirks that have come up since partitioning

your 3TB?

Please post to me.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Big Al

 

[odditory]

Hi Al,

I'm trying to follow what exactly your dilemma is. It also sounds like maybe there was some confusion on the TBU tech support's end on what exactly you're trying to do. I'll assume you have some good reason for creating so many partitions, so I won't ask why, but it's kind of an outdated practice.

GPT partitions are the ideal these days for NTFS. So is the sticking point that you don't want to give up Ghost as your imaging solution? Acronis True Image is kind of the new 'Ghost' these days, there are other image based backup solutions but Acronis has gotten pretty damn user friendly and full featured. It ofcourse supports GPT partitions and you do not need to use a bootdisk - backup/snapshot can be scheduled and all the activity happens transparently in Windows in the background, by leveraging VSS. It has a free trial. PC backup software | Acronis True Image. I haven't really kept up with Ghost except to know its continued to get more bloated over the past decade.

I'm not sure how one goes about "exposing the 4K physical sectors" to the host controller or O/S -- the processor on the harddisk's controller board is doing the 512<->4096 translation and that's pretty much that, I'm not aware of any way to bypass it, whether its possible, or whether its even a good idea.

 

[Big_Al_C]

Odd, as you can see from my updating of my post, I'm half way there.

Just hoping there are other MBR lovers out there!

As far as Ghost goes, I'm in love with it:

I always Ghost with DOS Bootable CDs I make with custom

Autoexec.bat files I write, never Windows.

I pop the "Make" CD in the player just as the computer is booting and Ghost makes

an image of my C Drive AND CRC checks (verifies) it automatically while I go make

a cup of coffee! Easy-Peasy.

 

[Big_Al_C]

MAJOR Update

Guys,

I just found this and would like some input before opening the

Toshiba 3TB's box:

Make SURE the 3TB is EMPTY as this will wipe ALL data on the drive

To make a fully accessible 3TB with 4k sector:


1. Boot to desktop.

2. Open "My Computer" in Windows Explorer.

3. Click on the EMPTY 3TB HDD.

4. If the factory made some partitions on it, delete them all.

5. Once it is just one disk, right-click it and click "Format"

6. Select "4096", "NTFS" and "Format".

7. Click OK. Since the 3TB is EMPTY, it should be real quick.

8. It's now ready to be partitioned to your liking up to 2.7 or so

TB's total and is set as MBR.

So, has anyone used these programs or the "4096", "NTFS" and "Format"

method?

Big Al

 

[Big_Al_C]

The End Is Here

Sorry to say that I've heard from numerous people with 3+ TB's

and they have grave reservations about Acronis/Seagate/WD's

Extended Capacity Manager to get full MBR 3TB HDD's and they

say that the "4096", "NTFS" and "Format" won't work.


Well, I HATE to admit defeat, but since I CANNOT find the

Ghost v11.5.1.2298 from GSS 2.5.1 that DOES see GPT HDD's,

I've concluded that my only recourse is to relegate my 3TB to

GPT and to BACKUP status to my 2TB Toshiba and dusted-off 1TB

Hitachi MBR HDD's that I'll be using as my main drives.


After numerous E-Mails to a bunch of Cloning Software companies,

I've settled on MiniTool Partition Wizard v8.1.1 from

Free Partition Magic alternative, partition manager freeware, partition magic server, partition magic Windows 7 and free Partition Manager software for Windows 7/8/VISTA/XP/2000 and Windows Server 2003/2008/2000. (To top it off, it's FREE!!!)

to pre-partition my 3TBer and to do the "Copy partitions from

my 1 and 2TB MBR's to partitions on my 3TB GPT" and use my

Ghost v11.5.1.2269's Make and Restore Bootable CD's to do my

MBR C and D Drive imaging chores.

It's been fun--NOT!