Toshiba 3TB Partitioned As All MBR?

Hi, I run Windows 7 Pro SP-1 64-Bit with a ASRock P67 PRO3 (B3)

MoBo that has a UEFI BIOS.


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

I installed Windows 7 on a pre-partitioned SSD, so no hidden

"System Partition".


I installed a Toshiba PH3200U-1I72 2TB HDD that is Advanced Format

512e and is properly "Aligned" using the Toshiba provided utility.

The PH3200U-1I72 is used as storage only on partitions "F" thru "M"

set as MBR and working perfectly.


I bought a Toshiba PH3300U-1I72 3TB HDD that is also Advanced

Format 512e to replace the 2TB.

I know that 3TBers can't utilize the full capacity in MBR,

and must be set as GPT to do so.


BTW: I would make 5 partitions, 4 NTFS and one small FAT32.


I use Norton's Ghost weekly and it has issues with GPT.


I proceeded to contact various partitioning/cloning software

companies to see if their products could be used in place of

Ghost.


The partial exchange below is between TeraByte Unlimited and me:

TBU:

"If your new drive uses 4K sector sizes you
wouldn't need to have a GPT."

Me:

Please elaborate.

BTW, This is what my present Toshiba 2TB looks like:

http://i.technet.microsoft.com/dynimg/IC546236.jpg


TBU:

If you expose the 4K sector size and not the emulated

normal 512 byte sector size, you can use an MBR and

use the entire space (up to 16TiB).

0xFFFFFFFF*512=2,199,023,255,040
0xFFFFFFFF*4096=17,592,186,040,320


Me:

With what software and what is the procedure to go about

doing this?

Can it be done via a Bootable CD or must it be done in Windows

with just my SSD and empty 3TB connected?


TBU:

It would be a drive feature/option, typically using
a jumper. The BIOS would also have to support the larger
sizes too so it doesn't crash reading larger sectors, a
modern BIOS should be able to handle it.


My hunt for answers from Toshiba is a lost cause as their

support is a TOTAL joke and does NOT offer E-Mail support.

So, I'm here to find out if this "exposing the 4K sector size" can,

indeed, be done to my PH3300U-1I72, and if so, EXACTLY how to go

about doing it.

Also, are there any shortcomings to having the Toshiba "exposing

the 4K sector size" using 5 partitions, 4 NTFS and one small FAT32?


Thanks in advance for any help you can be.

Big Al

 

I think is simpler just to to initialize and partition the disk as GPT. In principle, there shouldn´t be any problem, and you can create five or more partitions.

You can initialize and partition the disk as GPT using the Windows disk manager. To do backups or perform other operations, you can use programs from Macrium, Paragon, Terabyte. Partition Wizard is a free partition manager that also handles GPT disks.