OK, I'm a long time Windows user, but just bought my first hard drive with greater than 2 TB capacity, and I've got several GPT newbie questions regarding formatting.
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Background: The hard drive is a WD 3 TB blue. The only documentation it came with told about how to install it, but not how to format it. I've installed it in an external enclosure, Vantec NexStar CX FWIW. I've connected it to a desktop computer's USB 2 port and booted Windows 8.1. When I booted, Windows recognized the drive and asked whether I wanted to format it MBR or GPT, so I answered GPT.
After getting Windows 8.1 fully up and running, I went to Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management -> Disk Management. It showed the new drive as 746.39 GB Unallocated.
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Question: Where is the rest of the 3 TB total & how do I get to it? I was able to format the 746 GB NTFS and copy data into it, but I still can't see how to get to the rest of the space on the HD. FWIW if I need to boot from a Windows 8 install disk to format this sucker, I can do that easily.
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I'm sure this is a very elementary question, but I'm brand new to GPT drives and have set about educating myself. Any answers to this GPT newbie will be much appreciated. TIA
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Question
Newbie to GPT questions
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7 Posts
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Answer
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I'll d/l & check out the WD program. I've tried the Easeus Partition Master program, and it's no help. Works about the same as the Windows disk management. Windows 10 (build 9926) wouldn't recognize the drive at all, and Windows 7 Pro recognized it, but refused to do anything with it. Well I said I was looking for an education, but I was expecting it to be more straightforward - silly me! 
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I had a drive no app under windows would touch. Now I didn't try DBAN as I only pull that out when I can run it on a PC with no other drives. That's me being safe with my nuclear arsenal.
To get that drive back I booted up GPARTED to dust off the partitions then it was clean and back to Windows 8.1 own partition manager. Success there.
Bob
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That Vantec enclosure didn't support that size drive. Well now, I set out to educate myself and sure enough I've gotten an education. I went to the local computer store and looked at the specs for enclosures. They had some in boxes just like the one I was using that said "up to 1 TB hard drives". So I picked up an Inland enclosure for $21 that said "up to 4 TB" and lo and behold. I see a 2048 GB partition and a 746 GB one. Ain't technology wunnerful! Amazing what can happen when you throw a few high order bits, isn't it.
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I've got to say I've come to appreciate the Inland brand. I don't remember seeing them around until a few years ago (maybe I just don't remember), but everything I've gotten of theirs just works and works right out of the box. FWIW I have no association with them.
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I went looking for that case and the ones that looked like it matched noted 6TB 3.5 inch drive support so I went huh, that's not it. You've reminded me that I should be more pushy for model numbers, etc.
Anyhow, I've see Inland cases too over the years.
Bob
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Answer
if you haven't store data to the 3TB drive, then you can reformat or repartition it with partitionguru, and select GPT as the partition table.
http://www.eassos.com/partitionguru/manual/ConvertPartitionTableStyle.php
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