Windows can only boot a GPT partition on a new type of BIOS called UEFI. You can use GPT today on any Windows 7 and Vista system as a non-booting data drive. GUID Partition Tables (GPT) can define drives larger than 2.2TB.
Linux initialize drive as mbr driver#
The device driver mounts the capacity above 2.2TB with another MBR which looks to the system as a second virtual “physical” device. Two partitions will be necessary because of the MBR limitation.
Linux initialize drive as mbr full#
A 3TB disk drive in a legacy BIOS and Window system will need a DiscWizard device driver to access the full capacity of a 3TB disk drive. Windows operating systems that boot from an MBR are therefore limited to 2.2TB per MBR. The MBR Partitions can define a disk drive capacity up to 2.2TB. This type of BIOS uses a Master Boot Record (MBR). Most legacy systems built before 2011 have a traditional PC BIOS. In practice, though, the software that reads the MBR can't be guaranteed to perform the arithmetic properly for the sectors beyond 2.2TB and so you really can't go there.
In theory, an MBR partition table could specify a partition whose starting sector was right at the 2.2TB limit and whose size was 2.2TB, allowing partitions to fill up to 4.4TB of a large volume. Larger sector sizes would eliminate the problem and raise the cap, but the current round of "advanced format" drives that use 4096-byte sectors hide those large sectors behind firmware that reports 512-byte sectors to the host in order to maintain compatibility with existing and older operating systems. You CAN use an MBR partition table with a drive larger than 2.2TB but you won't be able to create partitions that extend past the 2.2TB limit, which means that you'll have wasted space on the drive. It's not just the SIZE of the partitions that's the issue, it's also their STARTING sector number that MBR can't handle. 4 billion times 512 bytes per sector = 2048 billion sectors = 2.2TB. The sector numbers in an MBR partition table can't hold sector numbers greater than 4 billion. I could have a 10 GB drive with five 2 GB partitions and still use MBR. From what I've read, only individual partitions are limited to 2.19 TB, e.g.