Cannot view area/data of hard drive above 2 TB of 4 TB hard drive


  1. Posts : 14
    Windows 10 Pro 64bit
       #1

    Cannot view area/data of hard drive above 2 TB of 4 TB hard drive


    I had to uninstall Acronis True Image 2013 which seemed to be the issue with my Windows 10 64bit PC having many BSODs. Un-installing Acronis True Image 2013 meant that I lost the use of Acronis Extended Capacity Manager to make use of all of my Western Digital Black 4 TB hard drive. I lost my H drive with a lot of data there. Right now it shows up as almost 1700 GB of Unallocated space. I downloaded and installed Acronis True Image 2017 thinking that there would be a similar compatible Acronis Extended Capacity Manager, but there was not, nor a program like it from WD. I see in Computer Management/Storage/Disk Management and then under Action there is Create VHD and Attach VHD. Is either Create VHD or Attach VHD or both the answer to recreate my virtual disk that Acronis True Image 2013 Extended Capacity Manager gave me? I need a method that will not cause me to lose that saved data. I have found using Google a Seagate version of an Extended Capacity Manager. Will a Seagate version of an Extended Capacity Manager work on a WD hard drive? (No, it does not, I tried it and I got another BSOD) If there is a tutorial on this in this forum, then please point me towards that tutorial. I have looked but I have not found one. Thank You
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Cannot view area/data of hard drive above 2 TB of 4 TB hard drive-my-disk.png  
      My Computer


  2. Posts : 70
    Windows 10 Pro x64 1607 (14393.693)
       #2

    You will need to convert your HDD to GPT from MBR. This cannot be done in Disk Management without deleting all partitions first. So unless there are third-party solutions you will have to re-install Windows 10 or restore from a back-up after the conversion.

    MBR disks can only be a maximum of 2.2TB, GPT disks do not have this limitation. There might be a problem with using a GPT disk as your boot drive as GPT disks cannot be used with BIOS, only UEFI. If you are still using BIOS then a smaller disk (<2.2TB) could be used as the boot disk.
      My Computer


  3. Posts : 18,421
    Windows 11 Pro
       #3

    Alan Russell said:
    You will need to convert your HDD to GPT from MBR.
    If the OP's computer does not have UEFI, that will not be possible because it is the only hard drive in the computer and, therefore, his system disk. Legacy BIOS won't boot from a GPT disk.

    @dlfetters48, see these two links:
    DiscWizard Extended Capacity Manager partition is missing after updating to Windows 10

    True Image 2013 by Acronis Errors Out with "Please Install Virtual Disk Driver Manually" | Knowledge Base

    Then, if your computer does not have UEFI and is only legacy BIOS, I would suggest you get a <2TB hard drive or SSD for your system disk, move the 4 TB disk to secondary data storage and then you can format it as GPT and not have to use any software other than Windows to get the 4 TB capacity.
      My Computer


  4. Posts : 14
    Windows 10 Pro 64bit
    Thread Starter
       #4

    My PC does have legacy BIOS, not UEFI. I have successfully cloned my 4TB hard drive onto a 2 TB hard drive. All works well just like the hard drive that I have cloned from. My clone hard drive is a 2TB Hitachi hard drive that originally came with my PC. I have a new Western Digital 2TB hard drive to be my new cloned hard drive. I do not trust the 2 TB Hitachi hard drive to last very long. Once I have the new Western Digital 2 TB hard drive installed I will convert my Western Digital Black 4 TB hard drive to GPT from MBR. I have a question about what comes next. My Western Digital Black 4 TB hard drive will have Windows 10 Pro previously installed on it which will no longer be needed, as my boot Windows 10 Pro will be on the Western Digital 2 TB hard drive. Now then, how will I be able to remove the Windows 10 Pro from the Western Digital Black 4 TB hard drive that has been converted to GPT? Thanks
      My Computer


  5. Posts : 14
    Windows 10 Pro 64bit
    Thread Starter
       #5

    Cannot view area/data of hard drive above 2 TB of 4 TB hard drive foll


    Cannot view area/data of hard drive above 2 TB of 4 TB hard drive-my-pc-disks.png
    I have installed my cloned Western Digital Black 2 TB hard drive and booted up as sole drive and all went well. I then shut down my PC and disconnected the Western Digital Black 2 TB hard drive and I then reconnected my Western Digital Black 4 TB hard drive and then I converted this drive to GPT from MBR. I shut down my PC again and reconnected my Western Digital Black 2 TB hard drive, restarted and then went into my PC BIOS and set this drive as the primary boot device. I still cannot access any of the data in the just under 1700 GB partion of Disk 1. I started to assign a drive letter to this partion but a reformat was asked for, so I backed off from that option. What steps next should I take? Thank to All
    Cannot view area/data of hard drive above 2 TB of 4 TB hard drive-my-pc-disks.png
      My Computer


  6. Posts : 11,609
    Windows11 Home 64bit v:23H2 b:22631.2861
       #6

    Some observations and questions:
    1. How did you insert the two screenshots in your previous post? Those are absolutely unreadable unless the browser is zoomed. In future please upload the screenshots to Ten Forum servers in the prescribed manner as you did in your first post.

    2. What is the difference between the first screenshot and the second screenshot in your previous post?

    3. Please explain how you converted the 4 TB MBR drive to GPT. ( To convert the drive from MBR to GPT without data loss you have to use a third party software like MiniTools Partition Wizard.)

    4. There is no screenshot of your 4TB drive as an MBR drive. So we don't know how it looked like as an MBR drive and how many partitions it had.

    5. Are you able to see all data in Disk 1 Drive E (2047 GB)?

    6. Now download and install MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition. Best Free Partition Manager for Windows | MiniTool Partition Free Run it and post a screenshot of how your 4TB drive presents itself in Parttition wizard - The very first screen that appears as soon as you launch PW. ( Please remove your 3TB My Book. We don't need to see it now)
      My Computer


  7. Posts : 31,398
    10 Home x64 (22H2) (10 Pro on 2nd pc)
       #7

    jumanji said:
    1. How did you insert the two screenshots in your previous post? Those are absolutely unreadable unless the browser is zoomed. In future please upload the screenshots to Ten Forum servers in the prescribed manner as you did in your first post.

    2. What is the difference between the first screenshot and the second screenshot in your previous post?
    With a bit of effort I've extracted the two links to the images - both are in fact links to the one uploaded attachment:
    https://www.tenforums.com/attachment...y-pc-disks.png
      My Computers


  8. Posts : 18,421
    Windows 11 Pro
       #8

    @dlfetters48,
    You need to create and format a partition in the RAW space on the 4TB hard drive. Or delete all the partitions on it and reformat the whole thing if there is nothing on it at this point you need to keep.
      My Computer


 

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