Clone 2tb MBR drive to new 4tb HDD -- convert MBR to GPT?
Okay,
So my 2TB WD Black C: (main) HDD started acting a bit flaky with occasional locks/freeze. No blue screen. Reboot...no problem, but felt I might just go ahead and get a new drive...just to be sure. Got a new WD Black 4TB HDD to replace/upgrade with.
Well...that was the idea, anyhow.
I formatted it in Computer Management/Disk Management for the full 4TB. I used Acronis True Image to do a Clone on the disk. This took many hours to complete...and (of course) I ended up with an MBR 2TB drive with 2TBs of "Unallocated Space" that I can't do squat with.
My computer is an HP ENVY Phoenix 800-030qe with an Intel i7 4770, Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit. BIOS is set to "Legacy" on hard drives, dvd, etc. UEFI is toggled "off."
I've searched high and low to find a reasonable solution that doesn't (a) cost $30-50 in "iffy" software to convert MBR to GPT, or (b) require me to completely reload my operating system on this computer.
I know this is a large order, and I'm willing to spend time with it...but I'm not sure what I can do at this point.
Also..I have an EXTERNAL 3.0 USB 4TB Hard Drive (Seagate) that has PLENTY of room on it (if needed).
Many thanks in advance.
~Seanzilla


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Note that Steve's info is correct. However, additionally, if you do this, your bios also needs to support UEFI mode and be configured to boot it as the default instead of legacy/MBR.
Here's a fairly thorough run-down of all this on Tom's Hardware forum (great place for information).
http://www.tomshardware.com/faq/id-1923415/install-windows-3tb-4tb-larger-hdd.html
**EDIT - just don't do the fresh install stuff... That is where Steve's info about booting the Acronis rescue media in UEFI mode an restoring from it to the new drive will automatically convert the new drive from MBR to UEFI/GPT.
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Thanks for the information. I'll try to give this a go in the next few days when I have time. May have to wait until the weekend.
Really appreciate your help!
~S
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