I bought a 3 TB HD and installed it into my computer but only can use 1.99 TB and 742 GB is unallocated and I can't get it to do anything. Is it a motherboard problem? Motherboard and processor is in my sig. Thanks
Is this a data drive or OS drive?
info: http://en.community.dell.com/techcenter/extras/w/wiki/2838.aspx
Go to Disk Management > select 3TB HD > partition as GPT partition
Either reformat the HD, or just make multiple partitions.
IMO, multiple partitions is much better on a big drive, so you can back everything up much easier / faster.
do you have the latest bios? there is one dated 2013-01-09 on their site.
http://us.msi.com/product/mb/P67A-GD65--B3-.html#/?div=BIOS
also, you might try updating the drivers for the sata controller
http://us.msi.com/product/mb/P67A-GD65--B3-.html#/?div=Driver&os=Win8 64
I've got the latest bios and drivers. In disk management, the unallocated partitions is grayed out and I can't even partition it or reformat it.
You need to remove ALL partitions before you can convert it...
Right click on disk -> Convert to GPT-disk
How is it either faster or easier?
If you have multiple partitions, it takes much less time to backup the actively used partition, than it does the whole HD.
ie, game partition, data partition, and apps partition, while you wouldn't really care about the games or apps, since you can install those again without too much trouble, the data partition is where you actively use/store things, so it would take much less time to backup that partition than doing the whole drive.
Either reformat the HD, or just make multiple partitions.
IMO, multiple partitions is much better on a big drive, so you can back everything up much easier / faster.
I still don't understand. Unless you're talking about using imaging to do backups. If you have 1/4 TB of files to backup, whether they're spread across one or five partitions, it should take about the same time.
If you have multiple partitions, it takes much less time to backup the actively used partition, than it does the whole HD.
ie, game partition, data partition, and apps partition, while you wouldn't really care about the games or apps, since you can install those again without too much trouble, the data partition is where you actively use/store things, so it would take much less time to backup that partition than doing the whole drive.