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Windows 10 - Gpt Or Mbr Partition Table?


Snacko

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As some of you know, I upgraded my rig a few weeks ago.  I installed Windows 10 Home x64 clean on my existing 2x SanDisk Raid0 drive.  Since then, I have been working out some bugs and kinks here and there.  I've got most of them sorted out, but am wondering about my Partition setup.

 

I have not heard of this GPT Partition Table thing before.  Obviously Win10 upgrades fine over a Win7 MBR partition.  And I think that when I installed it clean, I didn't change the partition.  But with all the stuff I've been doing, I remember seeing some 'error/info?' message about GPT at some point.  Maybe when I was booting?  Maybe when I was in the bios?  IDK.  It only occured once.  So, now that I have most other problems worked out, I was wondering if anybody knew much about this.  What is it.  Should I change my partition to use this?  I can backup and restore an image on that I guess?  

 
Check if your hard disk drive is using a GPT or MBR Partition Table

A new method of using partitions on your hard disk has been introduced.

The G.U.I.D. Partition Table (GPT) is replacing the long-established Master Boot Record (MBR). GPT forms a part of the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) replacement for the PC BIOS, Microsoft have mandated that all computers using a Windows 8 logo sticker must use this method and it is expected to become universal.

As of 2010, most current operating systems support GPT. Some, including OS X and Microsoft Windows, only support booting from GPT partitions on systems with UEFI firmware. Most Linux distributions can boot from GPT partitions on systems with either legacy BIOS firmware interface or with UEFI.

Disks larger than 2TB necessitate the use of GPT partition tables. A hard disk cannot be both GPT and MBR (all GPT disks do contain a Protective MBR but that only exists to protect a GPT disk from disk management utilities that operate on MBR). Seperate GPT and MBR hard disks can be mixed on systems that support GPT. However, Windows systems that support UEFI require that the OS's boot partition must be on a GPT disk.

 

Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows Server 2008 can read and write on GPT disks (booting is only supported for 64-bit editions on UEFI-based systems). Older Windows versions and MS-DOS cannot access GPT partitions so users need to know if their hard disk does use GPT.

 

 

 

 

PS: one of the problems that I figured out was that Task Scheduler crashes if you have Fraps set to Start with Windows.  You get 1 fraps error when you Start Task Manager.  From then on you get a MMC Snapin error every time and Task Scheduler is useless.

 

Also, BitDefender has a new Ransomware feature.  This stopped explorer.exe from accessing my Taskbar icons.  This took several weeks to figure out, as the Ransomware normally pops up a window to ask if the app can have access.  But it didn't most of the time.  I finally just shut it off..

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GPT can be a PITA as I found out, but only because I went from a UEFI to non UEFI board, and back to UEFI.

 

This necessitated completely reinstalling Windows each time.

 

Swapping UEFI capable boards should not present the same issue, and resilience is a big selling point along with > 2TB drive support for using GPT.

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Well, I wish that I would have used GPT when I installed Windows, but I just formatted the partitions and installed it.  Oh well, it doesn't really matter from what I have read.  I don't have any 2T drives, and I have my own backups..

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