Windows 10: How to delete a MBR when partition has already been deleted

I was using external drive and was using Macrium Reflect to clone my primary drive once a week. I decided to use a different drive for the cloning and decided to delete the partitions on the original drive I was using. I successfully deleted the first two partitions and combined them., the third partition is a different story as I didn't know that it was and MBR Partition and deleted the partition but it is being considered in Disk Management as UNALLOCATED space. I cannot combine this space with the rest. I have two Questions.
1. Can I use DISKPART CLEAN ALL? Will this remove the partition or
2. Do I need to use something like EaseUS Partition Master to delete or merge the partition?

Thanks in advance

Windows 10 Version 1703
OS Build 15063.540

:)

 

Clean installing windows 10

I think Windows chooses what it needs and wants if the hard drive has already been "Initialised". If it is a brand new hard drive that has not been "Initialised" then you may get a choice. MBR Disks are the "old way" and GPT the "new boy on the block".

My advice is try it aiming for an overwrite of a single partition and see if you can get it to install, it will immediately object if it can't. I have found clicking on "New" in the options provided at Setup (in relation to targeting a partition) can help.
It is only when progress is stymied that you go for deleting all partitions on a hard drive option.

I hope that the above make sense but hard drive and partition formatting is not a daily experience for normal users like you and me so instructions may appear a bit vague.

Whats-the-difference-between-gpt-and-mbr-when-partitioning-a-drive

What’s the Difference Between GPT and MBR When Partitioning a Drive?

mbr v gpt - Recherche Google

 

Win10 Installed 32-bit not 64-bit?

that was a good link but it seems if i delete the partition it turns out its the recovery partition that has the mbr and if i change to the c-drv part. as active partive windows wont start its looking for the mbr

 

Hi there. You may want to try this tutorial on our sister site: Disk - Clean and Clean All with Diskpart Command - Windows 7 Help Forums

 

I was afraid someone would respond with the DISKPART CMD, reason is because the hard drive that has this partition is a 3TB drive. Now you understand why I was hoping not to have to use it but that's ok. That's easier than having to buy a program to do the dirty work.
I appreciate your response and hope you have a great day. Now it's off to see the wizard and about a day and a half of running Diskpart.

 

MBR isnt a partition its the boot sector that loads the o/s

 

Yes, well, the other alternative was to simply format it, but that really doesn't wipe the disk. Not sure if there's 3rd party to skip any unwritten sectors and just wipe written ones to use for a disk that big. That's huge! *Shock

You have a great day as well. *Smile

 

No need to spend days *Wink

The diskpart clean command only destroys the partition table - the underlying data remains and is (theoretically) recoverable. It will take a fraction of a second. Conversely clean all will take forever as it writes zeros over the whole disk.

Unless you want to make the old data unrecoverable then all you need to is in diskpart (as in the tutorial linked above)

select drive 1 (or whatever number)
clean (not clean all)
convert gpt
create partition primary
format fs=ntfs quick (notice the word "quick" here - this again means it doesn't bother writing 0 over everything and so only takes seconds)

 

Much better answer. Thanks for that, lx07. *Smile

 

Granted CLEAN is much faster but when you have bunches of hard drives and want to get rid of the CLEAN ALL is much better. I used CLEAN, in fact I had to use it twice in a row to get the disk cleaned. For some reason the first time I got an error message but the second time it worked. Now all is well in the world (tongue in cheek). Thanks guys, appreciate your help

 

You're welcome. Yes, clean all is better. Depends on what you want to accomplish.

Just curious as to how long it took on 3TB drive?

 

Well, actually it took some time and the reason for it was because I kept getting an I/O error. So I just got sick and tire of it and called WD. A few thing happened. First he told me to us the CLEAN and needless to say we got the I/O error. After that we got into Disk management and it said we had to Initialize the drive which we did and the it wanted to format the drive which you have either MBR or something else, I can't remember what it was but the WD guy said to use the second option which I did but it didn't work. So we deleted the partition, initialized again and tried it again and it still didn't work. So I said lets try rebooting the computer and see what happens. So I rebooted and tried CLEAN and it worked, in fact it worked so fast I hadn't even gotten my finger off the enter key. More than likely it had already cleaned the drive but just got stuck some where. So the disk is fine now. So I'm guessing that if you run into the I/O error after using CLEAN just reboot your computer and use it again and it should work? Who knows, at least it worked here.

 

Cool! Glad you got 'er done. Another day > another thing learned. Now if I can only retain it. Good luck to you.