Windows 10: Mixing drives with GPT and MBR

All the drives in an old computer are MBR drives. Windows 10 is installed on one of these drives. A friend gave me a 2T disk drive which is GPT. I installed the drive and the computer seems to recognize it . Can I leave it as a GPT drive or should I convert it to MBR. This disk will be used only for movies . Tks

:)

 

clone MBR HD to bootable GPT partition?

Hi,

1. You cannot convert mbr to gpt without data loss. otherwise, you can follow directions here:

FROM WINDOWS RECOVERY CONSOLE:

To change a master boot record disk into a GUID partition table disk using a command line

• 
  Back up or move the data on the basic master boot record (MBR) disk you want to convert into a GUID partition table (GPT) disk.
  
• 
  Open an elevated command prompt (right-click Command Prompt, and then click Run as Administrator) and type diskpart. If the disk does not contain any partitions or volumes, skip to step 6.
  
• 
  At the DISKPART prompt, type list disk. Make note of the disk number you want to convert.
  
• 
  At the DISKPART prompt, type select disk <disknumber>.
  
• 
  At the DISKPART prompt, type clean.
  

2. I'd suggest converting your vista drive to a virtual machine, load that up on your windows 10 system and use a program like virtualbox to run it.

 

Convert GPT to MBR

if you cant do it using Disk Manager, Try DISKPART in command prompt.

otherwise you will need to find a 3rd party format/paritition program, google around for one.



the only way to go from GPT to MBR is to remove all volumes / parititions from the drive.





EDIT, im farily certain that only XP PRO can read GPT drives, HOME edition cant.
Vista premium and Win 7 can both read GPT drives i think.... i know for sure that the ultimate editions can.

 

Convert only one partition on the disk from MBR to GPT

Follow the steps listed here on using GPTgen. He also lists how to create and restore backups.

https://blog.bramp.net/post/2010/08/30/converting-mbr-to-gpt-without-deleting-your-partitions/