Clone MBR 2TB Exrternal Drive to GPT 4TB Internal

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H

Hotopf

Honorable
Jan 7, 2013
12
0
10,510
Hey everyone,

So, I'll give you some background.

I have a fairly old 2tb external drive that I want to upgrade to 4tb because it's full and I thought it would be better to expand the drive rather than buy a replacement and then a new drive as I already have a few drives.

However, I'm not sure of the best way to go about it. I know there's often issues cloning mbr to gpt because obviously I want full access to the 4tbs of the drive.

I was also wondering if I should just do a straight copy and then change the drive letter as the drive has a bunch of applications on it too, not just files.

I would appreciate any advice helping me figure out the best way to go and also to keep my data safe.

Thanks! :)
 
Solution
USAFRet
No, 2TB won't take forever.

Just the regular copy function.
And do NOT try to grab all of the data at once and copy it. Just some of it at a time.
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Boogieman_WD

Boogieman_WD

Judicious
Jul 31, 2014
6,050
2
35,960
Hey there, Hotopf.

Assuming the destination drive is empty (the 4TB internal HDD) you could clone the external drive over to it and then use a 3rd party partition management tool to convert the drive to GPT without reformatting it. Why not convert the external drive to GPT you might ask. Because your important data is on it and you shouldn't risk it, no matter how safe the process might be (according to all the 3rd party partitioning tools).
The other option is as you've mentioned - copying the data and changing the letter for the apps. If those programs work without an issue with an external drive, you shouldn't have any problems just copying the installation over to a different HDD and running them off of it.

edit: Looks like I've been beaten to the answer while I was typing. Kudos to @USAFRet :)

Hope that helps.
Boogieman_WD
 
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H

Hotopf

Honorable
Jan 7, 2013
12
0
10,510
Hey Guys,

Thanks so much for the quick feedback! I was thinking that would be the best way to go but I just wanted to get some other opinions because its 2tb of quite important data.

When I say the best way I meant just doing a straight copy like you guys said and then changing the letter.

Do you know any good copying software that would help with the speed because 2tb would take forever. If it comes down to it I'll just use the standard copy function but I just wanted to ask if you knew any good software that would be better.

Thanks again! :)
 
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