Can I boot from GPT formatted patition

[welliam]

Hi
I got a new hard drive and I read about GPT format that is a new reliable format and I have win 7 64bit and my board is P55 (Intel)

can I boot from this partition using win 7 64bit edition ?

thanks

 

[Hawkeye22]

According to this article you should be able to use GPT with windows 7. You may run into problems reading the disk with some utilities or if you try to read it from a Win XP machine. Using MBR will guarantee it's more compatable with older OS's and utilities.

 

[welliam]

they say EFI-based systems can only boot , what is EFI-based systems ???

 

[Hawkeye22]

Did you read the article? The word "article" in my first post is a link. click on it. Anyhow, it says:

5. Is EFI required for a GPT disk?
No. GPT disks are self-identifying. All the information needed to interpret the partitioning scheme of a GPT disk is completely contained in structures in specified locations on the physical media.

The OS needs to know how to read GPT disks, which windows 7 does.

 

[welliam]

I read most of the FAQ but did not understand some things , this is why I ask here !!

and my comment was quoted from the FAQ link

And do you think I will be able to be here if I dont know how to click on a link !!!!

 

[Hawkeye22]

Easy dude. I wasn't insulting you. Some people just don't notice links.

EFI is required if you are going to use it as a boot disk, otherwise windows 7 can read it just fine. So, to answer your intial question, no you can't boot from a GPT disk without an EFI motherboard.

 

[welliam]

thanks I tried now that and did not work, Reformatting....

 

[Hawkeye22]

No problem. This was addressed in the article under #16.

16. Can Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 read, write, and boot from GPT disks?
Yes, all versions can use GPT partitioned disks for data. Booting is only supported for EFI-based systems.