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I got a 3TB ST3000DM001 Hard. I formatted it using USB interface (SATA to USB3), then I copied my files to it.

Now, when I install the hard into my case using regular motherboard SATA connector it showed "Unallocated". I tried the USB interface again and it showed my files and everything as expected.

How can I fix this?

Note: When I formatted using the USB interface I used "Minitool Partition", and made 1 Logical partition 2794.52GB since I'll use it for storage.

user2132188
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  • You might not be able to. What motherboard do you have ? (Some older systems can't handle drives > 2TB due to geometry issues for a start) – davidgo Oct 15 '16 at 09:37
  • I am aware of this fact but I thought that related to boot and installing systems which isn't what I am using the drive for. I have Gigabyte GA-880GA-UD3H – user2132188 Oct 15 '16 at 09:41
  • The enclosure most likely emulates 4Kn sectors. You need to decide where to use to the disk and keep it there. – Daniel B Oct 15 '16 at 09:44
  • @DanielB - I know it would be risky, but what is the chance that testdisk could be used to realign/fix things ? – davidgo Oct 15 '16 at 09:45
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    @davidgo No chance at all. It would have to recreate the filesystem from scratch to refer to the appropriate on-disk locations (which are now addressed in 512 B blocks, instead of 4 K blocks). While theoretically possible, it would require *absolute* knowledge of the NTFS filesystem. – Daniel B Oct 15 '16 at 09:47
  • @DanielB - That does not make sense to me. Surely you need 4k blocks (regardless of SATA or USB), and NTFS positions must be relative to the start of the partition so its "just" a matter of fixing the alignment - which must be out if the disk is reporting as unallocated? – davidgo Oct 16 '16 at 00:36
  • @davidgo It’s just the question how the relative position is stored – it could be in physical blocks. However, it appears NTFS performs the abstraction from physical block size at a very low level, so it might just work. The MBR depends heavily on physical block size, so it’ll at least be misinterpreted when the 4Kn emulation goes away. – Daniel B Oct 17 '16 at 07:52

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