Best way to use a 3TB drive in XP? Mult Partitions? other ideas?

[777funk]

I have a 3TB drive and would like to use it. I'm ok with multiple drive letters if necessary. Is there an easy way to use all the space on the drive in XP?

thank you in advance!

 

[Ra_V_en]

1) On 32 bit XP will be the limit of the single partition to 2TB so you will need at least 2 partitions to use the whole disk space.
2) Also if you don't have UEFI bios the HDD itself can be limited to 2TB.

The size of the system partition and data partition doesn't matter.
I personally have 100GB partition (SYSTEM) for an OS with all programs I need, ~900GB (Data) partition where I install games and store some data used quite frequently and 1TB (Storage) partition for mp3, movies and game installers.

 

[mesab66]

What is your current setup?

Ideally/if possible use an SSD for your OS + a few of your most frequently used apps/games,
then (and alternatively), consider what other programs & games you'd like to have installed. With this information, partition your 3TB into 2 to allow for these additional programs + future headroom software installation. The second partition of your 3TB HDD should be limited to data (media - films/photos/etc. etc.).

[Note the size/OS constraints as mentioned by Ra_V_en above]

 

[777funk]

I have XP (SP3 32 Bit) on a 500GB drive and would really like to use the 3TB drive only as file storage.

thanks for the answers so far.

I did split the drive into 2 partitions (2TB + 1TB) and XP sees it now but it only shows one of the partitions and lists it as 748GB or some such random number (not the partition sizes I had made and only is showing it as one new drive letter).

 

[mesab66]

There may be a partition/HDD initialisation issue.

Run Computer Management (if needed, see https://support.microsoft.com/kb/308423)

In Computer Management select Disk Management.

Examine the listing. Do you see your original HDD plus the new HDD and it's 2 partitions? We're looking to see if your larger partition is in an uninitialized state (not formatted and/or not had drive letter assigned). If it is in this state, you'll need to do this yourself (your partition software might not have completed this).
Be careful, though, make sure you perform this action on the correct partition.

 

[777funk]

I went to Disk Management and it only shows just the one partition of the new drive (746GB). I created two under the same exact NTFS format but for some reason only the smaller of the two is showing up. I also updated my bios to Pheonix 1.0.10 through Dell's website.

Specs on this is a Dell 531S Athlon Dual Core X2 4000+ 4GB Ram and Win XP 32 SP3.

 

[Chicano]

Paragon GPT Loader lets 3TB drives work under Windows XP
http://www.geek.com/chips/paragon-gpt-loader-lets-3tb-drives-work-under-windows-xp-1292899/