Wednesday May 28
15:06
How To Delete A GPT Protective Partition
I reformatted one of my USB hard drives as Mac OS Extended format the other day to try as a backup for Time Machine, and today converted it back to PC format. Stuck on the beginning of the disk I found a 200MB “GPT Protective Partition”.
I’ve no idea what it is, but I know it’s not necessary. Being space conscious, I wanted to remove it - but I also wanted to remove it on “safety” grounds: it causes problems with Partition Magic (which can’t even reinitialise the disk), and, I think, XP. I don’t want to copy files onto that disk and then later find out there are problems accessing it because of the GPT Protective Partition.
Here’s how to remove it:
1. In XP, run: cmd
2. diskpart
3. list disk
4. select disk # (the number from the list)
5. clean
6. In XP, run: compmgmt.msc and select Disk Management
7. Look for the disk which says “Not Initialized”, right click, then select Initialize Disk
8. Select OK to confirm
9. Right click on the Unallocated space and select “New Partition…”
10. Partition as required
Did this help you? Did it save you hours of your precious time? Then consider sending me a few bucks - not only will it make me happy, but it will help keep my free site The Korean Blog List running!
Thanks for the tip, I was stuck!
Thanks for the tip - this has enabled me to sort out a disk I had just bought.
Thank you i have trying diferent metods and none worked this one was the solution graet help thank you very much
[…] I keep searching and then I found a page by Lemon Soju that got the same problem, and also step-by-step how to remove GPT Protective […]
works in vista home premium too
Thanks a lot. You saved me a lot of time trying to fix this.
Thank you, very much appreciated.
thanks!
This worked like a dream, Saved my 300gb external :-)
Awesome…so simple but so efficient !
Thanks!!
wow thanks a lot that really helped. I actually got a refund for my hard drive but got to keep it so i just got it for free thanks to you!