The Scenario
"I have 3 TB hard drive, and I installed it on my Windows 7 computer. There are
four parts on my hard drive, the system reserved partition, system partition and two
unallocated space, and I want to use the unallocated space to create some new
partition to store different files. However, when I right click the last unallocated
space, it showed gray like the following picture displayed (the first unalloacated
space is valuable)."
It was too bad that the New Simple Volume, New Spanned Volume, New Stripped Volume,
New Mirrored Volume, New RAID-5 Volume greyed out so that you cannot create new
partition with this unallocated space.
Another user said that his 3 TB disk only used 2 TB like the following screen shot,
and he tried to use the New Simple Volume to create a new partition to use it.
However, he found the option greyed out.
With those kind of problem, how could you make a full use of your disk?
Why "New Simple Volume" grayed out?
As the scenario said, the first unallocated space is in normal state, while the
options in the second unallocated space is grayed out. Why? Most of users may know
that Windows operating system supports both MBR and GPT disk, and the two disk types
have their own characteristics to effect on their performance.
MBR, the abbreviation of Master Boot Record, which only supports the capacity up to 2
TB, and you can only create up to 4 primary partitions, once you want to create more
partitions for different files, you have to convert one primary partition to
extended partition.
GPT, the short of GUID Partition Table, breaks out the limitation of MBR. It supports
more than 2 TB capacity and you can create 128 partitions on GPT disk.
Considering of the problems in scenario, the problem is clear that your hard drive is
MBR that can only use up to 2 TB. That’s why the New Simple Volume greyed out beyond
2 TB in Windows Disk Management.
How to solve New Simple Volume greyed out?
To solve the New Simple Volume greyed out, you should change the MBR into GPT disk so
that the part beyond 2 TB can be available. And here provides you two different ways
to convert MBR to GPT disk.
Method 1. With built-in Disk Management
Disk Management is the build in disk manager of Windows system. Right-click This
PC -> Manage -> Disk Management,
then, right-click the 3TB hard drive and select “Convert to GPT
Disk”, then follow the guidance to finish this conversion.
However, when you want to use it to convert disk from MBR to GPT if there are some
files on the 3TB hard drive, you have to delete all the data on the disk. Because
Disk Management can only convert an empty MBR into GPT. Otherwise, you’ll find Windows
Convert to GPT greyed out.
Method 2. With AOMEI Partition Assistant
AOMEI Partition Assistant is a powerful
disk manager. You can use it to manage your disk for Windows XP/Vista/7/8/8.1/10.
What’s the most important thing is it can convert MBR to GPT
without losing data.
First, you need install and launch AOMEI Partition
Assistant Pro, you will see the main situation of your hard drive. To convert
MBR to GPT, you can right-click the disk no matter there are partitions on it or
not, select “Convert to GPT Disk”, you don’t need worry about the
data because it can convert MBR to GPT and vice versa without losing data.
Then, it will pop out a window that you can ensure whether you’d
like to convert it. Click OK.
After that, the 3TB hard drive will be in the GPT statement, but
don’t forget clicking “Apply” at the tool bar. Then, it will convert MBR disk to GPT
disk.
After converting the MBR disk to GPT disk, you can make a full use of your 3 TB hard
drive. The New Simple Volume of Disk Management would not be grayed out, so you can
use it to create new partition or extend the partition before. You can also use the
AOMEI Partition Assistant to create partition, merge unallocated
space, and so on.