By Sophia | Last Updated
MBR and GPT are two different partition recording ways of disk. IBM raised MBR in 1983, Intel proposed the GPT in 2005. So, which one is more suitable for us when we choose the disk partitioning method? Don't worry; we will analyze the motherboard types, the installed Windows system support types and the differences between MBR and GPT here, which is helpful for you to choose the disk partition style.
MBR, the abbreviation of Master Boot Record, includes the hard disk partition table and boot code. The hard disk partition table has a total of 64 bytes, each 16byte records a partition. In other words, MBR mode maximum supports 4 hard disk partitions. The partition will be carried out logical partitions over four.
At the same time, MBR supports up to 2TB's hard disk. Over 2TB's hard disk MBR can't work.
The GPT, the abbreviation of GUID Partition Table, is proposed by Intel later to solve the MBR weak point. Firstly, GPT theoretically supports an unlimited number of partitions; users are free to divide the hard disk space. But Microsoft currently limits that to within 128 partitions.
Secondly, GPT broke the MBR 's highest hard disk capacity support record. The GPT can support up to 18 EB (1EB=1048576TB) capacity hard disk, which is quite amazing.
In addition to these two advancements, GPT has better stability and security than MBR.
The startup code of the MBR is stored in the boot sector along with the operating system installation information. If the information of the MBR is deleted or damaged by mistake, we cannot start Windows normally.
GPT comes with a partition table backup, which saves the same partition table information in the head and tail of the disk. When one partition table is damaged, it can be easy to recover quickly with another portion. This mechanism is largely to protect users' data.
Therefore, GPT is more secure and reliable than MBR , and its performance is more powerful too.
In daily use, we often see these matchs: BIOS + MBR to boot system , UEFI + GPT to boot system.
This is the best match for them. The system disk with BIOS and GPT cannot be started. The system disk of the UEFI+MBR can be started but the UEFI needs to be set to the Legacy mode and turn on the CSM compatible module, so that there is no difference with BIOS + MBR. It is no value to do this.
UEFI + GPT is the future choose, not only GPT can support more large and complex disk partition, but also GPT can better avoid failure than MBR. It is very friendly for users. At the same time, UEFI is also faster, safer , more powerful and simpler than BIOS.
How to choose between MBR and GPT? We can check the motherboard type firstly. Here are two ways to check motherboard type.
2.1 Right-click on the "This Computer" icon on the desktop, select "Manage" from the shortcut menu.
In the computer management window, we select “Hard Disk Management” on the left. After waiting the system load the information, we can see the motherboard type from the middle of the window.
2.2 We use the "Win + R " combination key to call up the run window, enter "msinfo 32 " in the window and click "OK ".
In the pop-up window we can quickly see the BIOS mode.
After understanding the motherboard type, we just need to avoid the uncompatible system disk partition method. Remember that BIOS + MBR and UEFI + GPT combinations are the best ways to start system. For the data disk, it is usually free to set the partition mode.
Understand the type of motherboard, according to the golden rule of BIOS + MBR , UEFI + GPT , we also need to understand the support partition of the operating system. The old MBR will be supported very well, the new GPT is needed to check the system version.
We can refer to the following table for the support for GPT in each version of Windows:
So far, we have introduced a comprehensive introduction for the checking motherboard type, Windows operating system support partition type, differences between MBR and GPT. Do you have any idea about how to choose the disk partition style for new hard drive? Yes, you can put it into practice now!
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