Yes, you need to format in GPT to see the 3TB.
2TB is the limitation of MBR format.

Guys, wanna ask now what is the recommended brand currently for both notebook and desktop hdd?

I read in this thread a few years back, it was samsung (forgot which model) which was phased out.

I'm currently using Samsung and WD green for my desktop and also planning to change my notebook hd because all showing caution on crystal diskinfo.

My WD green was already showing caution a few months after purchase last year and thank god it hasn't die yet.

I think torrenting has some effect on killing hdds much more quickly than before.

dayum, was at All IT IKANO, WD Red 4TB cost RM719?


i bought mine months back at RM589

bumping for answers.

Perhaps a little bit on the expensive route but I suggest getting the SSD drives for your notebook and desktop boot drive. Don't need to get bleeding edge SSD. Just a normal bang for the buck one will do wonders for speed.

Then go for external drives or invest in NAS for large storage. If you have a few PCs / notebooks connected via your home network, best would be a NAS. Nowadays Seagate and WD drives should be fine. I hear Toshiba drives are also excellent. If you can get Hitachi, that would be best but hard to come by.

Spindle speed? 7200rpm for performance and for home use storage, best to get 5400rpm to keep heat and electricity bills down.

Yeah, my 6TB WD Red drives also damn expensive at the moment. Blame it on the weak currency.

How old is the drive? If there's already warning, best is to get ready and transfer / backup your data. It's not like a car where problems can be repaired.

I bought it in 2010, so it's already 5 years. Reading back my old post i just found out i was conned by seller, i requested for Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ

5 years is 10% is limadekad. Hardisk pretty cheap nowadays. Just get one to replace the Samsung. Re-format this Samsung drive and see if errors still come up. You can use it as spare for unimportant data.

Maybe I'll consider an SSD for the laptop but I'm not so up to the idea for the desktop as it is abit old.

So no specific models that come in mind for the hdd?

I'm thinking of the WD blue series as I heard it is quite good, performance wise.

WD Blue is good. I believe max size is 1TB. Don't know what's the latest info and reliability on the WD Green but I personally avoid it.

On SSD, it's never too old a motherboard to have one. I put a Samsung 840 EVO on my Socket 775 Intel mobo with SATA 2 port. Never been more happy.

I quickly Bought wd40efrx @rm680+ when it became clear to me prices are shooting up thanks to weakening RM

i have a 500gb buffalo portable harddisk HD-PNTU3,
the problem i have is..when i plug in,got green light,the device is connected,but not appearing on MY COMPUTER..wat happening?
tried on several laptops,it's the same..
the harddisk is bought on 2012..
sifu's pls help..

If you bought it from 2012 it's pretty safe to say the warranty have expired. You can try extracting the HDD out from the external hard disk enclosure shell and use the HDD as a usual HDD by plugging it into your SATA slot or cable.

If the HDD still fail to show up then it's your external HDD enclosure controller circuit that is the culprit. Frankly nothing much you can do with this other than getting a new portable external HDD.

Helo, I want to get a new external 3.5" harddrive, anyone can recommend?

Kinda vague la bro. Nowadays there's a whole range of these 3.5" ones (desktop external HDDs), from very basic storage right through fancy ones with cool functions.

If anything that's 2TB and lower, I'd recommend going for the 2 major brands, Seagate or WD. I'm kinda partial to whatever's cheaper in the market though.

If you kinda know what you're doing, then buy an internal 3.5" HDD and put it into an external case. Keep in mind the capacity of the HDD and upper limit of external case. Some external cases is only compatible with MBR format, so it's limited to recognizing up to 2TB HDD, no matter what capacity HDD you put in.

I've got a couple of old Seagate HDDs in external casings and plugged in via USB cables.

If you're looking for bigger storage, then I recommend getting a NAS. I have a WD My Cloud Mirror that I use for my family to share files with. It's become kind of like our common digital closet, where we keep our family photos and videos. Also, I toss any series and movies so anyone can watch it at anytime with their own devices.

Guys, quick question

Wanna ask where can I still get like 7200 rpm internal HDD 2.5" for my laptop.
Most of the sellers are only selling the 5400 rpm variation and limited brands like WD and Toshiba. Even hybrid drives are hard to find.

Thanks in advance!

Hi guys,

My WD 2TB is having some issues lately. When I am trying to copy some files over (PC to Harddisk), it just keep getting stuck half way.

I tried cancelling the process and ended up became not responding

Searching on the web on this, some say it needs to set the enable caching in Windows, but the issue still persist.

Anyone has idea how I can fix this problem?

Check the health of your hard disk, use HDDScan or any other software that can extract SMART info from your hard disk, then look at few of these attributes with keyword "sector", such as "Reallocated sector count" (worst possible case), "Pending sector count".
If there's any number other than "0" then backup all files from that hard disk to other hard disk. Look for software that can wipe your hard disk, usually format won't be enough to clear the "Pending sector count" flag, if the "Reallocated sector count" flag is increasing after you do wiping, proceed to RMA your hard disk, you can't rescue such severe damage.
This is an usual sign of failing hard disk, your case may be different, but you may try out those method as I faced this quite few times from my own hard disk and my time as technical support.

Thanks for the advise, I will try it out.

Hey there Homura15

Just would like to double confirm, can you copy the file to a different location (not to the external drive?)

Most likely there is a problematic file, or problematic portion of the disk that is causing this error then. Like mentioned by wildwestgoh I would suggest running a chkdsk on the machine, which might fix a problematic file issue and might be able to correct a minor disk error.
How to run Chkdsk from My Computer or from Windows Explorer
Double-click My Computer, and then right-click the hard disk that you want to check.
Click Properties, and then click Tools.
Under Error-checking, click Check Now. A dialog box that shows the Check disk options is displayed,
Use one of the following procedures:
To run Chkdsk in read-only mode, click Start.
To repair errors without scanning the volume for bad sectors, select the Automatically fix file system errors check box, and then click Start.
To repair errors, locate bad sectors, and recover readable information, select the Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors check box, and then click Start. Note If one or more of the files on the hard disk are open, you will receive the following message:
The disk check could not be performed because the disk check utility needs exclusive access to some Windows files on the disk. These files can be accessed by restarting Windows. Do you want to schedule the disk check to occur the next time you restart the computer?
Click Yes to schedule the disk check, and then restart your computer to start the disk check.
I would recommend Running it to repair errors and locate bad sectors in this case.
Hope this helps.

I downloaded HDDScan and saw a red with "x" mark status on "Reallocated Sector Count" there are a bunch of number on that line. I'm not sure what it means.

What kind of software would you suggest to wipe the harddisk?

I tried copying the files to a different location and there were no issue.

I followed your instructions to run Scan and attempt recovery of bad sectors check box on my external harddisk and the scan is still running this morning from last night. Is the scan supposed to be that long?

What are the scenario I should be seeing after the scan is complete?