2.4TB disk - MBR and GPT coexist?

[Jo Rhett]

> On Jan 12, 2007, at 1:04 AM, Jo Rhett wrote:
>> To make this into a step-by-step, what do you mean by "restore the MBR 
>> partition" ?  From backup, or...?

Marcel Moolenaar wrote:
> Manually recreate, I guess. When creating a GPT, the MBR is replaced
> by a PMBR. A PMBR is a MBR with a single partition spanning the
> whole disk (or as much as can be covered by the MBR) that has type
> 0xEE. The GPT kernel code expects such a partition but does not care
> if there are others. If you restore the MBR from a backup, the 0xEE
> partition will be gone and the GPT will not be used.
> 
> It would probably be nice if gpt(8) could migrate without destroying
> the existing MBR partition, because restoring the MBR partition is
> the least intuitive step. Let me think about this for a bit...

I am very interested in solving this problem, and have machines I am 
more than willing to dedicate to this project.  I'm just somehow lacking 
a clear understanding of what I need to do to test this:

1. Install FreeBSD with a normal MBR partition and leftover free space
2. Migrate the partition to GPT (can I do this from CD fixit mode?)
3. Create a GPT partition using the remaining space
4. Recreate the MBR partition in the original space

... this makes sense, but I suspect that I'm missing a step/option here.

-- 
Jo Rhett
senior geek
Silicon Valley Colocation