New Hard Drive not recognized by Windows (solved)

[Perene]

Guys, I installed a WD 1 TB Blue brand new Hard Drive. BIOS recognizes the drive, and Windows, too. This picture shows the drive exists, but I can't access it. HDTune also cannot see the drive specs:



(Click to enlarge)

It seems clear to me something needs to be done prior to seeing the drive ready for the 1st time (format?). How should I do that?

Windows used is 8.1 Pro 64.

 

[Cerb]

Right-click there and see if you have an option to initialize, create volume, or something like that, for that drive, or its space. With a new drive, it's supposed to automatically come up with the wizard for that, but it doesn't always.

 

[Perene]

Right-click there and see if you have an option to initialize, create volume, or something like that, for that drive, or its space. With a new drive, it's supposed to automatically come up with the wizard for that, but it doesn't always.

It's saying this right after I enter this area:

You need to initialize a disk before the manager can gain any access.

What should I reply? This screen is being displayed before you do anything there.

Disc 3 = the mentioned HDD. It's asking whether you will use one type of partition or another. MBR or GPT. And warning that GPT is not recognized by all Windows versions.

 

[Cerb]

<=2tb: MBR
>2tb: GPT

MBR can't use more than 2TB, but is compatible with older OSes, and more data recovery software. GPT can access incomprehensible (today, anyway!) amounts of storage, but XP can't see it, nor will most non-PCs you might use it on.

 

[ArisVer]

GPT is better, a bit more reliable.