Number of sectors off by two?

Sure, this is the output of the two commands, first fdisk

root@gyro /root % fdisk -l -u /dev/sdc

WARNING: GPT (GUID Partition Table) detected on '/dev/sdc'! The util fdisk doesn't support GPT. Use GNU Parted.


Disk /dev/sdc: 3000.6 GB, 3000592982016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 364801 cylinders, total 5860533168 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00000000

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sdc1               1  4294967295  2147483647+  ee  GPT

and then parted

root@gyro /root % parted /dev/sdc unit s print
Model: ATA ST33000650NS (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdc: 5860533168s
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt

Number  Start  End          Size         File system  Name  Flags
 1      2048s  5860532223s  5860530176s  ext3

The disk is in an external case now, thus the change from /dev/sdb to /dev/sdc.

Thanks for your help!

You are probably right. I might be a little overcautious: This is my first 3 TB disk, and the mainboard is little older.

As the output of gdisk show, the sole partition does not include the last couple of sectors anyway:

root@gyro /root % gdisk /dev/sdc
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 0.7.1

Partition table scan:
  MBR: protective
  BSD: not present
  APM: not present
  GPT: present

Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT.

Command (? for help): p
Disk /dev/sdc: 5860533168 sectors, 2.7 TiB
Logical sector size: 512 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): 63C30E54-3155-49AC-8D57-74998A78971C
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 5860533134
Partitions will be aligned on 2048-sector boundaries
Total free space is 2925 sectors (1.4 MiB)

Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name
   1            2048      5860532223   2.7 TiB     0700

May be there are two "off by one" errors here. One could stem from SeaTools, reporting 5,860,533,167 instead of 5,860,533,168 sectors. I'll ask Seagate about it. But the GParted info dialog suggests even one more sector for a "total" of 5860533169 sectors.

Interesting.  Unfortunately I do not know the reason for the difference reported between Seagate and the GNU/Linux tools.

Since the three GNU/Linux tools (fdisk, gdisk, and parted) all report the same value, I have a tendency to believe these three tools, but this does not mean that these are necessarily correct.  On the plus side, the source code is available so one can investigate to learn how the total number of sectors is calculated.

Of direct concern to me, is that you see GParted as reporting one sector more than the three GNU/Linux tools.  I have checked my drives (largest is 1 Terabyte) and the GParted values agree with the other three GNU/Linux tools.

Would you be able to post a link to a screen shot with GParted and the parted output so that I can see the problem for myself?

Thanks for the updated information and screen shot.   It would appear that you have found a bug in what GParted reports for the unallocated partition size.

Would you be able to check what "View --> Device Information" reports as the size of the drive?

Thanks for this additional information and again for reporting this problem.

If you have a chance, please feel free to open a new bug report for this problem and perhaps provide a link back to this post.  That will help minimize the chance of losing track of this problem.
http://gparted.org/bugs.php

Thank you for filing the bug report and the updated info from Seagate.

I plan to investigate a fix for this problem soon.