Persistent error after upgrade: ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb

Hardware: Asus U56E
Upgrade from Xubuntu 13.10 64-bit to 14.04 64-bit

# lsb_release -rd
Description: Ubuntu 14.04 LTS
Release: 14.04

I just upgraded to 14.04. During the upgrade I received the error: " ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb." multiple times. Here is an excerpt from /var/log/apt/term.log:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Found memtest86+ image: /boot/memtest86+.bin
ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb.
ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb.
ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb.
ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb.
ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb.
ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb.
ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb.
ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb.
grub-probe: error: unknown filesystem
Found Windows Recovery Environment (loader) on /dev/sda1
Found Windows 7 (loader) on /dev/sda2
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

/dev/sdb is an external USB-attached 3TB Seagate Backup Plus disk that has been attached to 13.10 since it was upgrade, and has caused no problems.

The upgrade acted as though there were unrecoverable errors and that the upgrade would be backed out, but it continued and finished the upgrade to 14.04. There were a few minor configuration problems with the upgrade, but it appear to work properly. However, now, every time I reboot, I get a blank screen with the message:

ERROR: unsupported sector size 4096 on /dev/sdb.

Then the system hangs for about 30 seconds or so before continuing with the boot into xfce4. Once up, both the Thunar and Nautilus file managers see the Seagate disk and are able to mount and navigate it without problem.

The Seagate disk is being used as formatted from the factory. gparted-pkexec and gnome-disks diagree on sizes, but show an initial 8.0/8.4Mb unallocated partition followed by /dev/sdb1 with 2.73/3.0Tb NTFS filesystem and then another unallocated 4.46/4.7Mb partition.

From this information and the fact that this message is not logged in any system file, I would assume the the problem is with the grub loader.

While this problem is investigated further, is there any way to stop the boot delay when this message is displayed?

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04
Package: ubuntu-release-upgrader-core 1:0.220.2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-29.53-generic 3.13.11.2
Uname: Linux 3.13.0-29-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.14.1-0ubuntu3.2
Architecture: amd64
CrashDB: ubuntu
CurrentDesktop: XFCE
Date: Thu Jun 26 17:17:15 2014
InstallationDate: Installed on 2012-04-17 (800 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.10 "Oneiric Ocelot" - Release amd64 (20111012)
PackageArchitecture: all
SourcePackage: ubuntu-release-upgrader
Symptom: release-upgrade
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to trusty on 2014-06-25 (1 days ago)
VarLogDistupgradeTermlog: