Large HD only setup as 2Gb

[WP]

I have and old P75 which I have been lovingly upgrading as time goes by. It is probably reaching retirement but I can't afford a new PC just yet.

I have recently installed a new 20Gb HD and put Windows 98 SE on this. The disk is only set up as a 2Gb drive. Is this because my BIOS is ancient and will not recognise big disks ? If so is there anything I can do to get the other 18Gb to be used ?

Many thanx,


Bill Paton
william.paton@ubsw.com

http://www.neptune400.co.uk/

Check out my website !

 

[edfair]

A bios problem. Run fdisk and set up an extended partition. Let drives d,e,f,g,h and possible i setup. You can use all of it in extended drives.
There are other solutions that will allow more of it on one drive id. Just don't know where I would send you for now.

Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[WP]

Ed Fair,

Ideally I would like to have just 2 partition (8 and 12 or 10 and 10 ).



Bill Paton
william.paton@ubsw.com

http://www.neptune400.co.uk/

Check out my website !

 

[Alt255]

I think you will have to go with a firm-ware solution like EZ Drive (Maxtor). After a few bad experiences with drive enhancement ware, I never thought I would be able to say that, but I'm working on an older Pentium with a huge NTFS partition managed by EZ Drive. I didn't think it was possible but seeing is believing. It works well and I don't see a lag in performance.

I think you should be able to download similar software from the HD manufacturer's web site.

Alt255@Vorpalcom.Intranets.com
​

 

[edfair]

There are tradeoffs whichever way you go. I would opt for a motherboard change over third party solutions. Partition magic could also do this. And one or two other products. But make sure that your emergency boot set works before you trust any data to the system.

Ed Fair
efair@atlnet.com

Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply.

Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[SO]

Couple of things spring to mind, does your BIOS see the Hard drive as it's full capacity? if the answer is yes then maybe you formatted the drive as FAT, which of course has a 2G limit. Otherwise Why not buy a UDMA66/100 controller, you'll get the full speed of the new drive. But still need to get the BIOS to see the drive first.

 

[cfowler]

I agree with Edfair, sounds like a BIOS limitation, although you never did mention weather you formatted the drive initially as FAT16 or not. However, the drive management software is a good idea. You should check your HDD manufacturer's site first to see if they have a proprietary software for your device. Each manufacturer calculates the physical / logical device parameters slightly different from one another.

Good luck,

CF

 

[lexx]

A P75 may or may not have a limitation on the bios HD size. though the 20 giga HD should have come with a software work around utility to enable large HD. was this a western 20 giga you installed. they have the utility on the floppy to large disc enable.

just my 15 seconds of fame