Hard Drive

[mike]

Hey fellow TCH ers how are you?

 

Question:

I am putting a 120 gig western digital hard drive in an old 266 mhz Gateway.

 

Fdisk reports only about 48 gigabyte for total partition size.

 

Anybody know how to deal with that? Is there a jumper setting?

 

thanks in advance.

[TCH-Bruce]

The deal with that would be your motherboard bois cannot detect the size of the new drive I would imagine.

[cajunman4life]

That would be my guess as well. A 266MHz eludes to the age of the system. Why not consider putting that "large" drive in a newer system? They are extremely easy to come by (at least in my area). I can get a P3 500MHz for next to nothing.

[Madmanmcp]

It could two things, your system BIOS and/or your operating system. I suspect both, you have and older computer which I assume has and old operating system and an old BIOS.

 

Read these two sites and see if it helps explain things a little for you.

 

You have a few options, but I don't think a single partition for the total size will be one of them.

 

h_tp://www.spcug.org/reviews/bl0107.htm

h_tp://www.dewassoc.com/kbase/hard_drives/hard_drive_size_barriers.htm

[TCH-Don]

I just bought a western digital 120 gig drive too

There is a CD included that will add a bios overlay to allow you to use all the space

on older computers.

[stevevan]

You might want to check the Western Digital website to see if they have software like what Don mentioned available for download.

[mike]

Ok here's where I am:

 

The owner doesn't have the disk so I downloaded from western digital.

The windows download, of course won't work, because I am only at the partition stage.

The dos download won't work because it requires win32.

 

So I am at the point where partition only sets it up at 48,935 megabyte so I can't load windows 98.

 

so I seem to be stuck at the low partition and unable to get the harddrive large enough to load windows.

 

I put in a new ata raid controller but have no way to make the pc see any different because it needs to be in windows to load the raid drivers.

 

 

Any suggestions?

[TCH-Don]

Partition magic can at least resize to let you use all the space

It can boot from CD

 

Or can you download from western digital a boot floppy version of the overlay disk.

[mike]

Well, Don I downloaded a dos version of the driver install but it just says it needs win32 to run

 

I will look into that partition magic thing though.

 

thanks

[TCH-Don]

I see the dos program

http://support.wdc.com/download/index.asp?...n&pid=3&swid=23

I think if you put it on a floppy

and then boot to the start up floppy it might work.

[mike]

Yep, that's the one I downloaded, Don, but it won't run on dos prompt, says it needs win32.

 

This is after I have partitioned, at 48,935, and booting up with a 98 startup disk.

 

Then I switch to the cd drive and try to run it. But it needs win32.

 

Wonder why they call it a dos download then?

[TCH-Don]

Too bad he lost the CD .

[mike]

yep.

[stevevan]

FWIW... I recently had to reformat and reinstall my Win2K OS. I stuck a Western Digital 60 GB disk in. My BIOS wouldn't recognize the disk. So me, being lazy, just left the HD installed. Once I got Win2K running, the OS found the hardware and I was able to use it. Maybe W98 might do the same for you. (Unless you are only using the one drive.)

[mike]

That's what I was hoping for , Steve, but the partition only gets to 48,935 and 98 won't install.

[TCH-Don]

win98 with an old bios will not see it all

it needs their drive overlay

I had a 90 meg PII and needed it.

[TweezerMan]

I'm a little fuzzy on some of the details here, but I think you're having trouble getting the DOS download to work because you're not installing/using it correctly.

 

Yep, that's the one I downloaded, Don, but it won't run on dos prompt, says it needs win32.

 

This is after I have partitioned, at 48,935, and booting up with a 98 startup disk.

 

Then I switch to the cd drive and try to run it. But it needs win32.

What you're supposed to do with the DOS download is use it to create a bootable diskette that contains the partitioning and drive overlay software on it.

 

Per the instructions on the WD site, this is what you're supposed to do:

 

1) Download the dlgsetup11_dos.zip file onto another machine that is working and running some version of Windows.

 

2) Using a program such as WinZip, extract the contents of the dlgsetup11_dos.zip file somewhere (such as your desktop). There is only one file in the archive, named 'diskette.exe'.

 

This is the point where I believe you are misunderstanding the instructions. The purpose of the 'diskette.exe' file is to create a bootable floppy disk for you containing the partitioning and drive overlay software. It is a Windows-based program, and if you copied this program to a CD and tried to run it from a DOS prompt, I imagine it would tell you that it needs 'win32' (a Windows environment to run in).

 

3) Still on the same machine where you extracted 'diskette.exe', run the 'diskette.exe' file (double-click its icon on the desktop if you extracted it there).

 

4) Read and agree to the license agreement.

 

5) You should be prompted to insert a blank 3.5" diskette, after which you would click the "Start" button. From here, the program should do whatever it needs to do to create the bootable diskette.

 

6) Once the bootable diskette has been created, you should then exit the program.

 

7) Insert the new bootable diskette into the computer with the new 120GB, and boot up the computer with this diskette (*not* your bootable Win98 diskette).

 

8) Once the computer has booted up, the diskette should automatically start up the disk tools without you having to do anything. Assuming the instructions are correct, you should eventually be presented with a menu, from where you can choose "SETUP YOUR HARD DRIVE" and other options. (Booting up from a floppy is slow. )

 

I think this should resolve the issue that you're experiencing and get you going again.

 

Hope this helps...

[mike]

Thanks, David.

 

I made the disk and ran it.

 

It got to the WD splash screen and setup everything until it got to the video.

Said it couldn't set up screen resolution and told me to remove all disks and reboot.

 

Then I am back where I started.

 

I have to leave for about 5 hrs now but will try again when I return.

 

thanks. That should have worked. I was real hopeful.

[mike]

 

Gentlemen, we have ignition.

 

A huge thanks for all the help to Bruce, Cajunman, Steve, and especially Madman, Don, and David.

 

Thanks for all your help guys.

 

I used the dos WD disk, and created the boot.

It booted the machine ok and set up virtual drives etc then got to the point

where it said " cannot setup screen display please remove disks and reboot.

 

It looked as though it wasn't going to allow full capacity to the disk, but I went ahead and loaded 98.

 

It loaded fine and now the 120 gig hdrive SAYS SO.

 

THANKS A MILLION YOU GUYS.

 

If you ever get to Nebraska we'll " husk some corn together ".

 

Thanks,

 

Mike

[TCH-Don]

Wahoo

Glad it worked,

 

 

 

David does it again

[Madmanmcp]

Good to hear Mike, glad you stuck with it and found a way to get all your disk space.

[stevevan]

Glad to hear it worked and thanks for sharing the solution.

 

BTW...I'm a Big-10 fan!

[TCH-Bruce]

Yeah Mike!

[mike]

HEH HEH.

 

Yep it got the right capacity, loaded windows, then corrupted windows.

 

I reloaded twice with same results. ( a regular soap opery ain't she ? )

 

So I love the challenge and think maybe I will look for a dos based program to look for maybe a boot virus or a corrupted MBR????

 

I'll keep you posted. heh heh.

 

We did win round one.

[Madmanmcp]

Well good luck Mike. I have a feeling its not a virus or an MBR problem. Either the BIOS or the OS is having difficulty accessing the space you think you have.

 

When you formatted and fdisked the drive you used the special boot disk which allowed the system to "see" the total amount of space you had on the drive. Are there instructions anywhere explaining how to load these drivers into your version of Win98 so IT can also see and access this space.

 

I think this is your current problem. The data is there on the HD, it reports all the space, Windows just doesn't know how to access it all because the drivers are not running.

[Madmanmcp]

After thinking about this a little more it could be a problem with the current data on the HD. When you installed Win98 the drivers were not loaded and it was not accessing the tracks and sectors correctly. It wrote the data and assumed everything was fine, once you rebooted it all went haywire.

 

For everything to work correctly these drivers need to be used/running when you fdisk and format the drive. They also need to be present when you install Windows, and present while running windows.

 

I know in some cases the drives come with these drivers pre-loaded on them and a pointer in the MBR loads them when the drive first boots. I don't know if this is the case with your drive.

[TweezerMan]

I'm with Bob - I think the odds of you having a boot virus or a problem with the MBR is very slim.

 

Digging around on the WD site, I found this post:

"Why do I encounter errors or data corruption in Windows 98/ME?"

 

The page list two possible causes: 1) The BIOS is allowing the drive to send/receive data faster than the chipset on the motherboard can handle, or 2) problems with the IDE cable connected to the drive.

 

For problem #1, they recommend going into the computer's BIOS Setup and disabling UDMA (Ultra-DMA) and setting the drive to use Mode-2 instead. For problem #2, they recommend replacing the IDE cable.

 

The boot diskette you made should have an installed an 'overlay driver', which should load every time the computer is booted. I don't know if you see any message referring to 'EZ-BIOS' or something like that when the computer is booted up - that would be the drive overlay loading.

 

It's possible that the drive overlay isn't working correctly, but I'd try changing the BIOS option noted above, and trying a different IDE cable if you have one. This will be time consuming - you'll have to re-format the drive and re-install Windows to test and see if either option fixes your problem.

 

*****

 

Going back to your earlier post:

I am putting a 120 gig western digital hard drive in an old 266 mhz Gateway.

 

Fdisk reports only about 48 gigabyte for total partition size.

You were hitting the 64GB limitation of the fdisk and format programs that ship with Windows 98. There is a replacement for fdisk at the MSKB web site, if you need to use fdisk to partition a disk larger than 64GB. I don't know if you were trying to use Win98's fdisk, or relying on the WD tools exclusively for partitioning and formatting. I'd recommend using the WD tools exclusively to partition your drive to avoid issues like this.

 

In the detailed product specs, a WD 120GB disk is listed with:

User Sectors Per Drive: 234,441,648

One sector holds 512 bytes of data, so the true capacity of the drive is:

>234,441,648 sectors X 512 bytes/sector = 120,034,123,776 bytes

Most people would see that number and agree that it is 120GB. This assumes that 1GB = 1,000 X 1,000 X 1000 bytes.

 

The computer sees it a little differently: 1 KB = 1,024 bytes; 1 MB = 1,024 KB; 1 GB = 1,024 MB.

 

The above size, converted to MB, where 1 MB = 1,024 X 1,024 bytes:

>120,034,123,776 bytes / 1,024 / 1,024 = 114,473.46 MB

The 64GB limit of fdisk in MB = 64 GB X 1,024 = 65,536 MB.

Subtracting the 64GB fdisk limit from the hard drive capacity:

>114,473.46 MB - 65,536 MB = 48,937.46 MB reported capacity by fdisk.

So I am at the point where partition only sets it up at 48,935 megabyte so I can't load windows 98.

Looks pretty close to me - close enough that it explains the behavior you were seeing.

 

Even if you had the replacement fdisk.exe from MS though, it would not have helped unless the computer's BIOS could properly handle a hard drive of that size (I seriously doubt it could).

[mike]

Yes, I agree with Bob on the Virus thing too.

 

I have been real busy, in and out, as I am now; but I don't recall seeing that EZ-Bios thing come

up, David.

 

So when I get back I think I will try again from square one with a newer fdisk?

 

But I think you are right about the old bios not being able to handle that drive.

 

 

In the words of ol' governor Swartz...... I'll be back.

[TCH-Don]

You should see EZ-Bios flash on the screen when you boot

with a press F-? for options

which will include boot from floppy

if it is working.