What is the 137 gig barrier and should I worry?

[J Barr]

When I had my last computer build I got a Maxtor 160 Gig HD, the gentle who built it mentioned the 137 barrier and how
he had to work around it using a Promise card. Now I am getting ready to build another unit and was planning on using XP
Pro, the ASUS P4C800 Deluxe MB and I wanted to put two WD 200 Gig HDs in it, will I be faced with the 137 Barrier this
time?

Thanks
Jim Barr

 

[Nick]

When I had my last computer build I got a Maxtor 160 Gig HD, the gentle who built it mentioned the 137 barrier and how
he had to work around it using a Promise card. Now I am getting ready to build another unit and was planning on using XP
Pro, the ASUS P4C800 Deluxe MB and I wanted to put two WD 200 Gig HDs in it, will I be faced with the 137 Barrier this
time?

Thanks
Jim Barr

The 137 GB barrier is due to the way to adress sectors in a drive.
Previous IDE system (previous to ATA5 if I'm not mistaking) used only
28 bits to adress sectors, so you couldn't access more than 137 GB.

Thus IDE 48 bits has been deviced to allow acces to very very very
large drive. The Promise card used this access method, and I assume
the Asus P4C800 does so since it's quite new. I believe as well that
XP Pro can handle more than 137 GB, if not there shall be a patch
available somewhere.

Hope this helped
Nick