120Gb HD reading as 111Gb

[Guest]

Hi,
I have recently installed my new slave 120Gb hard drive. It is recognised as
only 111Gb. Is there anyway to get the full amount of 120Gb out of this
device? I got to format it through XP but will only allow me to select 111Gb
option.

I run XP Pro,
120Gb 8Mb
Motherboard - M7VIG Pro

Any help would be appreciated!

 

[NoNoBadDog!]

You are getting the full volume on the disc that can be allocated. It boils
down to the different "meanings" of Gigabyte. It can be "measured" in two
different ways. a Gigabyte is defined as follows:

2 to the 30th power (1,073,741,824) bytes. One gigabyte is equal to 1,024
megabytes. Gigabyte is often abbreviated as G or GB.


However, the disc manufacturer uses a figure of 1,000 megabytes to equal a
gigabyte when publishing the disc capacity. the difference between 1,024
and 1,000 multiplied by 120, plus the small overhead that the disc
formatting uses, accounts for the discrepancy.

In short, you are seeing the full available capacity of your disc, and
windows considers a GB to be 1.024 MB, while the disc manufacturer considers
a GB to be 1,00MB.

Bobby

 

[roman modic]

Hello

In short, you are seeing the full available capacity of your disc, and
windows considers a GB to be 1.024 MB, while the disc manufacturer
considers a GB to be 1,00MB.

Windows probably sees aproximately 120/1.073741824=111.76 GB.
BTW, if you go to "My computer" and right click on your disk
and select "properties", you will see two numbers for capacity.
(Here is an example for my external Samsung USB "120 GB" disk)

Capacity: 121.860.587.520 bytes 113 GB

Best regards, Roman

 

[HillBillyBuddhist]

| Hi,
| I have recently installed my new slave 120Gb hard drive. It is recognised
as
| only 111Gb. Is there anyway to get the full amount of 120Gb out of this
| device? I got to format it through XP but will only allow me to select
111Gb
| option.
|
| I run XP Pro,
| 120Gb 8Mb
| Motherboard - M7VIG Pro
|
| Any help would be appreciated!

The size you're seeing is correct.

Drive manufacturers advertise their drives in decimal capacity. Computers
"see" the drive in binary capacity.

Here's a good explanation;
http://wdc.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/wdc...X5hbnl_JnBfc29ydF9ieT1kZmx0JnBfcGFnZT0x&p_li=

http://tinyurl.com/3an62

--
D

I'm not an MVP a VIP nor do I have ESP.
I was just trying to help.
Please use your own best judgment before implementing any suggestions or
advice herein.
No warranty is expressed or implied.
Your mileage may vary.
See store for details.

Remove shoes to E-mail.

 

[Plato]

I have recently installed my new slave 120Gb hard drive. It is recognised as
only 111Gb. Is there anyway to get the full amount of 120Gb out of this
device? I got to format it through XP but will only allow me to select 111Gb
option.

Normal. You only purchased a 111/112 HDD. The 120 is a marketing
gimmick. Just like monitors.

 

[Stan Brown]

in
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general:

Hi,
I have recently installed my new slave 120Gb hard drive. It is recognised as
only 111Gb.

120,000,000,000 = 111.75 * 1024 * 1024 * 1024

Microsoft's billion is 2^30 = 1024^3; everyone else's billion is
10^9.

 

[Ron Martell]

Microsoft's billion is 2^30 = 1024^3; everyone else's billion is
10^9.

No. Everyone in the computer industry uses binary values for computer
memory (RAM) and for ROM chips.

It is only with hard drives that there is a difference. And while
this situation is confusing it would be worse, at least in my opinion,
if a gigabyte of RAM referred to a different quantity than does a
gigabyte of hard drive space.


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

In memory of a dear friend Alex Nichol MVP
http://aumha.org/alex.htm

 

[Stan Brown]

No. Everyone in the computer industry uses binary values for computer
memory (RAM) and for ROM chips.

I meant "everyone else's billion" as used to measure hard-disk
capacity.

It is only with hard drives that there is a difference. And while
this situation is confusing it would be worse, at least in my opinion,
if a gigabyte of RAM referred to a different quantity than does a
gigabyte of hard drive space.

I have to agree with your last point -- a gigabyte of disk ought to
equal a gigabyte of RAM. Despite the fact that "giga" means 10^9 in
standard metric, it definitely means 2^30 in RAM.