137 GB Limit on External HD

[Guest]

I have PC runnong XP Pro SP2. I have an older externalfirewire HD enclosure
that I used as a backup HD. Recently I bought a new HD that is bigger than
137 Gb and for some reason I am unable to get it to work.
I formatted it on IDE channel (NTFS) using MaxBlast4 utility. Then I removed
it and put it inside the enclosure. Now, "disc management" shows 189 GB of
unformatted spave. I am able to change the drive letter, but when I try to
format it the process hangs.
Also, when I try partition magic(PM) it shows 131 GB of "BADMBR". if I try
to run PM while disk manager is running, pm just hangs. My primary HD is 250
GB, my atapi.sys file is version 28xx and I am running SP2 so I should not
have this problem. CompUsa website informs me that this enclosure does not
need any drivers as xp offers native support for IEEE 1394.
I am confused what do I do wrong?

 

[Richard Urban]

What did you do wrong? You used maxblast to partition/format your drive.
Many who use maxblast report this problem. Maxblast makes entries in the MBR
that are causing problems when you use the drive under Windows XP. Partition
Magic doesn't like it much either. But you have found this out.

I suggest you reinstall the drive where it was when you installed maxblast
and then UN-install it. Use the same utility you used for the install.

Windows XP SP2 is perfectly capable of using a large drive without it being
touched by maxblast. If your bios does not see the large drive correctly you
may want to update your bios. If there is no bios update available, maybe it
is time for a new motherboard or computer.

--


Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User

Quote from George Ankner:
If you knew as much as you think you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!

 

[Guest]

Deleted it. Now the system "sees" only 131 GB. My MoBo is not even 2 years
old, my BIOS is dated August 2004. and I have a 250 GB HD on my primary IDE
channel? Why can't this external HD be seen in full capacity. This does not
make sense to me. Ahrrrr, This drives me nuts!

 

[Andy]

I have PC runnong XP Pro SP2. I have an older externalfirewire HD enclosure
that I used as a backup HD. Recently I bought a new HD that is bigger than
137 Gb and for some reason I am unable to get it to work.
I formatted it on IDE channel (NTFS) using MaxBlast4 utility. Then I removed
it and put it inside the enclosure. Now, "disc management" shows 189 GB of
unformatted spave. I am able to change the drive letter, but when I try to
format it the process hangs.
Also, when I try partition magic(PM) it shows 131 GB of "BADMBR". if I try
to run PM while disk manager is running, pm just hangs. My primary HD is 250
GB, my atapi.sys file is version 28xx and I am running SP2 so I should not
have this problem. CompUsa website informs me that this enclosure does not
need any drivers as xp offers native support for IEEE 1394.
I am confused what do I do wrong?

Assuming that the older enclosure is able to handle large drives.
Regardless of whether your PC can properly access large ATA drives, it
won't work if the enclosure itself is unable to properly access large
drives.

 

[Guest]

I was afraid you'd say that!

 

[Jonny]

Just get a new USB/Firewire external enclosure, they're not expensive.

 

[Guest]

I have 2nd internal HD that is 120 GB. I'll just swap them for now. I'll just
be a pain to transfer all my files

 

[LVTravel]

Yep, change the position of the two drives and simply do a full copy of the
files from the "New" USB drive to the "new" slave drive in the computer.

As long as you don't have any hidden for in use files on the USB drive you
can safely use either Windows Explorer or a "DOS" command window to Xcopy
all the files in one evening/night.

Start|CMD then type

XCOPY S:\*.* D:\ /E /H /K
Where S: is the drive to be copied and D: is the target drive letter. I have
left out the command to continue if errors occur since you want to make sure
the entire drive gets copied with no errors.

 

[Guest]

Sorry, but I'm really lost!

I've been reading all the posts and still don't know what to do.

I recently installed at WD 250 GB hard drive. The BIOS regognizes it as
232gb on the startup, and it's connected to a Promise card. But windows only
shows 128gb

I also have another hard drive that has been attached to that Promise card
for 2 years, and that drive shows over 137 GB. But for some reason the new
one only registers 128GB in the Disk Manager.

I am running XP SP2.

I've tried using WD's "Data lifeguard tools" and that didnt work......any
ideas?

sorry to highjack the thread, but this is really bugging me.

 

[Guest]

From what I understand it's all about the drivers for you Hd/external
enclosure. PCI Card has nothing to do with it. If you can track down the
manufacturer of you external device and get new driver, the device will
enable Disk Manager to see past 128 GB. Under "Disk Drivers" in Device
Manager you should be able to see your device. Look at the driver Version. If
its like July 2001, then it is the Generic XP Version and it will mos likely
not "see" past 128 GB. Your new HD software will not help you with this.You
can try to Google it and see what comes up for drivers. Otherwise, join the
club!!!

By the way, if you find a new driver for "Genesys Logic 1394 Storage Device
IEEE SBP2 Device" let me know. I need it!!

 

[LVTravel]

Your right, you shouldn't hijack the thread. I thought initially that this
was the OP responding again.

You will probably have to either delete the partition and repartition the
drive to get the full size of the drive or partition the remainder of the
space and create another logical drive. (If you have Partition Magic or
similar program you can stretch the original partition to the full size of
the drive.)

Right click MyComputer then Left click Manage|Disk Management and find the
drive in the right bottom window. See if it shows unpartitioned space. If
so you have found the remainder of the drive space.

 

[Guest]

UPDATE THE CONTROLER CARD!!!

I manually searched out my controler card on-line, downloaded the newest
driver set from Promise and whalla I know have 232 GB of Storage!!!!!!

PK, you were right...the July 7, 2001 driver date was the indication that it
was just the generic windows....it works now!!!! I didn't think it was going
to be this difficult...good luck finding the answer to your problem.