Can't activate paritions in XP SP2

[Guest]

I have all updates installed for XP Professional. I have 2 hard drives, each
with a native BIOS capacity of 300 gigs. Through XP installation, I was only
offered the option of 127.9 gig partitions, one on each drive. Now I have
170 gigs on each drive that are shown as "Unallocated" within the Computer
Management console.

When I try to activate the unallocated partitions (and format them), I go
through the Wizard and at the end, I am told that "the disk configuration
operation did not complete...." According to Microsoft Knowledgebase, there
is a Hotfix for this, but they provide no was of obtaining it short of paying
$59 for a support call - which are almost useless because the techs don't
speak English.

If anyone has a solution, I would be grateful.
Gary

 

[Jerry]

The XP install you performed had to have been from an original XP CD - XP
w/SP1 or SP2 will recognize drives larger than 127Gb.

The thing to do is to slipstream the SP2 download with the original XP CD
and burn a new XP w/SP2 CD and try the install again.

A Google search on slipstreaming will rpovide information on how you
proceed.

 

[Guest]

Slipstreaming into youre xp cd is a bad idea,youre cd can get corrupted from
trying to add to it.Also,youre big mistake in the installation was having 2
hds
connected & running,data gets lost when it sometimes goes to the other hd
instead of C: Also,even with a 127. partition (although this install
failed with
the 2 drives) usually one can do what you tried,2 partitions can be a
benifit...

 

[Shenan Stanley]

Slipstreaming into youre xp cd is a bad idea,youre cd can get
corrupted from trying to add to it.Also,youre big mistake in the
installation was having 2 hds
connected & running,data gets lost when it sometimes goes to the
other hd instead of C: Also,even with a 127. partition (although
this install
failed with
the 2 drives) usually one can do what you tried,2 partitions can be
a benifit...

Andrew E.,

You cannot 'corrupt' an original CD by slipstreaming. You could corrupt
your new copy if there is something wrong with your burner or you do
something beyond the instruction set you follow (or make a mistake - which
is difficult to do as slipstreaming is pretty simplistic.) However - unless
you physically damage your original CD - it's the same CD you had before.

As for your statement about having two hard disk drives running while
installing... Particularly, "data gets lost when it sometimes goes to the
other hd instead of C:"; where do you get this stuff? It can - depending on
what you have connected, install the OS on a drive letter *other than* C:,
but data is not 'lost'.

 

[Guest]

Thanks for the hint, Jerry. I was trying to find a solution that didn't
involve another reinstallation. Microsoft is absolutely no help with this
even though they have a hotfix available. Evidently, I am supposed to pay
for it... I just don't understand why I can't activate the inactive
partitions - forgetting about the limitations of the raw version of XP I have
(without SP2). It is frustrating because it has worked in the past, before I
tried Vista. (In had Vista running for a couple of weeks and found it so
flawed that I switched back to XP.) Thanks for the help.

 

[NZSchoolTech]

I believe XP Setup needs an update for 48 Bit BIOS. This may be a driver
that your HDD controller or motherboard manufacturer supplies and is
installed when you press F6 in the early stage of the installation.

 

[Guest]

The problem has been solved. Microsoft was no help at all in the mystery...
So I tinkered... and discovered that Norton Go-Back was actually preventing
the initialization of the 2 hard drives. I disabled Go-Back and the Disk
Management Console worked fine. I am beginning to re-think my use of
Symantec products.

Gary

 

[Jerry]

There have been many comments in these newsgroups about how bad Norton is
and many recommend not installing it at all.

 

[Guest]

Gary,

Were you able to see or allocate all 300GB of your drives? I have a similar
problem were only 127 GB of my new 300 GB drive is allocated. I have tried
all fixes except slip streaming...not going there.

Any suggestions?

 

[Shenan Stanley]

Were you able to see or allocate all 300GB of your drives? I have a
similar problem were only 127 GB of my new 300 GB drive is
allocated. I have tried all fixes except slip streaming...not going
there.

Any suggestions?

First - quote what you are responding to.

Second - new install? Without SP1 or greater Windows XP Media - you will
not be able to format the drive greater than 127GB. You have to have
slipstreamed Windows XP media in order to format (during the install) a
driver larger than 127GB. It's not hard to do and poses no danger to your
original media. Products like nLite and such will do this *for* you.