installing a large hd on a old PC / old BIOS

[raylopez99]

I am installing an EIDE hd (>40 GB) that is not recognized by the
bios. I googled around and found various suggestions, along the lines
of upgrading the bios or buying a new controller card. I opted for
the latter, but my question is, for a Pentium II, built around 1996 or
1998, is it possible that even with a new controller card, the bios
will, upon bootup, refuse to acknowledge a large drive? Right now the
current drive is 2 or 3 GB

RL

 

[raylopez99]

Thanks nobody. Somebody said that with Linux OS the OS itself will
recognize a larger HD that the BIOS cannot, and if you have any
insight on that issue please share. Right now the current machine is
running Windows 2000. Presumeably Linux during a new installation
would also 'see' a new 40 GB HD as well.

RL

 

[Franc Zabkar]

I am installing an EIDE hd (>40 GB) that is not recognized by the
bios. I googled around and found various suggestions, along the lines
of upgrading the bios or buying a new controller card. I opted for
the latter, but my question is, for a Pentium II, built around 1996 or
1998, is it possible that even with a new controller card, the bios
will, upon bootup, refuse to acknowledge a large drive? Right now the
current drive is 2 or 3 GB

RL

If your motherboard manufacturer doesn't offer a BIOS update to
circumvent the HD size limitation, then you may be able to download a
patched BIOS from here:

http://wims.rainbow-software.org/index.php?count=-1

See the bottom of that page for links to more patched BIOSes. The
upper limit for these BIOSes is typically 128GB.

If your motherboard isn't listed, then post a request to the wimsbios
forum and one of the experts will probably patch your BIOS for you:

http://www.wimsbios.com/phpBB2/my-hard-drive-isn-t-recognized-vf26.html

- Franc Zabkar

 

[Andy]

The problem is if you want to boot from the large drive, then the BIOS
must be able to detect and read it. If the large drive is just a
slave, then you can set the BIOS to not detect it, and that does not
prevent the operating system (Windows or Linux) from being able to
access it.

 

[raylopez99]

The problem is if you want to boot from the large drive, then the BIOS
must be able to detect and read it. If the large drive is just a
slave, then you can set the BIOS to not detect it, and that does not
prevent the operating system (Windows or Linux) from being able to
access it.

Andy--thanks.

I am cross-posting to a Linux group to confirm that Linux can see
drive bigger than your BIOS recognizes, and, whether (your answer did
not directly address this) you can set up a _master_ drive that's
bigger than the biggest drive your BIOS will recognize, and whether
Linux will recognize it (or Windows 2000 for that matter). That is,
whether installing a fresh new 40 GB master drive will allow Windows
or Linux, being loaded from a CD to be installed for the very first
time (clean install), will work, when your BIOS can only see a smaller
3 GB drive maximum.

Thanks,

RL

 

[raylopez99]

Andy--thanks.

I am cross-posting to a Linux group to confirm that Linux can see
drive bigger than your BIOS recognizes, and, whether (your answer did
not directly address this) you can set up a _master_ drive that's
bigger than the biggest drive your BIOS will recognize, and whether
Linux will recognize it (or Windows 2000 for that matter).  That is,
whether installing a fresh new 40 GB master drive will allow Windows
or Linux, being loaded from a CD to be installed for the very first
time (clean install), will work, when your BIOS can only see a smaller
3 GB drive maximum.

Thanks,

RL

Here is some information more. Apparently you first set up your new
big 40 GB drive 'within the parameters of the BIOS' (what parameters
would you pick? I guess something close to the what--the number of
heads or cylinders?--but what if the heads and cylinders are way
different? do you then pick custom head/cylinders in the BIOS option,
and manually input the heads and cylinders? anybody done this?)

Then, after setting up your new big 40 GB HD 'within the parameters of
the (old) BIOS'--you load Linux or Windows 2k SP4. Then, afterwards,
you let the OS itself detect the rest of the HD--I guess from a hard
disk management utility that comes with Win2k (or like Partition
Magic), or something similar in Linux (what would that be?), or, is
this detection by the OS done 'automatically' (I doubt it)?

Anybody have thoughts on this?

RL

BIOS Guru
http://www.wimsbios.com/phpBB2/my-hard-drive-isn-t-recognized-vf26.html

Post subject: HDD above 128/137 GB, general Information
First the bad We can't patch/update Bios for native support of
HDD over 128/137GB.

But the good If your Bios won't provide 48 Bit LBA support for
drives above 128/137GB then you have additional options:

W2K SP4, WinXP SP1, Linux
You won't need native Bios support if you have Windows2000 SP4,
Windows XP SP1 or Linux with a somewhat recent kernel (2.4.18
upwards). Install your OS into a partition within Bios limits and
allocate space above Bios limits within the OS.

 

[Jan Alter]

If the drive is bigger than the bios can recognize it mayu lock the
machine before it will boot any os. Buy a controller card and get
around the problem or go find a thrown out machine newer than the one
you're messing with.

You have a couple of options with your large hdd. You can install a
controller card as suggested, connecting your new hdd to that. They run
between $10 - $20.
Or you can use overlay software (also known as a 'hard drive management
program') that will usually be provided by the hdd's manufacturer for free.
Installing this software first adds code to the new hard drive at the first
sector that allows the mb's bios to translate the specs of the new hdd so
it's recognized. In the early days of larger hdds the software overlays were
often 'iffy', and it many folks would swear against using them. If the code
became corrupted the hard drive wouldn't start and all data on it was
unreadable.
I've found these programs to be pretty reliable and wouldn't sweat it
these days. The most important thing you can do, whether you use a
controller card or the overlay program is to back up your data on a regular
basis. Running a computer without backing up is like driving a car from the
east to the west coast without a spare tire.

 

[Georg]

A few years back my 10 GB HD on an old pc broke down
and I got a new 80GB Seagate. It was to big, and would
not work until I got a bit of software from Seagate
(via an other computer) that solved the problem.

George

raylopez99 skrev:

 

[Georg]

Jan Alter skrev:

Or you can use overlay software (also known as a 'hard drive management
program') that will usually be provided by the hdd's manufacturer for free.
Installing this software first adds code to the new hard drive at the first
sector that allows the mb's bios to translate the specs of the new hdd so
it's recognized.

I did that, and it worked well. (se my other post)

 

[Michael Black]

BTW, I earlier recommended that it could be easier to abandon the on-board
IDE (disable it in BIOS) and get another dedicated controller card, such
as the Promise Ultra 100 TX2 (if sticking to IDE.) All of the limitiations
imposed by the onboard BIOS "go away" when you insert the separate
controller. It's just much easier and the performance will be better
(utltra DMA 5). It allows you to buy the disk that is the best value on
the market today, and not say, "I need a disk which is less than 130G,
because my computer won't work with anything else." Also, consider
abandoning IDE. The market has shifted to SATA, and setting that up is
extremely similar. You only need a SATA PCI controller card, instead the
IDE PCI controller card. I have had excellent results with the PCI
cards which use a Silicon Image 3112 chipset. YMMV.

But once you start buying, you have to reconsider the original computer.

Like I said, I am now seeing, here in Canada, computers identical to this
1GHz computer selling for forty dollars. You won't get a 160gig hard
drive with it, but you will get a 20gig hard drive that is reasonable,
plus a higher CPU clock. The issue of too big a hard drive is not there,
since it's well beyond the date when that was a problem.

To improve the "old" computer, the poster has to buy a controller card,
then a bigger hard drive. Since he's not likely to buy a really large
drive, he likely is going to get the same effect by buying a more recent
but still cheap computer.

That's even assuming there is a problem with the original computer and
a larger hard drive. I don't recall seeing specifics about that, and
given the poster's long repetitive posting history, he seems clueless
enough that when things don't work he assumes they won't work, rather than
because it needs a simple fix.

Michael

 

[Jean-David Beyer]

BTW, I asked the OP to stick with one thread. To ask followup questions
for specific problems, etc. It appears he thinks a solution will
appear out of thin air by merely "talking about it."

This reminds me of the old saying,

When all is said and done,
more is said than done.