I have just received my Hard Drive replacement from Seagate, which is a SATA 200GB, the one it replaces is a 160GB. When I run win setup., it tells me it only reads 137062, how do I get the PC to read the complete drive. Am I suppised to Flash the BIOS? I am lost / frustrated. This PC is only 6 months old.

Also when my PC was running fine (Hard Drive actually working!) The level of sound from the computer was quite low. Am I supposed to have amplified speakers for this type of sound card?? My son's PC (PIII) sounds louder than this new more powerful one!

Thks for your help.


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Model Name : GA-K8NF-9
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M/B Rev : 1.0
BIOS Ver : 6.00pg
Purchase Dealer : from store
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VGA Brand : ATi Model : Sapphire
CPU Brand : AMD Model : athlon64(939) Speed : 3000+
Operation System:
Win 2000 SP : 4 After installing and running win Update.
Memory Brand : Type : DDR
Memory Size : 1GB Speed : 400
Power Supply : W

In Windows setup, did you partition the drive? If so, did you use 100% of the available space on the drive to make the partition?

Secondly, are you absolutely sure this is a 200GB drive? 160GB drives will show up in the range of 137GB after partitioning and formatting. I think you have a 160GB drive. Hard drive manufacturers don't typically "upgrade" your hard drive when replacing it. Though it has been known to happen.

-mpjesse

mpjesse may be right - it may be a 160GB Drive...

Though, if you're sure it's a 200GB drive, then you simply need to install Windows XP Service Pack 2.

Also ensure that 48-bit (?) addressing is enabled in the BIOS?

Service Pack 2 should cure the problem though. Afterwards, you can either partition the extra space as a new drive, or reformat & create a 200GB partition.

Without SP1 or 2, XP can't see more than about 130GB. After you update you may find you have 60+gb of unformatted space.

It could be what mpjesse suggests too - just throwing out more possibilities.

Mike.

Guys, if you look at his post, he is running Windows 2000 SP4, NOT XP. Its been awhile since I have supported 2000, but i am pretty sure that he will not get support for a drive that large out of 2000. Please let me know if I am wrong.

Second, on the sound issue, you most likely do need amplified speakers, as most sound cards are designed to work with higher quality amplified speakers. You can pick up a decent pair for pretty cheap just about anywhere.

Good catch. I didn't even see W2k...

I think you're right. I have a vague memory of a patch being available, but I don't recall where/how and its been a while...

Mike.

well thks guys, for your input.

To answer a cpl of your replies:

1) Seagate upgraded my 160 for the 200 GB cause of the probs I had, at only 6 mths. I did check the back of the HD it did say 200GB.

2) Yes I do W2K. I did read somewhere, that if I partition the HD (137602) to what I want it to be, for my OS and other s/ware (I was thinking about 90GB) and complete the win install. Then do the update to SP4. then run disk management, to claim the space that 'should' be now available.

I was also told that I should just flash my BIOS. Something I haven't done b4.

there U have it. If U think #2, sounds like a good plan, let me know.

thks again.

That may work, I would also google large size disk support in win2k.

flashing the BIOS is risky business even if you know what you are doing and since the BIOS isnt the one reading the hard drive that probably wont solve the problem...problem is going to be Win2K, i would try for XP before i flashed the BIOS...but that is just my opinion which isnt worth much

I had a problem with my 300 Gb SATA hard drive kind of like this, what i eventually found out was that windows needed additonal drivers that had come with my mother board on a floppy. When installing windows it will ask for additional drivers, thats when you put in the floppy and load the drivers and it should recognize the full formatted hard drive.

Not that I am recommending that he flash his BIOS, as that is not the problem. However, flashing the BIOS isn't nearly as risky as it once was. Many boards today (I am pretty sure his is one of them) have redundant BIOS chips and other features to prevent accidentally frying the BIOS.

Well, I am kind of confused as to what to do. 'Additioinal drivers' don't they come when the O/S has been loaded... when U do an update or something? I am prob missing s/thing.

Sounds like flashing the BIOS is to be a waste of time...

There's a Registry key.

Taken from here

Now, obviously if you've had to install windows onto the drive this isn't much use, but if you're running your OS on a separate disk, or install another one of >130Gb later, this will help. I suspect though that you'll have to live with two partitions, if this is your only system disk :S.. Although something like Partition Magic might be able to resize your OS partition to take up the rest of the disk after the hack, but I've not tried that myself, or even used PM in years now.

I had exactly this problem when I installed W2K SP4 as part of some troubleshooting recently. I had a 250Gb drive split into a 50Gb and a 200Gb partition (Although I was installing windows on a separate 80Gb drive). Before I changed the above registry key, my 2K install couldn't see the 200Gb partition. After I made the change and rebooted, it was fine. This was a disk that I'd previously partitioned in XP which had stuff on.

[EDIT] Fix for stupid forum software treating every as a bloody escape char... grumble grumble..[/EDIT]

There is NO need for the registry hack...

Windows 2000 SP4 supports hard drives over 137Gb. After you install Windows, you will be able to partition the remaining space on the drive. If you want one big 200Gb partition, you will need to slipstream SP4 into your Win2k install disc. If you search around www.google.com for "Windows 2000 SP4 slipstream" there are plenty of websites that will tell you how to do it.

Also, as was previously posted, updating your BIOS will not fix this problem.

Thks for your continued input. Here is an update as of today.

I spoke to SEAGATE supprt, they told me to d/load this diskwizard s/ware. After doing so I ran it on my other tower, the one that is giving me all this problem! It said that there was some other controller, that was present and would not read the drive.

Tech support guy told me to check in BIOS to see what the drive was showing... 200GB. So he told me that it isn't their prob. perhaps I am using the wrong controller drivers Gigabyte m/bd - nVIDIA nForce4-4X.
I F6'd the WIN setup process loaded those drivers that I d/loaded from the Gigabyte site, but after all said an done... it came back and read 131062mb being read!

So after just reading about 'Windows 2000 SP4 slipstream' here. I will research this and give it a shot. Any recommended sites to slipstream on?Any other comments bring em 'on!

thks again