How Can I change to 48Bit LBA ??

hussam_el_din

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Jun 21, 2008
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Hi everybody

I bought a HDD enclosure which got a network connector (LAN Storage)

I installed a 80GB (WD800BB) but I didn't read it even not as need to be formatted

I tried the same other HDD (WD300AB) and the same happened

I returned back to the manual and found that the it support only 48BIT LBA HDD in fat32 format


How can I know of my HDD is 48bit or 24bit ???

what settings I can do in the format and may fit that enclosure ???
 

MrLinux

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Dec 28, 2007
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The only difference 48-LBA will make is the size of drive the PC can access (directly); as it's a network caddy the LBA size will make no difference.

If the caddy isn't seeing the drive it's probably the drive jumpers (providing it's PATA) not being set to Master.
 

Paperdoc

Polypheme
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The original LBA used 28 bits, and that's enough addressing space (with normal HDD organization) to handle up to 127 GB in one volume (that is, in Microsoft's way of defining 1 GB as 1024 x 1024 x 1024 bytes). If your HDD is less than that you do not even need 48-bit LBA. But the new 48-bit way, introduced around year 2000, will handle a HDD volume up into the petabyte region!

For 48-bit LBA to work, you need three things:
(a) the HDD must support 48-bit LBA;
(b) the HDD controller must support it; and,
(c) the Operating system (e.g., Windows) must support it. With Win XP, the original version did not, but Service Pack 1 and later do. With Vista, I'm sure it's there from the start. With Win 2000 it came in a later Service Pack, maybe #4. The OS MUST be updated (if not already) before you can prepare a large HDD that needs 48-bit LBA support.

I am surprised the manual claims it supports 48-bit LBA only in FAT32 format. If it was written a bit early, what it may mean (without saying clearly) is that it does NOT support 48-bit LBA in the older FAT16 format - that is, if you stick to a FAT?? system your only choice will be FAT32. But you should still have the option of going to NTFS on your HDD and using 48-bit LBA that way.

Your post indicates you may have forgotten a very important step. When you first mount a new blank HDD in a system (internal, or external case as you have done) the first step is to PARTITION it. Partitioning establishes how the HDD is divided up into logical drives (one or more, as you choose), which of them (if more than one) is the boot drive, and which file system (FAT32 or NTFS) is used for each logical drive. Only after that is done can you Format each (if more than one) partition. You can't just run FORMAT on a new blank drive, because it does not know all those other pieces of disk organization information.

So, with the new HDD installed in the enclosure, you will need some software tools to get it running. I would hope some came with the enclosure on a CD. The basic thing to start is some way to access a HDD storage device connected to your network, so there should be a driver for that. Maybe you already have that in place - you post indicates you were able to access it in a limited way to find out that it needs to be formatted, etc.

Then there are two steps. The software with the enclosure may help here. Or you often can download for free software tools to set up your HDD from the website of the HDD unit's manufacturer. Or you can use the tools built into Windows XP and Vista in the Disk Management part. To get there in XP, click on Start ... Control Panel ... Administrative Tools ... Computer Management, and choose Disk Mangement from that menu. In the upper right window you'll see all the existing HDD and CD units that Windows already can use. In the lower right window is a scrolling list of these devices, plus any new devices that are not yet prepared for Windows - like your new external drive. A RIGHT-click on it (if it's there) will give you a menu of actions available. You need to do a PARTITION first on it. Be VERY careful you do NOT do this on an existing drive, because this will DESTROY all data on the disk you work on! Anyway, in setting up the partition, I suggest you choose to use all of the HDD as one volume and set it to NTFS file system. Since this is an external drive on the network, do NOT set it to be a bootable drive.

When the Parition is done, go back to this device and right-click again, and now you can FORMAT it. When that is done you may have to reboot your system so Windows can put the new drive into its Registry. Then you should be able to see it in My Computer as a valid drive with no information on it yet, but completely ready for use.

If you cannot find the drive in its external enclosure so that you can Partition and Format it, you might try temporarily mounting it in the computer as an internal drive and perform the setup that way. When it's running OK, shut down and move it out to the enclosure, reboot, and let Windows figure out it just lost the new drive it had, but gained a network resource. I would expect a HDD that is Partitioned and formatted, then mounted in an external enclosure, would be recognized properly.